East Coast vs Gulf coast

After talking to Jay and receiving pictures of the East Coast crews hunt, I have to say that was quite impressive. I’m not bragging, but I got one of them big fellas a few years ago. It field dressed 117lbs., and you can see it in one of my earlier posts. I believe you can see it in the October and November 2005 post. Unfortunately this year I didn’t get a deer. I didn’t even see one!!! I take that back, the one doe I saw was about 80 to 100 yards away but I had my bow that day. I did see a lot of turkeys and I had a great time. The turkeys were everywhere. But the Gulf Coast crew did score rather impressively. The total was 1 buck, 2 does, and 2 turkeys, and 10 pounds lost on the Jay Johnson drill sgt weight loss program. Jenny Craig ain’t got jack on him. Neither does Jack Lalane. It’s how the two does were taken that is memorable. You know what they say, “variety is the spice of life” and as you can see by our count we have two entrees on the menu. If after reading some of these posts you come to the conclusion that I have a one track mind, and that it’s always on food, well you’re right. Lunch was my favorite subject in school.

Now you’re probably wondering why I’ve included a picture of that barbecue smoker in this blog. Mark and I brought that smoker from San Antonio since we were going to leave it with Joan After breaking it in by smoking part of a hog (which we also brought up) we took the smoker to Jay and Malissa’s. Mark and Melvin decided not to go on the evening hunt since they wanted to make sure the fire stayed at a certain temperature. Justin and I went out and I hunted the ground blind just past the old house and Justin continued on over the hill.

The only thing I saw that evening were turkeys. They were everywhere. As I was sitting in that blind I could hear a lot of noise behind me on top of the hill. It was then that I saw a head pop up and then another head pop. Then the two heads would go down and another 2 or 3 would pop up and then go down. This continued for a few minutes as they traeled down the hill into the holler about 30 yards from my position. The thought did occur to me to shoot and take one but I decided against it. If I would have had my bow, I most certainly could have taken one and maybe two. How could I miss so close. Oooppppss….I won’t go there

Anyway it was rather amusing to see 20 or so turkeys so close with their heads going up; and down like that whack a mole game at the carnival. They need to rename it Whack a turkey. So after watching these turkeys I heard a shot coming from the direction of Jays house. It sure sounded like Marks 30-06. It couldn’t have been more than 15 or 20 seconds then I heard another shot in that same direction. The thought did occur to me that Mark and Melvin were messing with us since they knew that Justin and I had planned on taking a hike further on back in the holler. Suddenly I heard a shot coming from Justins direction. Bless God everybody is shooting except me. Did I not put on enough scent killer? Did I sweat so much getting to this location that my scent killed the scent killer stuff? Whats up with that??? Well Justin came back and said he had seen a doe quite a ways off and decided to take a shot at it but missed. I think he was glad he missed, I know I was, since that would have been one heck of a drag back to the house.

So we headed back to the house and that’s when we found out there would be two more visitors for supper. Rumor has it once the smoker got started Mark and Melvin were directly in the path of the hickory smoke and they plan on getting a patent on the smoke. They said who needs that scent killer formula when they have the hickory smoke flavor, and it works. The Gulf Coast crew has come up with a revolutionary way of hunting. As Mark was stoking the fire and Melvin was taking notes, two does walked up. Mark said it was the smoke screen and smell that disguised them. So Mark picked up his rifle and shot one. Melvin said one doe went down and the other looked at it and appeared to be saying “you alright down there”, that’s when Mark dropped that one also. Now that’s some kind of hunting and the distance couldn’t be more than 30 yards.

Since the weeds and brush were very tall it was suggested to use the lawn mower to cut a path to the does. (uuhh you do know about that don't you) Mark said I’ll have none of that I had 2 monster drinks, so he drug them to the wood pile like it was a bale of hay and gutted them. I think he said the lawn mower was for the old guys. Ok whatever dude, here have another monster drink oh and your brother said he needed a hole dug somewhere in the yard.

I think next year we’ll be taking up a fry daddy and a cappucinno machine that way breakfast and lunch covered. Who knows what will show up.