It Doesn't Take Much......

Ya know, it doesn't take much to get me a riled up some days......

Mr. Johnson's weekly edition of the Minnesota Outdoor News showed up in our mailbox today. I generally try to avoid posting about controversial subjects on my blog, but I've put colored boxes around the 2 headlines that bugged the shit out of me as I was reading and walking back from the mailbox.
Here's a link for you to click on if you'd like to read both of these articles.

I'm sure I'll get some comments I won't like for posting my opinions here in my blog, but I'm going to do it anyway (because I'm just so bugged by both of these decisions!) In the article about the sandhill crane season, I found this statement particularly interesting:
"They are plentiful and they are doing well," said Dennis Simon, DNR Wildlife Section chief, who will make the pitch to the councils next week. "We just think it's an opportunity that we should take advantage of for a fairly small cost."
Cost to who? The State of Minnesota or the Sandhill Cranes?? Give me a freakin' break!!

If this hunting season passes, Minnesota would become the first state of the northern Mississippi Flyway to allow hunting of these cranes (it's already allowed in every state of the Central Flyway except Nebraska). Maybe if it passes, the DNR should consider tacking on a short, lottery-only season for Tundra Swans too. Everyone know there's a ton of them migrating through the state in the fall, and think of all the extra revenue that would generate -- especially for non-resident permits! Hell, let's just shoot em all!

Farther down in the article Steve Cordts, the waterfowl specialist for the DNR says the following, "It's hard to say how much interest there would be in Minnesota in crane hunting." There are hunters in the state who travel elsewhere to hunt cranes, and he figures the number of hunters who participate might be in the hundreds. In defense of the cranes, Steve Cordts also says, "Cranes wise up pretty quickly to hunting pressure, so if we opened it and there was some interest, I would think they would wise up to it pretty quick." That's a profound statement, don't you think? Does that somehow justify selling bunches of licenses to shoot these cranes? Because after the first day of the season, they will just "wise up" and fly somewhere else? I'm sure that hundreds of years of migratory flight patterns aren't going to change because these birds will now be getting shot at. If that were the case, there would be no cranes to hunt in the Central Flyway either.

Well, there, I've gotten that rant out of my system for today...... I don't think I'm even going to delve into the wolf de-listing issue, I'm sure my blood pressure is already sky high. I'm just going to sit back and see where this post goes in the blogosphere and see what types of comments it generates.

St. Patrick's Day, 2010

We both had a day off work today and once the fog cleared late in the morning, Mr. Johnson decided it would be a good day for us to take down the 3 remaining deer stands still up from last fall. It turned out to be a really nice afternoon for spending an enjoyable couple of hours in the woods. Taking down the tree stands is a job that Mr. Johnson could certainly do by himself, but I believe he enjoys having me accompany him for the insightful commentary and helpful advice I provide from the ground. In fact, after struggling to get the padlock open on this particular stand, he vacated the ladder and allowed me to remove this stand and ladder all by myself! (I can't remember for sure, but I believe the words, "do you just want to do it?" were uttered somewhere along the line.)
While hiking from stand to stand, I had plenty of time to walk around the woods and look for signs of spring. I even remembered to bring my camera along this time and there were plenty of photo ops along the way. We've had enough warm weather and rain the past few days, but the only real signs of green in the woods so far was lots of moss. It was so nice to see this moss growing that I couldn't resist getting right down on the ground to take a photo.

By looking close to the ground, I managed to spot some other interesting signs of spring too. Thanks to a Google search on "orange cup fungus" I found out this one is called Scarlet Cup Fungus (Sarcoscypha dudleyi). Isn't it neat looking? I almost missed spotting this. Although it looks really large in this picture, it was only about the size of my pinkie fingertip. It was attached to a little piece of wood about the size of my index finger.

I was keeping my eyes open for birds, deer and squirrels, but the only moving creature I did see was this one small earthworm.

Another special sighting was this small feather caught on the end of a branch. It was mostly white with dark gray on the top edge and very fluffy. It didn't look at all like a turkey feather, so I'm thinking it might have been from a Cooper's Hawk or some other raptor.

