This photo was taken on a cell phone last week after the guy took his friend to Bass Pro Shop to buy his first bow. The clerk was ‘assisting’ him in zeroing it in, and, after shooting several arrows, making adjustments etc., the clerk accidently handed him an arrow that was too short.

When he drew back, the arrow tip fell down onto his hand and he somehow released it. They rode to the hospital with the bow in his buddy’s hand because it impaled his finger also! They are both archery amateurs (I’m thinking the clerk is also?). I don’t think the guy who got shot ever had held a bow prior, let alone shoot one…OUCH!

So this year my new wife of 9 months decided she would love to experience Archery hunting by my side. I have told her many tales and she was able to see the excitement it brought me and she wanted to experience it first hand.

This year has been a very strange one to say the least. The weather seems to be running a few months ahead and the opening weekend was one of the hottest I’ve ever had.

This year has been a busy one so we couldn’t get the time away like I wanted to head for the back country and really pursue Elk free of any other hunters. So for Labor day weekend we decided to hunt a more local location only an hour and a half away. I had hunted this area the weekend prior and had actually bumped a bull down on the face of this hill we never saw him but he attempted to bugle as he took off from the thick pines.

So this weekend my plan was to drop down into this little pocket and just set up and let them come to me. So my wife and I headed down into the pines found a great spot and set up. This area has a lot of sheep in it and a bunch of herd dogs running around. After we had settled into this spot I heard one of the dogs bark towards the top of the hill and soon after a crashing sound that could only be Elk coming towards us. I rocked up on my knee and sure enough a bunch of cows came through the clearing right in front of me. I hadn’t had a chance to pull out my cow call so I let out my best vocal impression and she stopped 20 yards in front of me and looked my direction. It was at this point that I realized I failed to pull my bow back with all the excitement. So I attempted to pull back but it was too late she saw me and took off. We tried to pursue but they were long gone. I was bummed. I always feel that an archery hunter will get one chance a year to fill his tag and he needs to play things perfectly or he may have just gave up his chance.

We returned to our spot and after 20 min my wife motioned to these trees in front of me. I looked up and this real nice 3 point buck walked out 15 yards in front of us and was walking right to us. All he had to do was go behind a tree in front of him giving me a chance to pull back and he was done for. He went behind the tree and I pulled back and all of a sudden he turned and took off back up the hill. I still have no clue what happened I felt I played that one by the book I had the wind in my favor the tree blocking my movement… Who knows what happened but I didn’t get a shot off. So now I’m really feeling like crap. Two opportunities and not one shot.

I realized that we were only 1 hour into the morning and the activity had been crazy. So I decided that I wasn’t going to sit down that I needed to be ready. It had only been 20 min since the buck came through and I heard movement through the trees. I could see several cows working up the hill above us. I decided to step up on this trail because last time they went right through the clearing above it. Sure enough they started to cut across the top of the clearing the first cow stopped and I could see the tip of her nose in a pine tree 60 yard up the hill so I pulled back. She came trotting into the opening and down towards me. She was about 30-40 yards away and turned broadside to me I put the pin behind the shoulder and released. I watched as my luminock disappeared into her body right behind the shoulder and she took off running up the hill. My wife then watched as the adreniline rushed through my body and I got the shakes real bad. After she realized I was OK we went up to where I hit her.

I was a little shocked there was no blood. About 5 yards up I finally found a drop of blood and then heard what sounded like a cow call followed by a crashing thump. I was pretty sure that was her going down but decided to track the blood to be sure. We could not find any blood and I knew I drilled her. After about 40 yards of tracking my wife was standing at the last spot of blood and I was working up the hill scanning for the next sign when I saw her down in a clump of trees. Time for the happy dance… I had hit her right through the heart and then hit the opposite shoulder and she had broken my arrow in half inside of her. She had ran up hill so her cavity was filling with blood and not bleeding much.

I headed back up to camp and my brother was there and was able to come assist in cleaning her out and then we had to quarter her and pack her out. I was the only one with a meat hauling pack so I put a hind quarter and then the backstraps and tenderloins in while my brother dragged out a front and the other back quarter. My wife turned her coat into a pack and hauled out another front quarter. What an experience after it was all said and done my wife started asking about getting herself a bow. Pretty excited for more hunts to come.

