How did everyone do the first weekend?

[Ryan]

Probably a little late to ask since it is already the second weekend, I have not seen very many reports on what kind of success everyone had for the opener.

Personally I got 4 deer on opening day and my group got 7.  They were all pretty small, but those are the best kind to eat.  I've already had my most productive season and still have 2 weeks left to hunt and 4 more tags left.

[kenhuntin]

Congratulations. This season was not meant to be successful for me I should have five harvested but have zero it was one miscue after another.Like having to go back to camp at noon for my Dads chili on Saturday. I like to spend the day out hunting on opener but it is a big deal to him. I looked all the way around,lowered the gun down and looked around again when I started climbing down I heard a chitch chitch chitch in the leaves when I turned here was a doe 20 yards out looking around for the noise she just heard. When I pulled the old 7 rem. off the the leaves with the rope she locked onto it and followed it as it rose through the air I almost laughed out loud as she looked so quizzical watching this gun rise through the air. When the gun was at my feet and we were eye to eye she bolted as I reached for it.I would share the other four blunders but but too much typing.

[Dstark5625]

Our camp had a great opening weekend.  Saturday was slow with only 1 spiker shot in the morning.  A few others seen but no luck.  Sunday morning 4 guys took 6 deer. That must be our best mrning ever!.  I myslef shot a spike buck on Sunday morning.  Overall we so far have a 6 point, 3 spikers, 3 does.  Hopefully more this weekend.
 ::cheers::

[Spinach]

Terrible so far but right on track with the past 5-6 years or so. We ended up with one deer for the first weekend and 2 today. Nothing to brag about, my dad bagged 2 bucks, a 5 and a 6 pointer, and my sister shot a smaller doe this afternoon.

Nothing for me yet, I did pass on a 8 pointer last weekend, it was a small rack, medium sized body. I'm kicking myself right now for not taking it, I had it broadside at about 60 yards and decided to wait. I know in the end i'll forgive myself because it only gets better as the season goes along in our area, 2 of my 3 deer last year were on the 2nd weekend and the other the last weekend, I'm in the Metro zone (601) so i can hunt 4 weekends... Lots of time left for me.

I'm not seeing much deer activity though, no scrapes or rubs near my stand, which is really weird, my area is usually the heaviest on our property. It sure seems like the rut is not even close either, no chasing or activity during the day.

Maybe tomorrow will be the day....

[Randy Kaar]

opener was terrible with us too.. the boys went
to the state land to show a new hunter in our
group where everyone would be. they logged out
the whole woods since the last time we were there,
nothing but open feild with our stands un touched.
so we hunted my little peice of land and didnt see
anything. the boys heard the big boy grunt across
the river, but didnt see him. didnt have the funds
to go this weekend.. maybe next year...

randy aka bh

[Faceman]

Well we spent a week in Bemidji and not much to show for it.
On opener I had my oldest son in the stand with me (First year for him) and about 20 minutes into season he says dad I think I see a deer, yes i do see a deer and in all the excitement he did not even think about shooting and I could not get a shot at this big boy. A nice rack, 10 point plus and the biggest body deer I ever saw. So we watched him walk away and about 2-3 minutes later a 6 point walked out and I tried to get my son to see it but he couldnt so I had to shoot it. It was a good sized deer with a small rack but you cant eat the horns anyway. Then I shot a button on Monday afternoon and that was all we got. We didnt even see very many.


51 more weeks to go till next opener!!!!!! party3.gif

[tripnchip]

Sat. morning may son took a doe and I took a 2 1/2 year old buck with nothing but spikes. Took him at about 50 yrds with the hand gun. We canged hunting areas in the afternoon. Both my son and grandson drew hair but no blood. Sunday afternoon the grandson took a small doe at 250 to 275 yrds, thats after the near miss sat at 40 yrds. Sun evening I took a decent buck. The son and grandson have both missed since. Think I am only going to give them one shell at a time so they learn to make the first shot count.lol

[GirlGuide]

