Summertime Pictures!

Checking the Camera's!

Hoping for an Otter, but not yet!

Still Hoping!

A Small Buck at the Crossin'!





Placing Trail Camera's on Public Land

     When other hunters learn I place trail camera's on Indiana's heavily hunted public lands there is always one question asked: 

     "Aren't you afraid your cameras will be stolen?"

     "Of course!"  I always reply.  "Anytime I put a trail camera on public land I know I may never see it again."  Then I add:  "But, I have developed a strategy for placing trail cameras on public land that has allowed me to go theft free for the past six years."

     For the past six years I have placed an average of ten cameras on Indiana public land including State Forest Land, Hoosier National Forests, and Wildlife Refuges open to hunting, without a single stolen camera.

     I learned the hard way about placing cameras on public land.  The first year I put them out I had two cameras stolen.  The next year I bought locking cables for my cameras thinking this feature would keep them safe.  Then I had two more cameras stolen and I realized even a heavy lock and cable wasn't going to be enough to keep my cameras safe.  When those camera were stolen I decided I could stop using trail cameras all together or I could change the way I placed my cameras.
    
     Fortunately, I chose to carefully evaluate the way I placed my cameras and made a few simple adjustments -- I have not lost a single camera since.  Making these simple adjustments to the way I place my cameras  -- techniques any hunter can use -- has allowed me to become virtually worry free about trail camera theft.

     Here is my strategy for placing trail cameras on Indiana's public lands:

1. Use Cheap 35 mm Cameras:  I know these cameras are the dinosaurs of trail cameras these days, but here is my case for them:

A.  Unless you are made of money and can afford to lose hundreds of dollars, don't put an expensive camera on public land in Indiana.  There is always the chance a thief will find your camera.

B.  When loaded with 800 speed film these cameras take great pictures.  Somewhere along the line I have heard it takes a sixteen mega pixel digital image to match the image quality of film.  I don't know if it's true or not, but, I know five and six mega pixel images don't match the quality of images from my film cameras.  Buy film in bulk online for $.50 a roll or on sale at a Walgreens.  Even at $2.00 -- $3.00 per roll from Walgreens that's a lot of burnt film in a $20.00 -- $40.00 camera when compared to an expensive digital.

C.  Don't pay to develop the film.  Go to Sam's Club and pay $2.50 to have the film transferred to a disc and then download the images onto your computer.

D.  These cameras fit the old adage of KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid.)  There are only a few things that can go wrong with them when compared to all the features of the modern digitals.  I use cameras fifteen years old and sometimes leave them out all season through rain, sleet, snow, and freezing temperatures.  They are like an old Timex watch.  They take a lickin' and still keep on tickin'.  I still get great pictures with them.  I just don't know how reliable these modern cameras are going to be in a few years with all their wonderful features.

E.  Take the hit and buy rechargeable batteries.  Trust me on this one!

F.  These cameras are relatively small, even when compared to the compact digitals and thus are harder for a thief to spot.

2. Camera Placement:  The greater the distance from the road the safer your camera will be.  (This is where you need to hunt anyway.)

A.  If you have to climb a steep hill, or trudge through water and sucking mud, or battle thorny briers and whipping saplings to place your camera -- not many hunters are going to follow.  (Warning:  If you place a camera by a creek or river or in an area prone to flooding, keep an eye on the weather.)  If heavy rains are in the forecast get your camera out.  Trust me on this one!

B.  Hang cameras in thick cover -- the thicker the cover the harder your camera will be to see.  Just make sure you are absolutely sure you know where your camera is.  Trust me on this one!
A small clearing on a well used deer trail in a dense thicket is a perfect spot to hang a camera.  Likewise, a perennial rub or scrape in the same terrain is a diamond in the rough.

C.  Place cameras away from the rising sun and position the motion sensor somewhere between a parallel and a perpendicular to the area you want to cover, but more close to a parallel.  Bright sunlight triggers the sensor and these cameras react like cold molasses.  The parallel position helps to compensate for the slow trigger speed. 

3. Make the Camera Invisible:  Okay that's impossible, but you can make it hard to see, and if it can't be seen it can't be stolen!

A.  Replace wide straps with parachute cord or thin nylon shoe strings.  Replacing the manufactures straps with parachute cord not only reduces visibility, but also creates unlimited potential for hanging cameras.  Carry plenty of cord because when it comes to hanging a trail camera you are limited only by your imagination -- big trees, little trees, brush, rocks, logs -- with a little ingenuity just about anything you find in nature can have a trail camera tied to it.

