Rugged Camp 2012

Rugged Camp 2010

For the past few years I've been putting together an event with a small group of guys from my church called Rugged Camp. The idea is a weekend of primitive camping, hunting, and learning survival skills; It pretty much came from watching way too many Man vs. Wild episodes. Last year we went to Myakka State Forest during their archery hog management hunt in November. We split up into two man teams and had a list of survival accomplishments with different points for each one. The team with the most points at the end of the weekend won the title of top woodsmen; kind of like a survival scavenger hunt. We were so busy trying to check accomplishments off the list that it sort of took the fun out of it, "Fire with sticks, check. Eat a frog, check. Shoot a hog with a bow..." Well nobody checked that one off.

This year I had a different plan. Due to my son being born in November I changed the venue to a February small game hunt at Citrus WMA. We had a good group of guys signed up to camp Fri - Sun the last weekend of small game season at Citrus. Instead of making it a competition, I put together a schedule of events and planned to teach different survival skills over the course of three days: hydration skills, primitive fire making, small game cleaning, and other stuff every guy should know. But plans tend to change due to unforeseeable events. Tragically, a very young woman whom most of us knew was killed in an accidental shooting the week before and her memorial service was scheduled for the Saturday right in the middle of the camp. I shortened the camp to Saturday afternoon through Sunday and a few of the guys decided to cancel. After the memorial service four of us with heavy hearts got in our vehicles and headed north to Citrus in our dress clothes. My brother Jacob and his son Noah would meet up with us later in the evening.

We arrived about 3 p.m. and quickly changed into our hunting apparel. Being that we only had a day and a half and a smaller group of guys, we threw the agenda out the window and decided to just play it by ear. The one accomplishment that I did plan to do was not to bring any food with me but only eat what I could find in the woods. Shotguns in hand, except Carlos who had a slingshot, we headed down the trail towards a big pond. When we arrived at the edge of the pond we split up and I headed towards my climber that I had left up over some big hog wallows. Before I got to my stand I decided to get some dinner insurance; so I sat down for a little bit and shot two squirrels. After cleaning, bagging them up, and stuffing them in my backpack I made my way to the stand. When I got to the pond I found some young cattail reeds sprouting up. I pulled up a couple and added the tender part of their stalks to my dinner bag. They taste kind of like celery and work good in wild game stews when thinly sliced up. I had something to work with for dinner but a nice little 40lb hog would be a lot better than two squirrels and some cattails.

I climbed my stand and began to settle into the peaceful evening overlooking the pond when my older brother and his son started waging World War III on squirrels about 100 yards to my right, their 12 gauge and 22 mag. were making a great rhythmic beat. Then my brother Jonny started in on the squirrels 100 yards to my left. My expectations weren't too high of a hog coming from either direction so I began to accept the situation: Squirrel, it's what's for dinner. After dark we met up and tried to bop some frogs with sticks but missed the only one we saw. So with a good batch of squirrels we headed for camp.

I decided to do squirrel two ways: one stewed with cattails and the other skewered over an open flame. I did bring a little camp spice jar I picked up in the camping aisle of Wal-Mart. So after putting every spice it had on my two squirrels, I began cooking them. The first one I quartered up and put in my little camp frying pan with sliced cattails. Putting the top on the pan I left it to simmer on the grille. The second one I skewered with palmetto stalks, and after putting a couple garlic cloves given to me by Carlos in its cavity, I tied it all together with palmetto fronds. It ended up looking like a demonic little squirrel crucifix of some sort. I was just hoping it tasted better than it looked. I propped it up over the camp fire to simmer and attended to my stew on the grille. When all of our cooking was done we gathered around the picnic table, thanked the Lord and dug in. I ate the stew first and it tasted okay at best. The cattail was actually pretty good and the spices helped mask the rodent taste that squirrels can have when not slow cooked. I was surprised when I got to the skewered squirrel. It had a nice spicy smoky crust and the meat was white and not too tough. It was definitely the better course of the night. After joking around the campfire we spread our sleeping bags out on the ground and attempted to sleep.