Here's an old treestand Mr. Johnson built many years ago that we don't use anymore. It looked to me like there was a corncob laying on top (arrow's pointing at it). That got me to wondering whether the squirrels or raccoons had been using this as a convenient dining table.

Fortunately there were still a couple steps in the tree that allowed me to climb up for a closer look. Aha! Just as I suspected! Now I'm wondering.....was it raccoons or squirrels dining up here? And if it was squirrels, how did they carry those corncobs up this tree? This "table" was at least 10 feet up in the tree.

Finally, the last stand and ladders were all down and loaded into the sled for transport back to the truck. All this equipment is pretty heavy, so it was quite a workout for Mr. Johnson hiking back to the truck. I dutifully followed along behind to keep an eye on the load, while humming "I'll never be your beast of burden" to myself. (yeah, cuz I'm just helpful that way!)

Here's probably the most unusual sight we saw this afternoon.....the farmer who rents this field was picking last year's corn today! Due to the wet and cold weather last October and November, so many of the farmers around here were unable to get their corn crop harvested and are making up for lost time this spring.

And on our drive home, we saw a couple of happy ducks enjoying a sunny afternoon in their little pond that's finally thawed out after our long winter.

Happy Spring!

The View from My Deer Stand - Part 2

Spent another deerless afternoon in the woods today, but I'm not complaining because the outside temp was almost 60 degrees! Pretty unusual for early November and it got me to thinking about some previous deer hunting seasons where there was about a foot of snow on the ground and temps in the teens.

Here's the hill I walk down from the cornfield to get to today's deer stand. Pretty, isn't it? There are always lots of birds in this area because it's much more wooded than the stand I was sitting on yesterday.

This stand is a permanent stand (meaning we don't take it down every year). I built this stand myself 2 years ago. Are you impressed? I was. Mr. Johnson had chosen the tree and I was in charge of the design. I did my drawing of how I thought the stand should be built, took the measurements, and then cut all the wood at home. We carried all the pieces out to the woods and then I built the stand. Amazingly enough, all the pieces fit correctly and the stand turned out exactly as I had envisioned it. I love this stand! It's big enough to set up this little stool and today I was even able to curl up on the floor and take a little nap! (Nope, I'm definitely not a hardcore deer hunter, am I?)

The warm weather has brought out a new hatch of insects. I watched this little stink bug walking up one of the tree trunks.

Of course, there are always several of these pesty little bushy tails wreaking havoc in the woods. I'm always amazed at how much noise such a small animal can make. But on a slow deer hunting day, their antics are always amusing.

Have a good weekend everyone!

The View from My Deer Stand

Well, after a gentle nudge from my dear old Mom (who's experiencing some blog deprivation symptoms) I will be making an effort to become a little more proactive in my blog posts again.

Amazingly enough, I don't think I've even taken any photos in the last 2 weeks. I think that's the longest I've gone without taking a picture since I started this blog! Between work, deer hunting and knitting, it doesn't seem like I've had time to pay much attention to other stuff going on around here. Oh, there are plenty of birds -- flocks of cedar waxwings in the backyard -- but I've been negligent about carrying the camera along with me when I'm outside.

So this afternoon, while sitting on the deer stand, I realized here was a perfect photo opportunity right in front of me! So, here's a view from the deer stand I was sitting in this afternoon. Do you see any deer? Nope, I didn't either! That's because all you can see in almost any direction is corn, corn, and more corn, and that's where the deer are hiding out.
Minnesota's firearms deer opener is this Saturday (Nov. 7th). For as many years as we've been bowhunting, we always have at least one deer in the freezer by this time. This year has been a tough one as October brought us nearly record setting moisture in the forms of rain and snow. Needless to say, the farmers are the ones most negatively affected by this weather and the harvest has barely begun -- especially for corn.

Mr. Johnson is getting seriously frustrated by the lack of deer we've been seeing. Fortunately he has plenty of vacation time and he subscribes to the philosophy that "a bad day of hunting is better than a good day at work!" I, on the other hand, have no paid time off, so my hunting times are limited to afternoons and weekends (as long as the weather's nice).