B.  Cover your camera in camouflage duct tape to match the surroundings.  Utilize the tree-bark and leafy patterns available.

C.  Make the camera visible from only one angle.  Use natural camouflage, but don't go overboard.  Don't pile brush up on the side to hide the camera and make things look unnatural.  Use just enough to break up the boxy outline of the camera box.

     Over the years I have found almost as much enjoyment of placing trail cameras as actually hunting.  They simply give me another excuse to be in the woods.  I don't use them for scouting or trying to pattern a buck -- I simply don't have time for that.  They do, however, give me greater insight into the habits of whitetail deer and they give me a glimpse of animal behavior I might not otherwise see.  Simply put my trail cameras give me an added enjoyment in wildlife observation.

     Without a doubt though my cameras show me that even on highly pressured pieces of Indiana's public land there are big bucks that would make any hunters heart skip a beat.

The Waiting Game Begins!

September, the longest month of the year for the Hoosier Bow Hunter, has finally arrived.  The October opening is just around the bend and the anticipation is beginning to boil.  I admit I haven't picked up my bow since January, but you can bet I will find the time this weekend between the remnant rainstorms of Hurricane Isaac to do some much needed target practice.

 

 

I have hardly taken the time to wet a line and suddenly I realize it's time to change gears.  Some morning soon will find me toting my old remington 870 over my shoulder chasing a few bushytails in one of my old haunts to check on the acorn mast.  I know not all has been lost with the drought -- my deck is covered with acorn cuttings from the big chestnut oak in my yard, so I suspect there are going to be some hotspots on some of the oak flats in the Hoosier National.



 

Trail camera's will begin to go out and hopefully soon enough to catch some of the bucks losing their velvet.  Those bloody racks with hanging velvet make for some interesting pictures.

 





 

I have seen a lot of deer this year while driving through parts of the Hoosier National and some of the areas that were slammed by blue tongue disease several years ago are making a comeback in a big way.  I've seen more deer in those areas this year than the last four years combined.  Quite a few of the deer have been bucks and some of them were true trophy's by my standards.





 

These are some of the photo's from late season last year so hopes are high that these bucks made it through the mild winter and heat stressed summer.

 



 

Only time will tell, but I'm hoping it will be a good year for the hunters of Indiana Whitetail News!

A Hunter in the Making!

Sometimes I find it hard to believe that today's youth can become passionate about hunting and fishing, or trapping.  Pay attention to any budding teenager equipped with electronic gear and you will notice that their available time is spent talking through the push of buttons.  In a sense it's as if they feel alive because they are electronically connected.

That's why, several weeks ago, Chand's call came as such a surprise.  July had just begun and Opening Day was three months away.  Thoughts of deer season were gnawing away in the back of my mind like a fox squirrel cutting on a hickory nut, but were not yet devouring my thinking like a starving coyote on a fresh gut pile.  (This typically happens when September rolls around.)

Chand's voice held an anticipating excitement that I had forgot existed.  In his hands he clutched his first hunting license, and as he informed me of all the legal requirements he was bound by and the game and limits he was allowed to take, my mind drifted back to August 15, 1984 and I was once again in the squirrel woods with my dad and brother for the first time.

Chand talked of the coming deer season with unmatched enthusiasm, and recalled events of past seasons with a clearness and clarity that left little doubt how important those few days in October and November are to him.

Then and there I decided this deer season would be dedicated to Chand.  For years now he has been a part of deer camp.  Patiently he has waited his turn, quietly listening to the stories -- his time in the woods limited to a noon-day squirrel hunt and the occasional deer drag.  But for Chand, this year is going to be different.

Battleship Rock

With the heat wave and drought punishing Southern Indiana it may be hard to think about deer season.  But, if you look close there are signs of autumns approach.  For starters, the summer solstice has come and gone and the evening sun will be disappearing sooner and sooner.  Several weeks ago I noticed some of the lower leaves of the buckeye trees losing their color.  In my region these trees are always the first to leaf out in the springtime and the first to lose their leaves, too.  Of course now with this heat they are just wilting away and dying.  Yesterday, I saw squirrel cuttings underneath a walnut tree, though the nuts are not yet ripe.  Tuesday night will be the buck moon.  October is slowly rolling in.

I don't know how this drought is going to affect the deer.  Several years ago when this happened an EHD outbreak decimated some of the areas I hunt (including the area where these pictures were taken,) and those places have not even recovered -- let's hope the disease doesn't hit them this year, too.

