Man those woods were dangerous on Friday! About 30 minutes after first light, trees started cracking and popping. Huge oaks were splitting right in half from the weight of the snow on the branches. There's tons of new browse on the ground now!

Decided on a fast walk across a SGL ridgetop loaded with acorns friday morning, hoping to cut a track and get on it for a stalk. Covered a mile and a half, never cut a track. Dropped down to the bottom and stillhunted foodplot edges back, still no tracks.

Dang, hunting these deer that don't chit, don't leave tracks, don't rub trees and don't eat deer food has got me baffled. Maybe I need to hunt harder, hunt deeper, and hunt smarter because the tactics that I've used for the last 30 years just ain't working on state land anymore. Maybe I should get Carl Roe up here to teach me to hunt squirrels.

Then on Saturday, with roughly 8-10 inches of snow on the ground, a buddy and I hunted clearcuts deep in the Tioga State Forest in DMAP area 1618. Had a very nice 17" 5 pointer within 15 yards. This was the 4th deer I've seen in 2 weeks of hunting every day. He was a big deer, but that 3rd point on one side just didn't look to be 1 inch. Could've shot him a dozen times. Also seen a doe, and my buddy refused to shoot her with the inline to fill his DMAP tag. Very tough hunting with all the saplings hanging from the weight of the snow and the visibilty was 10 yards AT BEST in most places. But the deer were in the open woods because they didn't want to be in the thick stuff that was hanging any more than I did.

Was real easy to get disoriented Saturday with the fog, the hanging branches and snow. Had to dig out the compass a few times. Also, we cut more bear tracks than we did deer tracks, including one that was the biggest track I've ever seen anywhere, including griz tracks in British Columbia. This bear has to be close to a state record.

Pressure was non-existant Saturday, and very few camps were in. Heading to farm country north of Rt 49 Friday to fill our 3A tags.