I'll be staying out of the woods the next couple weekends because those gun hunters scare me and I'm looking forward to teaching a couple knitting classes -- mittens! Watch for a future blog post on that!

Why I Bowhunt

Last summer at the birding festival in North Dakota, someone asked me why I hunt. I think my response was probably pretty lame, but it got me to thinking and now I'm going to try and give you an explanation, in words and pictures, how I can be a nature lover and hunter at the same time. I know plenty of people who enjoy nature without having to be a hunter, but I feel bad for someone who's a hunter and yet doesn't fully appreciate or enjoy nature while they're out hunting.

Hunting with a bow and arrow is so completely different than hunting with a gun. First of all, the deer season starts in September (usually around the peak of fall songbird migration), when the weather is still beautiful and I can enjoy being outside. The season lasts until the end of December, so there's no pressure to shoot the first deer you see like there is during the 6 days of shotgun season. Another reason is that there are no other buck-crazy hunters out there with guns blasting away at practically anything brown and furry, so I never fear for my life or Mr. Johnson's while we're out bowhunting.

The nice thing about bowhunting is that you're all dressed in camouflage, so once you're where you need to be, you become part of the landscape (i.e., invisible to birds and wildlife). So I get to see cool things like this little doe snacking out in the hayfield and squinting into the late afternoon sunshine. Did you even know deer could squint? (me either until I took this picture)

I got the chance to see eye-to-eye with this little buck. He could see my hands moving as I took the picture, but he didn't know what I was, so no fear on his part.

I got to see this little buck right under my tree--he never even knew I was there!

And he crossed farther into the field maybe 10 yards from my treestand. This would have been an easy shot for me with a bow, but I prefer to let this little guy grow up. And that's a choice I can make as a bowhunter because I know there are bigger bucks (and does) out there that would provide a lot more meat for my freezer.

Bowhunting in the fall allows me to spend time outside on gorgeous days like this.
Bowhunting forces me to physically challenge myself and makes me so thankful that I have good health. It's not quite as easy as it used to me, but I can still haul my 50-year-old body 15 feet up that little ladder attached to the left tree to the treestand (right arrow is pointing to it).

Once I get up into my treestand, I get to enjoy this view. Definitely worth the hike and climb, don't you think?

From my treestand, I can look down on beautifully colored leaves on my tree.

And when I'm not watching for deer, I can watch Eastern Bluebirds, checking out evening roosting spots in natural cavities of a nearby dead tree (this is something I have never seen before!)

And because I'm in the tree at bird level, I can get a photo of a Ruby-Crowned Kinglet -- at his level -- for the nanosecond that he sat still before flitting out of my camera range just 10 feet in front of me.

I can watch Eastern Wild Turkeys going about their business across the pasture.

And I can watch another little buck enjoying some sweet alfalfa in the same pasture.

And in addition to wildlife, I get to have a little fun with the cattle out here too--in the daytime..... .....and after dark. I enjoy cattle because they are so goofy and curious.

Bowhunting takes a huge amount of time, dedication and practice to be successful. I practice target shooting every day and concentrate on hitting the target inside a 3-inch circle. I feel it's my personal responsibility to not to take any shot where there's a chance I could injure, but not kill a deer. I actually bowhunted for 3 years before I shot my first deer 2 years ago. For me, shooting a deer is the hardest part of the bowhunting experience. While I'm happy that I'm able to provide food for us, I actually have to kill an animal myself in order to do this. So I'm always aware of my responsbility to the animal to try and make its death as quick as possible. (Reading Catherine Friend's book "The Compassionate Carnivore" made me even more mindful of this responsibility.)

So there you have it.....why I bowhunt. Not because I enjoy killing animals, but because I love nature and I get the chance to be a part of it for many enjoyable hours each year. We have an overabundance of deer in this area, so I know I'm not doing any harm to their population and we will have a freezer full of great tasting, organic, free-range venison that was harvested with skill, appreciation and respect.