On Saturday morning about 10 or 15 minutes of being in my stand, a deer is about 15 yards away from me.  It looks like a real decent size deer, I couldn't see if it had a rack or not at first, it was walking by me real slow, it gets up to a small hill and lifts it's head....A MONSTER RACK...I about peed my pants ofcourse...I look down to see what time it is....7:15 am...9 minutes before it was legal to shoot!!!  I didn't ever pull my gun up or anything, but I can't say I didn't want to!!  I watched him slowly walk away, I would have never felt comfortable trying to take that shot anyway, even when it was legal time to shoot, it still seemed to dark for me...oh well, maybe next year...   sad3.gif 

A little later in the morning, I watched a small doe for about 20 minutes by my stand, to see if anything was coming in after her.  She came right up to my stand, she actually itched her back leg on my ladder!!  She never even knew I was there...until I tried to take a picture of her with my cell phone!  A buck did come in after her (or what I THINK was a buck), but he never came all the way through so I never got a clear shot of him..he stayed a little ways away in some real thick woods.  That one I actually keep playing over in my head a million times,..wondering if maybe I should of tried to take the shot...I'll never know though...

About an hour or so after those two, one more comes through the thick stuff, it's only about 40 to 50 yards away, but I never did get a clear viewing in my scope..so again I didn't shoot.

Then about a half hour after that, another doe comes through, I thought about it for a bit, and decided to take her, ...thought I had been pushing my luck by passing on the others.  So by 9:30 am on opening day I had saw 5 deer, and ended up taking a small doe.

I didn't see another deer until Wednesday afternoon, it was a big doe..she came crashing through woods, going pretty fast, and I took her on the run.  I had a good hit, I was pretty proud of myself for that one.

My husband took a button buck about a half hour after I shot that doe on Wednesday.  My nephew took a nice doe on Saturday evening, and my father-in-law also took a small doe on opening morning.

So out of about 15 guys and myself, we did not fare to well at all this year.  Probably one of the worse seasons for "deer count", but it was still fun as hell..and that's all that really matters! Plus an extra added bonus for me, because I was the only one out of all of us to fill both of my tags...don't worry I didn't rub it in...too much anyway...    gg

[Realtree]

I just got home about 9pm tonight from spending last Wed til lunch time this morning at Upper Red Lake hunting with Outdoors_Junkie and his clan. Things were pretty quiet up there all week with cooler temps and some winds on and off throughout the week. We ended up with a 7 pt, 4 pt, a big doe and a smaller doe for the party of 13 when we left today around 11am to pack up and come home. I think a few of the guys may head back up next weekend and see if they can get a couple more, but I am done til next season now. I will post a couple pics and think of some good stories to share tomorrow.  happy2.gif   

[deadeye]

All in all it was a great season.  There were 7 of us but my dad only hunted two half days and my sons friend only hunted two days.  Mostly there were 4 of us hunting.  We took 7 deer.  Two nice 8pts, two small baskets (these were only shot because they were wounded by other hunters) and three does.  I shot one of the 8's, a wounded 5 pt and a doe the first weekend.  During the week I let two nice 8's and one big 8-10 go.  I must be nuts.  The big one was hot on a doe and came within 20 yards of me.  They were heading towards my son so I let him go.  Still kind of kicking myself but maybe I will get a crack at him with the bow.  Anyway there were tons of deer.  Three of us hunted yesterday morning (the last day in zone 2) and we saw  18 deer.  Plenty seed for next year!

[GirlGuide]

I just got home about 9pm tonight from spending last Wed til lunch time this morning at Upper Red Lake hunting with Outdoors_Junkie and his clan. Things were pretty quiet up there all week with cooler temps and some winds on and off throughout the week. We ended up with a 7 pt, 4 pt, a big doe and a smaller doe for the party of 13 when we left today around 11am to pack up and come home. I think a few of the guys may head back up next weekend and see if they can get a couple more, but I am done til next season now. I will post a couple pics and think of some good stories to share tomorrow.  happy2.gif   

RT...don't forget to include the pictures of you dragging OJ's deer for him!!   :ROTFLMAO:
~also might want to include the foot massage pictures....

 ::  gg

[Crazy4Outdoors]

We had fun - our son (age 12; his first year) got 2 small bucks opening day.  Our other son got a doe on Sunday; my husband got a nice 11-pt buck Sunday and 2 does throughout the week; I got 2 does; our daughter didn't get to shoot but the kids can go again next season, which starts this weekend, so hopefully she'll get some shooting.  It was a blast, and so much fun to spend that time in the woods with the kids and see their excitement!