Carlos was the first one out as a low steady roar came from his sleeping bag. Then went my brother Jacob. His snore has evolved a lot since we shared a room as boys. It sounded like a mix between a kazoo and a weed whacker but it shifted gears like a race car. He must have won the race sometime in the wee hours of the morning because he finally stopped and I fell asleep for a little bit before I was awakened by the howling of coyotes. Soon 6 a.m. came and my iPhone sounded the alarm to get up and at em'. My back ached and my head was pounding. I felt like just lying in my sleeping bag all morning. But I forced my body to get up and we began preparing to go out and hunt down breakfast, that is until we checked the weather radar on our phones. How did we survive before smart phones? There was a big rain front coming right at us from the coast. I'm rugged and all but I don't like sitting in a rainstorm in the woods all morning so I asked who wanted to go into town for breakfast. The decision was unanimous. We piled into our trucks and drove 25 minutes to Cracker Barrel. Uncle Hershel's Favorite and three coffees later I felt like a new man; I was once again ready to tackle the wild. We headed back to Citrus and when we arrived at the parking lot it was still pouring rain and there was an empty truck there. Soon two drenched old guys with cowboy hats and 22's came trudging up the trail. I rolled down the window just long enough  to ask them if they had fun. Apparently they were still living in the good old days and didn't have smart phones with weather radar.

Finally late in the morning the weather broke and we headed once again down towards the pond. On the way there we took a couple detours so I could grab two trail cameras that I had left in the woods the week before. The first one had a couple does and the second one had some does and two big hogs. Finally we made it to the pond and began walking through the tall marshy reeds and sawgrass hoping to spook up a rabbit, a snipe or maybe even a hog. My brother Jonny did get one rabbit and I saw a couple snipe that flew too low to safely take a shot without risking a Dick Cheney. With one rabbit we headed towards a peninsula on the pond to figure out lunch. It was still raining off and on and so making a fire would be difficult especially since we forgot the lighter at the truck. This was our moment to rise to the occasion and make rugged camp history; our moment to make Dave and Cody look like a couple of wusies; to make Bear Grylls look like a British man, oh wait, he is. I found a dead maple tree and cut a fire board and spindle. Then I found a big clump of fine roots hanging from a willow tree. In the middle of the clump the fibers were somewhat dryer than those on the outside so I made a tinder nest to hopefully kindle an ember into a flame with. After preparing and notching the fire board we used the bow and spindle technique to make an ember which we placed into the nest of willow roots. We began blowing into it profusely as billows of smoke choked us, but it was just too moist to burst into flame. We had to act quick or we would be left with rabbit sushi for lunch. I had a light bulb moment and quickly pulled a shotgun shell out of my backpack. Using my Buck Knife I carfully cut open the plastic around the shell and poured the gun powder onto the ember. "Poof!" We had a flame, for a couple seconds. Three shotgun shells of gunpowder later we had a small fire going in the light drizzle and a rabbit roasting on a stick. By this time three of the guys had to head home and so it was just myself, Jonny and Ryan Jones left. We enjoyed the rabbit, which was much tastier than the squirrels and then once again checked the weather radar. Another round of heavy rain was coming our way so we made the decision to officially end Rugged Camp 2012.

By the time we hit the trail the rain had arrived. I still had to walk around to the other side of the pond and retrieve my climber tree stand before starting back to the parking area. A couple miles later we arrived back to my 4Runner soaking wet and sore. We still had our dress clothes from the memorial service in the car and being that they were the only dry clothes we had left, we changed into them and hit the road about 5 p.m. We went through the Wendy's drive-thru and got some burgers and frosties which didn't do nearly for us what Cracker Barrel did, I think the squirrels were better than the burgers. Then we hit the highway. Along the road we saw a few deer and a big sow rooting up an orange grove with a bunch of piglets, more than we saw in a day and a half of being in the woods. All in all Rugged Camp was alright this year. My highlights were eating what we could get, Cracker Barrel, and lighting a fire in the rain without any conventional fire starting device. Was this the last Rugged Camp? I don't think so. Lord willing, next Rugged Camp will be coming up this September. Jumper Creek WMA during archery season, the campsite accessible only by boat! In my mind, that's an adventure worth looking forward to!               