I have dreams that I am going to drive up to my favorite hunting spot one year and it will be just like this. I would love to go check this out someday!

OK I got this in an e-mail, not sure it’s true so check out the photo’s and let me know what you think.  Here’s the story that came with it:

Big Bear shot Saddle Hills Alberta, Sept 20/2010

These two gents were calling elk in the Saddle Hills when this big guy slipped in on

the caller the Shooter spotted the bear 8 yards from the caller and dropped him with 5 shots out of

his 338 Rem Mag. Farmers in the area knew about the Bear but weren’t able to track after it had killed

3 horses, 5 cows, 13 sheep and a pen full of chickens on several different homesteads in the area.

Fish and wildlife had bear traps set up in the area but notice on surveillance video that when ever a

he would enter his hump would hit the top of the culvert trap slowing him enough that the trap door

would wack him on the head before he was all the way in.  Check out the scar tissue on his face..

Bear weighed in just under 1300 pounds and would have stood 11 3/4 feet tall on its hind legs..

Whoever said that deer are helpless?  This story is hilarious!!

Why we shoot deer in the wild (A letter from someone who wants to remain anonymous, who farms, writes well and actually tried this)

I had this idea that I could rope a deer, put it in a stall, feed it up on corn for a couple of weeks, then kill it and eat it.  The first step in this adventure was getting a deer.  I figured that, since they congregate at my cattle feeder and do not seem to have much fear of me when we are there (a bold one will sometimes come right up and sniff at the bags of feed while I am in the back of the truck not 4 feet away), it should not be difficult to rope one, get up to it and toss a bag over its head (to calm it down) then hog tie it and transport it home.

I filled the cattle feeder then hid down at the end with my rope.  The cattle, having seen the roping thing before, stayed well back.  They were not having any of it. After about 20 minutes, my deer showed up – 3 of them.  I picked out a likely looking one, stepped out from the end of the feeder, and threw my rope. The deer just stood there and stared at me.  I wrapped the rope around my waist and twisted the end so I would have a good hold.

The deer still just stood and stared at me, but you could tell it was mildly concerned about the whole rope situation. I took a step towards it, it took a step away. I put a little tension on the rope  .., and then received an education.  The first thing that I learned is that, while a deer may just stand there looking at you funny while you rope it, they are spurred to action when you start pulling on that rope.

That deer EXPLODED.  The second thing I learned is that pound for pound, a deer is a LOT stronger than a cow or a colt.  A cow or a colt in that weight range I could fight down with a rope and with some dignity.  A deer– no Chance.  That thing ran and bucked and twisted and pulled.  There was no controlling it and certainly no getting close to it.  As it jerked me off my feet and started dragging me across the ground, it occurred to me that having a deer on a rope was not nearly as good an idea as I had originally imagined.  The only upside is that they do not have as much stamina as many other animals.

A brief 10 minutes later, it was tired and not nearly as quick to jerk me off my feet and drag me when I managed to get up.  It took me a few minutes to realize this, since I was mostly blinded by the blood flowing out of the big gash in my head.  At that point, I had lost my taste for corn-fed venison.  I just wanted to get that devil creature off the end of that rope.

I figured if I just let it go with the rope hanging around its neck, it would likely die slow and painfully somewhere. At the time, there was no love at all between me and that deer.  At that moment, I hated the thing, and  I would venture a guess that the feeling was mutual.  Despite the gash in my head and the several large knots where I had cleverly arrested the deer’s momentum by bracing my head against various large rocks as it dragged me across the ground, I could still think clearly enough to recognize that there was a small chance that I shared some tiny amount of responsibility for the situation we were in.  I didn’t want the deer to have to suffer a slow death, so I managed to get it lined back up in between my truck and the feeder – a little trap I had set before hand…kind of like a squeeze chute.  I got it to back in there and I started moving up so I could get my rope back.

Did you know that deer bite?

They do!  I never in a million years would have thought that a deer would bite somebody, so I was very surprised when ….. I reached up there to grab that rope and the deer grabbed hold of my wrist.  Now, when a deer bites you, it is not like being bit by a horse where they just bite you and slide off to then let go.  A deer bites you and shakes its head–almost like a pit bull.  They bite HARD and it hurts.

The proper thing to do when a deer bites you is probably to freeze and draw back slowly.  I tried screaming and shaking instead.  My method was ineffective.