[Grute Man]

My firearms hunt was fun but we didn't get any deer.  I got to spend time with GOGETTER, Hockey #12, and my Pastor.  Some new guys found our spot and came in after us and left before us with an 8 pointer.  Is that fare?   sad3.gif  THEY GOT MY BUCK!!!!  How'd they do that???  Seriously, we need more hunters in that area to help move the deer.  On Sunday it was just me and my son in that entire area.  Those deer wouldn't move unless we stuffed a lit stick of dynomite under their rump.  So Im done  for firearms for 2007.

Now I still have bow season.  I did get a small doe last Saturday which I posted under B&B Buck.  This weekend I go do my 2nd weekend of my Metro Bow Hunt.  Im pretty excited for that.  I took Friday off so I can hunt all day all 3 days.  I plan to take enough food to stay in stand all day.

[Realtree]

I just got home about 9pm tonight from spending last Wed til lunch time this morning at Upper Red Lake hunting with Outdoors_Junkie and his clan. Things were pretty quiet up there all week with cooler temps and some winds on and off throughout the week. We ended up with a 7 pt, 4 pt, a big doe and a smaller doe for the party of 13 when we left today around 11am to pack up and come home. I think a few of the guys may head back up next weekend and see if they can get a couple more, but I am done til next season now. I will post a couple pics and think of some good stories to share tomorrow.  happy2.gif   

RT...don't forget to include the pictures of you dragging OJ's deer for him!!   :ROTFLMAO:
~also might want to include the foot massage pictures....

 ::  gg

Well.....IF OJ HAD SHOT A DEER, I WOULD HAVE DRUG IT FOR HIM......    :ROTFLMAO:

[thunderpout]

Well...looks like our camp didnt make out so bad...one of our guys got a nice eight pointer...I had what sounded like a big-un grunting at me from some really thick cover one eve, so I went on a mission the next am rattling along a ridge every 1/2 hour... every time this deer would rip stuff up on the other side of the ridge, but not show his face....same big deer that would walk thru the fog grunting at me and one of our guys last year...its the legendary MONGO ghost buck that terrorizes us the last for years...we only see him when grouse hunting or ridin atv's in the summer...he's got elk size tracks and rips up scrapes at nite!     -thunderpout 8)

[kenhuntin]

"it is....7:15 am...9 minutes before it was legal to shoot!!!  I didn't ever pull my gun up or anything"(quote from Girl Guide)
 I think she she deserves kudos for restraint I wish everyone could respect the rules in such a way. I have run into too many that feel because they can see game and have opportunity they should kill it

[Grute Man]

You're so right. Big pat on the back to GG.  I heard shots as we were in the cabin getting ready to go and no we weren't late -- it was still dark.

[Realtree]

I agree guys....Bravo Zulu to GG for exercising true sportsman like restraint and ethics!!! I know some folks would have taken the shot regardless of the time or visibility.

[mnfisherguy]

Opener was good for me took shots at 3 deer but only got the buck. Which is fine as I didnt see any traces of shooting the other 2 after looking for a few and no blood signs at all. I did spine shoot the buck and then had to go into camp for more ammo to finish him off as I jsut wasnt sure how hurt he was casue he was sitting up licking his wounds and looking around. But nothing else since.Bummer.. wanted at least one more deer.

[GirlGuide]

Thanks to all of you for the "kudo's and pats on the back" for not taking the shot.  You would be surprised though at how many people actually thought that I made the wrong decision...that doesn't matter to me though.  I would way rather be safe than sorry, I've heard way too many horror stories to even consider doing something like that.  There are rules and regulations for a reason, and I will continue to follow them.  When I started hunting with my husband five years ago, he was a very good instructor and taught me how to be a safe hunter, if I don't have a clear shot, or can't see what is behind my shot, even if I THINK it might be good, I will not take it unless I KNOW it's safe.  I can't even imagine if I ever injured somebody out there or even worse, it would NO WAY be worth ANY monster buck~not in this lifetime!  Thanks again for all of your support, although like I said, it's not that I didn't want to take the shot, it was just not a possibility in my book.  Thanks again, I appreciate your thoughts!  gg