Flats Fishin' the Front

I've loved fishing since before I can remember. I guess I started fishing when I was a little baby and there has never been a time in my life that I have taken a break from it. I can thank my Grandpa for my fishing heritage. He lived on the water in Treasure Island, Fl and fished every day. He taught me how to fish. I can't tell you how many times he untangled bird's nests from my reel. But because of his patience, his love for me, and the time he invested in my life; I am much more blessed for it. He's 93 years old now and hasn't been able to fish in years. When I have a good offshore trip, I love to send a bag of fresh snapper his way; my way of hitting him back for all the hours he invested in teaching me to fish.

Now I have little boys of my own and they love to fish as well. Sometimes I chuckle when I'm on the other side of tangles and getting hooked when they cast. Just when I start to lose my patience, I think of the patience my Grandpa would show me when I was a youngster. One of the greatest things that has come from my boy's love to fish is their idea for a Christmas present this year. They wanted a boat. I thought it was a good idea and so did my wife, so after keeping my eyes open on Craig's List for a bit we picked up a little J16 Carolina Skiff, just for the kids mind you. It's a great little boat for cruising around the bay and polling in the shallows. I've taken the boys out a handful of times. Great times of untangling lines, putting them on the lady fish and watching my 4 year old feed the bait to a cormorant he named "My Buddy". It wasn't until last week that I got to really break it in and catch some fish. A cold front was on its way and it was a warm, calm and rainy afternoon. I was sitting in my office watching the dark cloud lines push through, bringing a steady drizzle, when it hit me. I knew that the fish were biting and I wanted to be catching them. I had finished the pressing needs for the day and there was no need to open the skatepark since it was raining, so I took off a little early in the afternoon and headed home to grab the boat.

Front clouds moving over the bay

I felt like I was a on a NASCAR pit crew as I hitched the trailer to the ball in record speed. In a matter of minutes I was at the Jungle Prada boat ramp. I quickly backed the boat into the water and went to push it off the trailer, oops, I forgot to put the plugs in! Back out of the water it came to drain. Plugs in this time, I was off! I headed towards Bay Pines in the steady drizzle as I admired the fact that dark front clouds were sweeping across the bay and yet it was flat calm, the best part was that I had Boca Ciega Bay all to myself. First stop, I drifted a grass flat on the edge of a deep channel. The trout were hammering my small gold jig and after weeding through a bunch of little guys, I had two nice eaters in the cooler.

Next I cruised over to a mangrove Island that has a good oyster bar around it with nice holes and a couple of old sunken boats lining its edge. Putting the motor up, I began push poling very slowly and casting the same small gold jig along the edge of the oyster bar tangled with mangrove roots. Right away I connected and felt the strong steady pull of a redfish. With a smile on my face, I worked in my first redfish of the year, a pretty little 16 incher. After snapping a picture while sheltering my iphone from the rain, I slipped her back in the water and watched her cruise away. I continued to push my way around the island and came to a deep hole with an abandoned flats boat sunken in the middle of it. On the second cast I got slammed by a redfish that had a little more fight than the first one. After a fun little battle I swung a beautiful 20 inch redfish into the boat, perfect size for the frying pan. I decided to turn around and take a cast out into the grass flat surrounding the oyster bar and caught a big fat gator trout that joined two other trout and a redfish in the cooler. I can fish for sport all day long if I have to, but I love eating fish and my family of six does too, so if I can keep a limit, I'm going to. I decided to leave the redfish and try to catch a fourth keeper trout before heading home.