The late spring frost hit my area three times this year and the white oak mast and persimmon crop were hit hard.  To make this even worse it seems this heat is cooking some of the nuts on the trees.  Yesterday I walked under a pignut hickory tree.  Scattered on the ground below it were dried, brown, heat schorched nuts.

These pictures were taken at an area I call Battleship Rock.  Every year I scout this piece of Hoosier National during the pre-season and post-season, though I have never gone in with a bow or gun. Some years there is big buck sign, some years there isn't. The flat is woodland edge habitat. There is a good stand of matures oaks on the level, but when the hill begins to climb a dense pine thicket takes over. A well used deer trail runs the edge between the pines and oaks. Every year there are scattered scrapes and rubs along its' length.

The shelf these deer are walking drops off into a steep ravine that even a noisy machine can't climb.  For me the place fullfills all the requirements for most places I hunt on public land: it's a tough climb in and in the event of a sucessful hunt -- it's a tough drag out.  As a matter of fact this may be one of those places that can really test the bonds of a hunting camp.Who knows, maybe I will never hunt this place, the years are beginning to add up, and this spot might be a young mans hunt.

But, just in case I feel a little froggy this autumn, the steep ravine offers a well concealed approach and there are plenty of tall, straight trees along the shelf for my old, trusty, loggy bayou climber.  

It All Begins Again!

When the season of great anticipation began, with its hopes of possibility that the big buck from from the year before was still out there sauntering through my hunting grounds,

and an early autumn picture showed indeed he still was, only now much bigger, with an immense thick chest and blocked head with graying muzzle,

and I knew this aging buck living on public land was a cagey, crafty old fellow, because for many seasons he had figured out what it took to survive on pressured land, and I spent the season wondering where he was hiding, trying in earnest to find him, sacrificing time and money to be where I thought he might be, calling in sick to work, jeopardizing job and relationship,

sitting on stand for long hours waiting for that one chance, listening to the echoing booms of the hunter over on the next ridge and the defiant report in return from the hunter across the big woods, wondering if somewhere the monarch had fallen, hoping against all odds he had somehow made it through.  And the fleeting months passed without one chance sighting of him, then on a late January day on my winter trapline a scrape popped up where one wasn't the day before, then another, and a trail camera went out and I hoped that just maybe it was him,

and when the picture came in it wasn't the best, but by all accounts it could be, and after all this was said and done it's then I realized -- it all begins again.

Hunting Season is over -- Time for a Trapline!

Unless you are lucky enough to have hunting grounds in the states urban zones the deer season is now over.  And if you are one of those lucky hunters the season is open until the end of January.



I ended the year with a hunt on the last day of the season.  Despite the gusting winds (sometimes over thirty miles per hour) I saw deer.  I hunkered down in a patch of briers watching over a river bottom trail.  As I carelessly ate a granola bar a doe walked up on me offering a clear shot at fifteen yards, unfortunately my bow was on the ground in front of me, and she didn't stick around long enough for me to pick it up.  I saw five other does that day, but they stayed just out of range.

When these pictures were taken most deer hunters had either tagged out or given up on the season.  But, it's pictures like these that give me that little bit of encouragement to keep hunting, and shows me bucks are still exhibiting rut like behavior late into the season.

For the past week I have ran a small trapline covering parts of the Hoosier National Forest.  Believe it or not the secondary rut is still in swing, or at least there are bucks still trying to find receptive does.  Monday, January 09, and again on Wednesday, January 11, I found freshly opened scrapes.

This is a great time to be in the field scouting for next year, too.  With all the vegetation gone the woods are an open book just waiting to be read.  All the sign from this fall is there to decipher -- rub lines, scrape lines, bedding areas, trails -- are all just waiting to be found.  Now is a perfect time to learn more about your hunting area or a new area you would like to hunt next year without worrying about pressuring deer on your hunting grounds.

Some bucks will have begun to drop their antlers, too, though I suppose prime shed hunting is still months away.  Several years ago, in late December, my brother walked my trapline with me.  He watched me walk right past two sheds from a big ten-pointer and then he casually strolled over and picked them up.  They are now his rattling antlers.

This week I have also picked up several cameras I put out after the end of muzzleloader season, so I am anxious to have the film developed to see what may be roaming my hunting grounds next year.

Pictures are still coming in of the bucks in these pictures.  Somebody is going to have a long wait until October rolls around again.