It seems like the deer was biting and shaking for several minutes, but it was likely only several seconds.  I, being smarter than a deer (though you may be questioning that claim by now), tricked it.  While I kept it busy tearing the tendons out of my right arm, I reached up with my left hand and pulled that rope loose.

That was when I got my final lesson in deer behavior for the day.

Deer will strike at you with their front feet. They rear right up on their back feet and strike right about head and shoulder level, and their hooves are surprisingly sharp … I learned a long time ago that, when an animal -like a horse – strikes at you with their hooves and you can’t get away easily, the best thing to do is try to make a loud noise and make an aggressive move towards the animal.  This will usually cause them to back down a bit so you can escape.

This was not a horse.  This was a deer, so obviously, such trickery would not work.  In the course of a millisecond, I devised a different strategy.  I screamed like a woman and tried to turn and run.  The reason I had always been told NOT to try to  turn and run from a horse that paws at you is that there is a good chance that it will hit you in the back of the head.  Deer may not be so different from horses after all, besides being twice as strong and 3 times as evil, because the second I turned to run, it hit me right in the back of the head and knocked me down.

Now, when a deer paws at you and knocks you down, it does not immediately leave.  I suspect it does not recognize that the danger has passed.  What they do instead is paw your back and jump up and down on you while you are laying there crying like a little girl and covering your head.

I finally managed to crawl under the truck and the deer went away.  So now I know why when people go deer hunting they bring a rifle with a scope……to sort of even the odds!!

All these events are true so help me God… An  Educated Farme

OK so this is a similar story, just as funny, got to add it.  Read on for more laughs:

Pocket Tazer Stun Gun, a great gift for the wife.

A guy who purchased his lovely wife a pocket Tazer for their anniversary submitted this:

Last weekend I saw something at Larry’s Pistol & Pawn Shop that
sparked my interest.
The occasion was our 15th anniversary and I was looking for a little
something extra for my wife Julie. What I came across was a
100,000-volt, pocket/purse-sized Tazer.

If you think education is difficult, try being stupid!!!!

The World’s Largest Army.  America‘s Hunters?

The state of Wisconsin has gone an entire deer hunting season without someone getting killed. That’s great. There were over 600,000 hunters. Allow me to restate that number. Over the last two months, the eighth largest army in the world – more men under arms than Iran; more than France and Germany combined – deployed to the woods of a single American state to help keep the deer menace at bay. But that pales in comparison to the 750,000 who are in the woods of Pennsylvania this week. Michigan ‘s 700,000 hunters have now returned home. Toss in a quarter million hunters in West Virginia , and it is literally the case that the hunters of those four states alone would comprise the largest army in the world. America will forever be safe from foreign invasion of troops with that kind of home-grown firepower.

Hunting – it’s not just a way to fill the freezer. It’s a matter of national security!

Now you know why the liberal anti-gun group wants to take the guns away.

A friend of mine was out hiking the trail by the equestrian center in Draper. He took this photo:

Now on October 6th this guys daughter was on the same trail with some friends and a mountain lion was growling at them. Freaked them out pretty good. Between the two stories I’d say be careful!! There are definately some cats up in that area and I’d be careful up there!

We need the help of all of our photoshop experts out there to determine if this picture is legit. If it is legit than it is one of the coolest pictures I have ever seen!

Here is the Hunter’s description of the picture as it was forwarded to me:

“This is freaking scary.  As you know I was alone when I downed this elk in ND.  I was using my camera’s timer attached to my shooting stick to give me enough time to get into the picture.  I knew there were a lot of cats in the area but had no idea they would come in this close to people.  He had to be within 10 feet of me and I didn’t even know it.  I about crapped my pants when I looked at the pictures the next morning and saw he was there.”

So I got an e-mail claiming the photo’s were of Big Horn Sheep and taken over in WY, it came from my grandpa’s cousin who lives in WY so I didn’t look into it, thanks to a reader we found the correct story.  These are Ibex Goats and are in Italy.  They are crossing a dam and eating something from the cracks as they do.  I’ve also added some video’s of it.  I’ve always heard Big Horn Sheep are tough to hunt, that they can climb into insane spots and stay high on rocky areas, I have to say the Ibex Goat looks to be a tough hunt too.