I thought it would be as easy as stopping where I caught the first two trout, but after 20 minutes of catching little guys I decided to try a flat I used to fish a lot as a kid in South Pasadena. As I arrived it brought back memories of my first inshore slam when I was about 10 years old. My mom dropped me off to wade fish and when she picked me up I had a stringer full of trout, a redfish, a big flounder and a 32" snook. As my mind came back to present time I began casting at the deeper edge of the flat and caught a couple little trout. As I retrieved my jig, I was about to pull it out of the water when a big trout came up behind it. I let the jig dangle next to the boat and through the clear water I watched the trout inhale it. I gave it a good pull and yanked the jig right out of its mouth. After a few drifts with no further luck I push pulled my way along the mangroves to the mouth of a small lagoon. On the first cast I caught another nice redfish who was very lucky I already had one in the cooler. Deciding that I wasn't going to get that fourth trout in the cooler, I pushed back into deeper water and motored toward the boat ramp. The sun was setting behind the overcast clouds, the rain was still steadily coming down and I was more than satisfied with the way a rainy afternoon looking out my office window turned out. Spring time seems to be coming early this year and already the February fishing is starting to feel like March madness. Sure there may still be a couple more cold fronts coming this year but if you can get out in front of them the fishing will be hot.

Creek Fishin'

Joe's Creek, the starting point of nearly every one of my childhood adventures. Today, kids have the internet, social sites, cell phones and video games to keep them entertained; I had Joe's Creek. The possibilities of what I could do during a day at the creek seemed endless: Fishing, hunting with slingshots and BB guns, snake catching, fort building, manhunt, rock fights, treasure digging, rafting on big sheets of Styrofoam we would get from the old concrete factory up the creek, and the list could go on and on for years. Me and Joe's Creek have a lot of fond memories together. My mom always warned me that I was going to get an amoeba up my ear and in my brain from spending so much time in that dirty water.

Somehow I eluded that amoeba and reached adulthood. I've had to trade in daylong adventures at Joe's Creek for  having a job. But me and Joe's Creek still keep in touch. I own a house about a block away from old Joe and my parents still live in the same house where I grew up; their property backs right up to Joe's Creek. These days my brothers and I keep our archery targets at my parent's house and get together regularly to shoot bows by the creek. While we shoot bows our kids go down and carry on our tradition of Joe's Creek adventures. I often take my two oldest boys bass fishing there and it's not uncommon for them to catch a dozen bass in an hour or two of fishing.

Today, after working this morning, I was fixing my boat trailer lights and got the urge to wet a line. A cold front just pushed through yesterday leaving strong north winds, not the best conditions for taking the boat out fishing, so I decided to give Joe's Creek a visit for old times sake. When the water in Boca Ciega Bay gets cold, the snook will push up into Joe's Creek making the possibilities interesting. Bass, snook, redfish, sheepshead and even baby tarpon will venture up into the creek this time of year.

I parked near the 66th Street bridge and started walking the creek line throwing a small gold Zoom jig. I saw a handful of big snook lazily swimming around and laughing at my lure. I walked all the way to the 54th Ave. bridge with only two small strikes to show for my multitude of casts. As I made my way back I switched to a small lime green Mirror Lure 17MR and connected with a little snook that thought he was a ladyfish. He was out of the water more than he was in it as I reeled him in. A couple casts later I connected with another little baby snook. Its nice to see that they're coming back after the cold winters a couple years ago took quite a toll on em'. Under the 71st Street bridge I saw a big snook whack a school of finger mullet so I switched to my bigger 25MR Mirror Lure hoping to blend in with the schools of finger mullet. No such luck.

My wife called and reminded me that I was a grown-up now and had to get home. I cast a few times at the same group of big snook that laughed at my jig earlier and they laughed at my Mirror Lure as well. When I was almost back to the 66th Street bridge, where I parked my car, I decided to take a few more casts at the last hole where a little side ditch empties into Joe's Creek. I switched back to the little 17MR lure and right away got smacked! I reeled in a nice fat Joe's Creek bass. A few more casts and I reeled in her twin sister. Two snook and two bass, not bad for a little afternoon fishing at my favorite childhood tromping grounds. I'm thinking about going back for more soon. Looks like me and Joe's Creek still have some memories to make.