And if you need anymore convincing, I enjoy bowhunting specifically for moments like this (shown in the video below) when I get to see and learn more about deer in their natural environment. These are things a person normally wouldn't have the chance to experience unless they're able to spend lots of hours out in the woods. "Life is not measured by the number of breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breath away."

Trail Camera Pics

For the first time ever, all the treestands are in place and we're ready for the bowhunting opener a month in advance! A couple Saturdays ago, we took both of the trail cameras out to the woods and set them up in what we hope are strategic locations near the deer stands. Mr. Johnson's plan is to move them every week or so in an effort to see what kind of deer movement there is in each area and that will give us an idea of which stands are going to be most productive in the early season.

After supper tonight, we went down to check on the cameras and swap out the picture disks. We have viewers for both of the trail cameras, but that little 2-inch screen doesn't show much, so we have to wait till we get home and look at them on the computer screen (assisted by some Photoshop enhancements). Here are some pictures we got in the last week:

These first two are from the Leaf River camera. We've got it on a tree next to the deer trail that comes into the woods from the cornfield.

See how gray this one's fur has gotten already?

These next pictures are from the StealthCam. This camera is much farther down in the woods and placed on a tree near a confluence of several deer trails.

Even though I've got the flash set to "auto" for whatever reason it sometimes goes off in the daylight too (that's what happened when this deer walked right in front of the camera).
This picture was really dark and when I first looked at it, I couldn't see anything at all until I compared it to another nighttime picture on the disk. I finally saw what triggered the camera but only after enlarging the photo to about 125%. Can you see them? (look right in the center of the picture....)
Remember when I was first testing this camera in the backyard and I was worried that it didn't seem to be sensing bunnies--even though it had an infrared sensor in addition to motion detection? I thought maybe the bunnies were too small. But here's the proof that this camera even senses the small critters (this is what was in the photo above that activated the camera):When I was looking at the photo, it was the striped tails that caught my eye!

StealthCam

Mr. Johnson purchased a new "toy" for me last Saturday.

Of course, it's really his toy, but I'm the "geek" who gets to figure out how to use it and make this camera take the right kind of pictures once we put it out in the woods for deer scouting (near the new treestand!)

Once I got the programming figured out, the camera went out on one of our trees in the backyard by the ground feeding tray where we know the deer are nighttime visitors.

Our other trail camera is motion activated, but this camera has a Passive Infrared Detector. That means the camera will take a picture when any large, warm object moves within its range. It didn't take any pictures of the birds that sat at this feeder, but Sophie is a large enough object that the camera took a few pictures of her.

Even though I know bunnies also sit in this tray feeder and eat corn, there were no pictures of bunnies, so they must not be large enough either to trigger the infrared sensor.

I decided to test it myself once it got dark to make sure I had the flash setting correctly programmed. (I got lots of pictures the previous night, but didn't have the flash turned on so couldn't see anything.)

This is why I hate having my picture taken......the body view I see in the mirror is way different from what the camera sees! UGH!! Looks like I've got some work to do!

But finally, here are just some of the pictures we were hoping to see on this camera.

I'm really happy with the pictures this camera takes. They seem much brighter and clearer than our older trail camera (this camera gives you 4 choices on the resolution of your pictures and even has a video feature). It's nice that the time/date stamp shows under the picture and not down in the corner of the photo like our other camera. I'm amazed at the advances in technology of these camera over just a few years. This camera also has the viewing screen built right in (like our digital cameras) so you can instantly see what images you've captured without having to go home and download to the computer. I think this camera is going to work well for us and I'm looking forward to what kind of images of deer and other wild creatures we'll be able see once this camera is out in our deer hunting area.

First Weekend of Summer

Thanks for all your kind words and comments on my last post. It's nice to know I have such faithful readers and more importantly so many dear blogging friends.

Well, it's early Sunday morning and no one's up around the Johnson household except Kitty who's sitting behind me here and monitoring bird activity outside the window. I decided to take advantage of a few minutes to get quick blog post done before the day's activities begin.

Our first "official" weekend of summer has been perfect (weather-wise)......not too hot and no rain so far (although we could use a little shower, the lawn is starting to get dry in spots).

