Y’all must not be living right, because the activity on my cameras up north and behind my house here in TX is still good. 
check cameras today. Still see quite a few does and a couple of smaller bucks. Even saw a couple of Toms. Also a VERY big bobcat and .some beaver ( 4-legged with big flat tail ). Saw one coyote that had a missing back foot/leg, must have chewed his way out of a leg trap somewhere.
I'd love to see some turkeys start showing up. Saw some tracks in June near the pond, but they didn't stick around for fall. Hopefully that means they'll be back in the Spring.
I don’t know much about turkeys and don’t know if this is normal, but around my place they are nomadic. They show up, stay for a few days or maybe a week, and move on, and then they randomly show back up. Wash, rinse, repeat.
That’s my experience too.I don’t know much about turkeys and don’t know if this is normal, but around my place they are nomadic. They show up, stay for a few days or maybe a week, and move on, and then they randomly show back up. Wash, rinse, repeat.
I'm guessing the last several weeks of the season have been miserably slow for everyone else too. That changed on Sunday when a buck I've been chasing since early December daylighted for the first time in a month.
I've been playing chess with this backyard buck, hunting before and after work many days when i thought the conditions were favorable (and plenty of days where they weren't). He was here last year through the rut before disappearing. He showed up on December 5th this year. His most frequented spot was a stand 150 yards from the back porch and occasionally using the food plot 50 yards from the stand.
He was extremely erratic in his timing and approach direction, but i was able to nail down his preferred approach, which was downwind of the "best wind for the stand."
I'll shorten the story by saying i hunted 20 times before i saw him in person. Sunday morning the wind wasn't right for his preferred spot so I sat in a stand which doesn't have a camera or corn. At 10am, it was heating up quickly and i was prepping to get down when a camera went off 70 yards away. He was coming onto the property! Knowing he approached and left the same way 95% of the time, i got down and crept 40 yards closer. He fed at my other stand and left without showing himself. Monday night, he showed up at 1150pm.
Alarm went off Tuesday morning and decided the hour of daylight before work was worth the chance and i climbed in the stand. Knowing he would come in quick (he covered 100 yards in 2 minutes regularly based on cameras), i was on high alert. At 730am, i saw something in the food plot through the trees and i got ready, positioning for a left hand shot with the crossbow (didn't have time to spin, stand, etc). He came in like a Sunday morning mall walker, straight at me.
Pause: had i been looking at my phone, i would have seen that he visited a stand at the very back, 250 yards away, where he'd never been on camera. He covered 250 yards in 5 minutes.
As he crossed the plot i carved out of the woods this year:
He got to 18 yards before he turned broadside and stopped, right behind 3 trees, looking straight up at me. He stepped forward twice while turning to face me. Knowing i was spotted and how spooky he was, i aimed for his mid-chest, just inside the left shoulder as he was quartering slightly.
The arrow punched him hard and he disappeared for a few seconds, bulldozing the woods before appearing 20 yards away. I prepared for another shot as I feared i had hit his leg (which he was favoring). I didn't get it nocked before he started to lay down and fell over on the trail i walk in on!
He has 12" G2s and 3 kickers off his left base. This is the first year I've killed 2 bucks in a season and i couldn't be happier.
I've been playing chess with this backyard buck, hunting before and after work many days when i thought the conditions were favorable (and plenty of days where they weren't). He was here last year through the rut before disappearing. He showed up on December 5th this year. His most frequented spot was a stand 150 yards from the back porch and occasionally using the food plot 50 yards from the stand.
He was extremely erratic in his timing and approach direction, but i was able to nail down his preferred approach, which was downwind of the "best wind for the stand."
I'll shorten the story by saying i hunted 20 times before i saw him in person. Sunday morning the wind wasn't right for his preferred spot so I sat in a stand which doesn't have a camera or corn. At 10am, it was heating up quickly and i was prepping to get down when a camera went off 70 yards away. He was coming onto the property! Knowing he approached and left the same way 95% of the time, i got down and crept 40 yards closer. He fed at my other stand and left without showing himself. Monday night, he showed up at 1150pm.
Alarm went off Tuesday morning and decided the hour of daylight before work was worth the chance and i climbed in the stand. Knowing he would come in quick (he covered 100 yards in 2 minutes regularly based on cameras), i was on high alert. At 730am, i saw something in the food plot through the trees and i got ready, positioning for a left hand shot with the crossbow (didn't have time to spin, stand, etc). He came in like a Sunday morning mall walker, straight at me.
Pause: had i been looking at my phone, i would have seen that he visited a stand at the very back, 250 yards away, where he'd never been on camera. He covered 250 yards in 5 minutes.
As he crossed the plot i carved out of the woods this year:
He got to 18 yards before he turned broadside and stopped, right behind 3 trees, looking straight up at me. He stepped forward twice while turning to face me. Knowing i was spotted and how spooky he was, i aimed for his mid-chest, just inside the left shoulder as he was quartering slightly.
The arrow punched him hard and he disappeared for a few seconds, bulldozing the woods before appearing 20 yards away. I prepared for another shot as I feared i had hit his leg (which he was favoring). I didn't get it nocked before he started to lay down and fell over on the trail i walk in on!
He has 12" G2s and 3 kickers off his left base. This is the first year I've killed 2 bucks in a season and i couldn't be happier.
Hell yeah man congratulations!!! Hell of a buck hard work paid off!
Heck yeah!!! You put in the time and work, and it paid big dividends!!! 
You might make a deer hunter yet.
You might make a deer hunter yet.
Way to go Make!
Awesome story and buck, congrats!
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