Postseason Scouting

It's a really lame feeling to walk into an area you've never been, climb a tree and hope to randomly hit the jackpot of stand set-ups. Yeah, I've done it once or twice in my early days of hunting Florida's WMA's; but if I am given any sort of opportunity, I'm going to do a lot of scouting before I decide on a stand set-up. When I think of scouting Florida Public Land, memories of wading through miles of swamps in 95 degree August heat come to mind. Cotton mouths, alligators, copper heads and lots of mosquitoes. A few years ago I encountered all of these in one horrible trek trying to scout Richloam Baird Unit in August. Preseason scouting can be really tough in Florida. Many times, areas that are banging come fall are covered in water during the summer. By the time you find a good spot, you've thoroughly drenched it in your sweat. I still do some preseason scouting, but the past couple years I have found a way to scout the areas I hunt in a way that is much more enjoyable and productive.  I'm talking about postseason scouting.

Deer season has ended and I'm never ready for it. The weather is cool, the brush is thin and the woods are littered with rubs and scrapes. This is the perfect time to tromp through the deer woods and find new areas to set-up for next season. Don't worry about leaving your scent, it will be long gone come next fall. This is also a good time to set up trail cams on public land and see what bucks survived the season. There aren't a lot of other hunters scouting around so the threat of having your cameras stolen is minimal. At my request, my brother brought my two trail cameras back from my lease in GA and I set them up at a WMA I've been hunting this year. I left them for a week and when I checked them this morning I was presently surprised to find 12 pictures on the first and 87 pictures on the second. The very first picture I checked was a tall eight point buck! I'm ready for next fall!

Another added plus of postseason scouting is that many WMA's have a small game season this time of year. While scouting I get to carry around my Pardner Pump 12 gauge with a pocket full of assorted shells and blast squirrels, rabbit, snipe, hog and a whole list of other critters that are legal to harvest at most WMA's this time of year. This morning I found a stand of small pine trees that were rubbed nearly waist high by some big boar; there's nothing small about some of the game you can chase during small game season.

If you have little guys who are interested in hunting, this is a great time to take them out into the woods. They don't have to sit in a stand or a blind and get the dreaded whisper yell for not having patience. They can release their wiggles and giggles, learn gun safety and practice their marksmanship on those furry tailed critters that jump from branch to branch. My boys love eatin' those rodent-tasting things too! Sometimes during small game season I'll take my whole family, wife and baby included, for a hike/squirrel hunt. Whatever your excuse for getting into the huntin' woods, it will only increase your knowledge of the land and the game you are most excited about chasing.

Yeah, deer season is over in most parts of the state, but there are still a lot of opportunities to get into the woods, chase other game and increase your scouting knowledge before the long, hot days of summer. Get out there, enjoy the best weather Florida has to offer and be safe.

Offshore Spring Fishing In Winter

"I probably should pass this time." was my first response to Danny's asking me to go offshore fishing on a Friday morning in early January. I'd been working a ton of hours and hadn't seen my family much, plus my bank account was suffering as it tends to do between Christmas and tax returns. But then I thought about my response for about two seconds and recanted, "You know what, I'll go ahead and do it, let me just check with my wife real quick."

Danny added to the incentive by letting me know I would just have to catch the bait and he would cover gas. After getting the go ahead from Rebekah, I received a text from Danny, "We're going with Captain Glenn to the spring." Oh boy, did I make the right decision! I had the pleasure of going with this local charter captain who is a friend of Danny's before and we absolutely slayed the snapper last time.

The next morning I met Glenn and Danny at the dock at 5:30 a.m. and we headed to the lights under the Bayway bridge to catch bait. It was a dead calm, cold morning. I put some camo rain pants over my jeans and sported my rubber hunting boots. Nothing worse than running 50 miles offshore soaking wet in the middle of winter. As we pulled up to the bridge I cast my brand new 10' cracker bait net and spread it wide open on the edge of the shadow under the bridge. First cast and I pulled in a net full of nice whitebait and thread fins, snapper candy. I continued to cast the net catching only about a half-dozen at a time until it was time to pick up Dustin at the dock and head out.