Mr. Johnson has gotten permission from the land owner where we deer hunt to put up a couple of permanent tree stands. We went out last weekend to get measurements and yesterday we put up the first stand.

I can already tell we will fight over who gets this stand in the fall. It's a beautiful location on the bluff overlooking the river and pasture below. It's about the height of where the eagles fly by over the river. It's going to be an awesome spot for watching birds (or deer).

There are some new arrivals in my yard! The baby bluebirds have hatched. I know now this is the same pair I had nesting last year. She always lays 5 eggs, but only 4 babies hatch. Aren't they cute?

And the wildflowers are starting to bloom in my backyard garden.

Purple Coneflower

Gaillardia?

Turkeys 2, Johnsons 0

We gave up on our turkey hunt this morning. Our change of tactics involved each of us going to a different location (where we've heard turkeys every day this season) and sitting on the ground in full camouflage with a shotgun (the way we used to hunt turkeys before we used a blind). We were really optimistic this was the morning that we'd get our birds -- and I was thankful it was above freezing since I would be sitting outside on the ground.

As it started getting lighter and lighter, we still weren't hearing any gobbling. What's up with that? I wondered, since I was sitting practically right underneath the trees they had flown down from on Sunday morning. I checked in with Mr. Johnson on the radio to ask if he was hearing anything where he was sitting and he confirmed that nothing was going on over there either. It was as if someone had just come in overnight and taken every single turkey out of that area!

I did hear one turkey gobbling from probably a half-mile away and across the river, but there was no way he could hear my calls and was going to come to me. Finally about 9 AM, we just decided to hang it up for this disappointing turkey season. It was such a nice day we decided to pack up all our stuff and go home and see if we could get my motorcycle in for an oil change this afternoon. So at least we'll get to take advantage of the nice weather with a motorocycle ride.

Here are a couple pictures from our turkey hunting adventure:

Mr. Johnson next to our hunting blind. This is the Double Bull Blind; it was kind of pricey, but we really like it. Lots of room inside for 2 people and all our gear and we can actually stand up inside too. It's pretty easy to get set up and take down too, plus the fabric is very heavy and stands up well to windy and rainy conditions.

Here's a picture of me looking like a camouflage Michelin man! I'm truly amazed how much fatter these multiple layers of warm clothing make me look!

However, the morning wasn't totally disappointing for me.....I got to see several yellow-rumped warblers (my first for 2008) and also got this great little video of a Brown Thrasher singing from the treetop (he's a little hard to see, but look right in the center of the video). Can you recognize any of his imitations?

Sunday in the Turkey Blind

The wind died down overnight and there were clear skies and a half-moon as we hiked to our turkey blind at 5 AM today. It was still cold (around 30 degrees) but I had my blanket to wrap up in and we knew once the sun was up the day would be warmer.

We heard at least 3 turkeys gobbling right across the ridge from us, but were unable to call them over, so it was another long day of waiting for turkeys that never showed up. However, I had plenty of time for reading. Yesterday I finished "The Friday Night Knitting Club" and today I read "Tell Me Where It Hurts."

I still managed to work in a couple naps and by afternoon the sun had warmed up our blind enough that I was able to finally take off my gloves and knit a few rows.

For most of the day, we heard a woodpecker "sounding off" on the trees near our blind. I finally located who was making all the racket--it was a Hairy Woodpecker. I was able to capture this short video from the front window of our blind.

Before we left to come home, I walked over to the edge of the bluff to photograph the eagle's nest across the valley. The nest is in the top of a big white pine. I bet that nest was blowing at least 15 feet back and forth in yesterday's high winds.

When the adult eagle is not in the nest I can see something white sticking up that I think might be a chick, but I can't tell with just binoculars.

I'm so glad I finally found the location of this nest and have been able to get some photos and the chance to watch the eagles come and go.

Tomorrow's weather report sounds similar to what we had on Saturday (snow/rain mix, windy and cold) so I'm going back to work and will take Wednesday off instead when the weather is supposed to be warmer.

P.S. I just checked my stats and this is Blog Post #300!! Another reason for a celebration cake!