Help a Fellow Bowhunter....

Please see the link below and help if you can. This is a friend of backcountry bowhunter Cameron Hanes. Full post can be seen at link. I can attest that Cameron is a good dude and if he is asking for help, it is very much needed...

http://www.cameronhanes.com/?p=711

Another Step Closer....

Davis, West Virginia, the home of beautiful mountain tops and the Highland Sky 40 mile ultra marathon. It was not only a chance to take part in an awesome ultra, but more importantly a key stop on the road to the Burning River 100 and hopefully success in Elk country.

The race traversed the Dolly Sods wilderness area and Canaan Valley which by way of the West Virginia Mountain Trail Runners, is some of the most rugged and beautiful terrain in WV. The area ranges in elevation from 2500 to 4700 feet and the views are breathtaking.

The course was tough and in fact, the most technical, rocky, murky, steep, unforgiving course I have ran to date. It varied from rock, to woodland paths, to boulder, to upland bogs, to sand, to mud. Going into it I thought I would be able to knock it out in around 7-8hrs….a far cry from the 9hrs and 16minutes it took me to cross the finish.

All in all a great, tough as nails run. With 3 days rest under my belt and only 31 days until Burning River its time to get back at it. Stay tuned…

Running the Buckeye....

Check out the latest from the trail, knocked out 27 on this run....

Badlands Ox

Check out the review on the Badlands Ox. This is one sweet pack that will plain and simple get the job done. Without question the quality of a pack will make or break your hunt when your in the mountains and this pack lives up to the hype. Pack specs can be seen here, review can be found here. Enjoy!

Preparation Underway

The fall prep is well underway. Hard to believe but in a little less than 6 months the September bugles will be here. First ultra of the season is the Highland Sky 40 miler in West Virginia on Fathers day weekend. Should be a dandy....

"Point to point course begins near the Dolly Sods Wilderness Area on Red Creek in Laneville, WV. Following a 2 mile paved section, the trail ascends to Roaring Plains, Flatrock Plains and Red Creek Plains into Dolly Sods. The course proceeds north along the Allegheny Front to Bear Rocks. Here runners will turn west crossing Dolly Sods to the rim of Canaan Valley north of Timberline Ski Resort. A descent through Timberline leads to Freeland Rd and into Canaan Valley State Park.

This is not an easy ultra.....The course climbs a total of 5474 feet and descends 4856 feet and is basically in three sections; the Plains, the Road Across the Sky, and Dolly Sods. Two significant climbs occur in the first 15 miles where a 2300′ ascent is followed by a 1700′ descent, and then another 1200′ climb. In the first half of the course highly technical (rocky), single track sections occur from mile 7-11 and 16-18. The Dolly Sods section has an exciting boulder-hopping section from mile 30-31. The course is 75% trail, 15% Forest Service road, and 10% paved road. There are eight aid stations. You should carry fluids and fuel due to remote location and distance between of aid stations."

This year I'm committed to putting Pops in front of a bull with his recurve so anything claiming to be "not an easy ultra" sounds like perfect Elk prep to me. We're heading to some pretty rough backcountry and a little extra prep is going to go along way on the road to pulling it off.

Coming along for the ride on this and many runs this year will be the new Badlands Reactor. It's a sweet little pack that will help carry essential items while on the move. While weighing a tad more than traditional "running" hydration packs (a mere 1lb 8oz total weight) in the end it will be small potatoes to 100lbs of elk meat I hope to carrying in the fall. Stay tuned, LOTS to do.

Persistence Pays Off

"Your biggest break can come from never quitting. Being at the right place at the right time can only happen when you keep moving toward the next opportunity." ~Arthur Pine

To say this Whitetail season has been a long one would not do it justice. It has been a marathon of a season. Opening day was September 26 and ever since I have been working my tail off trying to get in bow range of a mature whitetail. After failing to arrow a good buck through both the November and December rut I was beginning to wonder if I would ever get it done.

October 11 was the day I first saw my old buddy Fred. He came to a mere 6 yards from the tree but unfortunately it was just too dark to shoot. 6 days later on October 17 I got a great picture of him walking by my tree at 6:18 in the evening. Well within shooting light however on that particular night I couldn't make it to the tree. Then on the evening of October 31 at 4:30 pm I rattled old Fred into 35 yards but couldn't pull off a shot. That night was the last time I saw him. My hope is that he is still around and next year we can meet again. I'm sure by then he will have added another 10-15 inches and hopefully should be a banger of a buck.

During the Fred quest there were 3 does that fell to the Pearson and lots of buck encounters. None of the bucks I was seeing were ones that I wanted to try and fill my tag on. Many of them were 1 and 2 and I was looking for something a little more mature. After checking the camera on December 12 I finally got a photo of the big 7. Not a deer that would score well but a mature buck for sure. Looking at the pictures I remembered getting this same buck on film back in June when they were still putting on the inches. That particular deer I had not seen around since and in December he was back. To this day as I still have not seen that deer on the hoof, however I have over 40 trail cam pictures to prove he exists.

So between Fred and the big 7 I felt like I was fighting a losing battle. A ton of mornings, afternoons, and evenings in the stand but little to show for it. From the pictures I knew there were good bucks in the area but I just couldn't seem to catch up to one. No sightings and no close calls. As I stand at the corner of depression and despair I felt my only hope was to just keep slugging it out and hope that persistence would pay off. I could hardly believe it but on January 16 that hope came true.

With 3 weeks to go in the season I hit the woods full of optimism. I knew between work, life, and family my time was getting short. Looking at the calendar I really only had 2 weekends to go. As I sit in the stand that night thinking over the season and wondering what the remaining days would hold I heard a noise from my left. I looked over to see a small buck heading my way.

When I first saw the buck I had no idea he was a piebald. I was actually looking past him for the big 7 when I happened to notice a white spot on his belly (this buck resembled one that the big 7 seems to always be with) and then the white on his legs. I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. From talking to the land owner 2 weeks earlier I had heard that someone had saw a piebald deer in the area. Who would have thought it would walk by my tree at 15 yards. He is obviously not the mature buck I was after but a true, rare trophy as a piebald.

For those who don't know a piebald is a genetic variation or defect in the deer and is found in less than 1% of the entire North American whitetail deer population. There is nothing actually wrong with the deer, however this genetic trait produces the white and brown mix found in their coats.

After a close 15 yard shot from the Pearson Z-34 and a short 50 yard track job all the work, all the effort, all of the time spent 25 feet up in the air paid off. I had just taken a true trophy of a lifetime and I couldn't believe it. As I sit in the stand waiting to get down I called Jori, Dad, and Pup in that order. I had just been lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time I couldn't wait to tell my story. Almost 4 months of banging it out toe to toe with the whitetail and I couldn't be happier with the way it ended.

Hope is in the Air!

Fresh photo's from the ScoutGuard reveal an old friend....I'm pumped, hope is in the air! Back at it tomorrow....