I took off my rain pants and boots, changed my jacket and patted myself on the back for having the foresight to keep myself dry for a long day of fishing in cold weather. We gassed up, nearly forgot the ice and headed offshore. We decided to stop at a shipping channel to catch some bigger bait for the free-line. As Glenn was pulling up a couple at a time with the Sabiki, I noticed a big school of true goggle eyes coming right to the surface and decided to try a toss with the net. This is usually a vain effort in 40 feet of water but sometimes it pays off to try. This time it payed off with about 50 goggle eyes in the bait well!

after enjoying a 50 mile run at 40 mph in the Calcutta, we arrived at the spring and we're greeted by schools of tuna hitting the surface. We started by slow trolling some goggle eyes and caught a small bonita. Then on the second try I connected with a nice black fin tuna. I've been wanting to catch one of these for years and had finally succeeded!

It was time to anchor up! We found the spring and threw the marker. The water was clear and blue and the amber jack came up to investigate the boat. They were everywhere! All in the 40 inch range and hungry. They were hitting the marker jug! I really wished I had a bowfishing set-up because they we're putting their backs out of the water and sliding up against the boat. I reached out and pet one. As soon as a goggle eye hit the water it was mayhem! We caught a few nice ones right off the bat and then Danny who had managed to get a snapper rig past the A.J's and to the bottom connected with a monster! About 30 minutes later we we're looking at an 80 pound A. J. landed on 25 lb test leader and a number 2 hook! We had to cut about a foot and a half off his tail to fit him in the cooler!


We were limited out on A.J.'s and I continued to try to connect with another tuna but was spoiled by A.J.'s every time. I must have caught a dozen of em'. My arms were cramped and it wasn't even Noon yet. I tried to muscle one up to the boat too quickly, and underestimating my brute strength, snapped my Redbone heavy spinner rod in two. Bummer.

We caught about ten keeper red grouper, one big mango snapper and a bunch of nice red snapper that had to go back into the water till we come back for them in July. I took a nice bean bag nap on the ride in and then got busy at the cleaning table. It was a little tough because the knife kept getting locked in my hands because of my cramped forearms. A.J.'s will do that to ya!

I topped off the day by making tuna sushi-mi for my family and man was it delicious. I cut the filet in inch and a half thick strips, marinated in a ginger sesame sauce, rolled in sesame seeds and quickly seared in a hot pan of sesame oil. After letting them cool I sliced into bite size pieces. They were money with some wasabi and soy sauce!

It's been a couple weeks and my forearms have recovered, as soon as I get a new rod I'll be ready for another invite. I'll throw a net and clean fish as much as anyone wants if it means going on a trip like that.

Venison Free Deer Season

My hunting career started with a bang about 7 years ago. After years of wondering why my older brother Jacob converted from a surfer to a redneck he finally invited me to go deer hunting with him to see what it was all about, and I accepted. My first time in the tree stand I saw a coyote, which I thought was a big grey fox, and two does, both of which I shot with the single shot youth 243 rifle he let me borrow. I was hooked! Shortly after, he gave me his old Matthews bow and took me on my first bow hunt at Tide Swamp WMA. The first morning I shot and recovered a spike. Beginner's luck was truly on my side.

Since my start at pursuing the wild game of the South I have been blessed first with many opportunities to get out of the city and into God's beautiful creation, and second with many successful hunts that ended with meat on my families' table. I enjoy hunting just about everything, but deer season is what really gets my imagination going. In the past I've been blessed with an average of 5 deer a season and for the last three seasons I've managed to harvest a nice buck off one of my two Georgia leases. That was until this season.

I knew this year would be a challenge when my wife and I discovered that she was pregnant with our fourth child which was due in the middle of November! I had managed to conceive my other three kids to be born in  March, May and July, but this time I really got my timing off. "No problem." I thought, "I'll just hit the early season hard before the baby is due."

Adding to my encouragement was the news that hunting over bait was legalized in South Georgia. My brother and I put together some corn feeders and drove up to our leases in July to put up feeders and cameras in anticipation of Archery Season in September. "We're hunting over feeders, we've got it in the bag." Or so we thought.

When the opener finally came we checked our cameras and were not disappointed except for one fact, all the photos were taken during the night. On our smaller lease, held by just my brother Jacob and I, there was a bachelor group of bucks that included a couple of bruisers coming in every evening about an hour after dark.  

I optimistically dismissed the fact that no deer photos were taken during the day and I sat over my feeders. I then moved to the swamps and the hardwoods and the pines. I tried everywhere and didn't see a single deer from the stand during my three archery season trips to GA. But gun season was coming and I would get one last chance to hunt my leases before the baby came. Opening day of general gun I saw a few deer but couldn't make a shot. A cold front came through and started a little pre-rut chasing. From the stand I glimpsed a doe running through some thick brush and could hear something crashing after her. Later as I walked back to my truck I saw a fellow club member, Tommy, heading back on a parallel trail about 100 yards to the left of me. Suddenly I heard something in the woods to my right, as I was bolting a round into my Savage 30-06  two deer busted across the trail right towards Tommy. I got ready as they pinged off Tommy and came back in my direction, first a doe, I put my eye to the scope, then a small six point. We have an eight point rule on this club. That was about the most excitement I had in GA this year. The only thing I shot was a five and a half foot long rattle snake I nearly stepped on walking down a ditch line to a stand I never ended up hunting.

The baby came November 27, a healthy little boy we name Simeon. I stayed home a week to help my wife, and decided it would be a good help to mount my eight point from last season. At least I could see a deer, right? It was my best mount yet, which is not saying much at all, and it has earned a prominent place on the wall of our boys' room. My GA season was done for the year, but I still had a shot of bagging a buck. I had drawn archery, muzzle loader and general gun tags for Citrus WMA in Florida which is only about an hour and a half from my house.

The first morning of hunting there I was greeted at my stand by a pair of blue eyes shining in my headlamp. I sat all morning listening to deer blow at me from downwind. My younger brother sat at another spot I had scouted and missed an eight point from my ground blind. He returned the next morning and claimed  he saw seven bucks but could not get a shot! I returned the next day and sat where he had been and saw nothing. I scouted around and found a small tram that had a good rub line. I returned with my younger brothers and put my climber in an oak tree right along the trail. It was a full moon and a beautiful morning. As the first glimpses of morning light mixed with the moonlight I heard footsteps coming right toward me from across the trail. I stood up to watch a buck cross right under me and started rubbing a tree about 5 yards away from my tree. He then turned and stepped onto the trail right below me! I drew my bow and put my top pin on his back..."Thwack!" He wheeled around and took off down the trail! I texted my brother Jonny that I had just whacked a buck.

I sat in the stand for two and a half more hours before getting down. There was my arrow stuck in the trail. There was dark hair and some blood on the blazers but no blood on the ground. That sick feeling that everyone who bow hunts long enough knows came over me. I called my brothers to help with the search, we couldn't find a speck of blood. We walked zig zags through the woods in the direction he ran to no avail. Nothing. I hunted there a couple more times during archery, hunted muzzle loader and decided to do a little more scouting the day before the first weekend of gun season when I came upon it. I had walked down the same tram I shot him at about 100 yards further than where I had given up the blind search at. To the left I saw an open area with green grass growing in the woods. I walked back to check it out and to my right I saw a rib case and a rack! Now I don't have the equipment in my garage to test the DNA of the hair on my arrow with the carcass I found, but I am pretty darn sure he is my buck. No, I didn't get the satisfaction of following a clean blood trail with a prize of venison at the end, but I did get to send him to the coyote taxidermist for a European mount. A nice wide eight point with dark chocolate antlers. A great Florida public land buck in anyone's book.

I didn't have the pleasure of putting venison in the freezer this year, but I did sent four nice hogs to the great pigsty in the sky and turkey season is coming soon.