ArcticBowMan

Ouch, give our best to your mom. I' ve heard about nicknames in your family, they don' t go away for a looooong time! Guess your mom will have a new one to get used to.

I feel thoroughly dumber today. I just finished the Nevada' s hunter education program. Wow, and I thought the Alaskan education programs were lax. This was pathetic. A family of 4 volunteering to hold the class, and between tossing cigarette butts on the ground during simulated hunts... [:@]... throwing stuff around in the class room, drawing back an old compound with an arrow nocked in a class room and pointing it at the door, pointing laser sited guns all over the room, inluding occasionally through a students body, not being able to answer simple questions like, " are mechanical broadheads legal in Nevada" and " are handguns allowed while muzzleloader hunting" and worse of all teaching the class with profanity when there are several young kids there. I' m not impressed in the least. I spoke up a few times in the first half of the class, but just bit my tongue to get the heck out of there after lunch. The " family" would joke around between themselves leaving us sitting there for minutes on end a few times every hour. It got pretty old. I felt it was more of a family reuniun than anything, but worst of all these kids got a pretty bad introduction into hunting and safety. The video on field dressing an elk was pretty bad too. " yea, we shot this elk in the head so there' s not a lot of blood inside the body cavity" Great idea kids, shoot em in the head! [:' (]

Anyway, enough ranting... I' m done, I got my card, I' m considered a safe and ethical hunter now.[][>:][][8D][8D][8D]

I' ll hopefully see SEAK on the run when I get up to Prudhoe on Tuesday. He' ll be going and I' ll be coming. Sounds like he ended up with a total of 7 geese, not bad! Hopefully next year our shifts will match up a little better and we' ll get some more hunting in together.

Got to rest the brain now, I think I mashed parts of it trying to understand what the heck those instructors were talking about.

juno grl

ABM--

Sorry you feel dumber. I' ll try to write in simple sentences. [>:][>:]

You' ll miss SeAk...he' s gone--has a meeting in town tomorrow, so he left the slope today.

I' m starting to hobble around a little better. Went to work for a couple hours....quite frankly, just GETTING to work was enough effort! Once I hit the office door, I was ready to turn around and head back! Will try for a little longer in the office tomorrow!

Take care!

beej99

Hey, all. I haven' t gone away for good yet. sounds like overall everyone is having a good season. being down in Alabama, I am just getting ready to start hunting. ABM, it is a shame the hunter ed course was that lax. I teach it down here now and I think we do a pretty good job, but then again, my example stemmed from the Alaska brand!

I am a bit curious. this is my second year away, and I am planning on getting up there again next year. I want to come up and go caribou hunting. now that I am paying for a flight and non-resident tags, I am trying to be as economical as possible. what do you all know about areas 25D or 24 GMU in late August/early sept. how will the bou hunting be? any of them there? our plan is to run a boat up the yukon or choose a smaller river in 24. but, if you know of a better way/area/whatever, fill me in, I am all ears and do not need a 10 bou limit (just two!)

ABM, if you want to whitetail hunt, let me know. I can hook you up in AL, TN, IL, MO, WI, and Upper Penn of MI, and maybe a few others....I will be hunting in AL, TN, MO, and WI and would be glad to take you along. Let me know!


beej

Phish-On!

Juno grl - Hey, neighbor - I didn' t know you were layed up following an operation! I guess I have to get on here more often to find out what' s happened just a couple of doors down! I am still nursing a couple of pretty stiff and sore wrists myself from getting each carpal tunnel operated on and " released" in the last couple of weeks. After having numb, wooden hands for the past couple of years, it is quite a change to actually be able to feel things once again! Best wishes for speedy recovery. If you need anything, don' t be bashful - just let us know.

ABM - Too bad about the Safety Course. Unfortunately, the boorish actions of this brand of highly-visible idiots is exactly the type of behavior a lot of antis associate with ALL hunters. People like this don' t make our P-R situation any easier! Anyway, welcome back north - SEAK probably has all the game and fowl up there scattered from Hell to breakfast! LOL And while we are on the subject of fowl, I had a flock of about 25 honkers land beside my boat this evening while I was out trolling for cohos on the Breadline, near Tee Harbor. they didn' t stick around for long, but it was fun to see them up close for a few moments!

juno grl

Thanks for the wishes Phish. I' m getting better slowly but surely. I have gone to work part-time this week. I am definitely getting tired of not being able to walk very well!! Hopefully, I' ll recover fully, and it' ll all be worth it. If it' s not, it' ll be really hard to schedule the left achilles surgery! I' m glad the carpal tunnel surgery went well! Take care!

ArcticBowMan

Hey guys, finally got out again tonight with the bow. Had an excellent set up on eight big bulls, 2 giants, but another hunter walked right in the wide open between me and the bulls and spooked them. I was paying attention to the bulls, who were 150 yards out and walking right to me, and they all looked in his direction at the same time and bolted seconds later. I looked over, and here he is standing straight up, 200 yards from the caribou glassing them. Dang, guess I' ll have to give it another go tomorrow night.

Brian, good to hear from you again! It doesn' t look like I' ll have time this year to go whitetail hunting, but I might take you up on that next year. Thanks for the offer. I wish I could help you with those units, but I really don' t know if the caribou are going to be in those areas in August and Sept. or not. I pretty much stick to 26 for caribou, and for the most part it is bow only. I' d love to go up the Yukon and get into the porcupine herd though, is that what you guys were thinking? You could try fish and game as they could help you figure out where the bulls will be at around that time.

I' m pretty much over the hunters ed course. Just still blown away at how bad it was. It was real entertaining when the instructor explained to us how he shot himself with a 22 pistol while rabbit hunting.

Phish, I think SEAK killed all the geese up here, didn' t see a one tonight. Of course all the ponds, lakes and most of the river is frozen up already, so that might have something to do with it. I' ve got goose feathers all over the place though, guess he wasn' t lying to us! He said that next time he comes up north, he goes straight to Juneau after he leaves here, so he can bring some of this bou meat I have in the freezer down to you guys. Hopefully I' ll have some more by the time he gets back up at the end of the month.

I was glad to see I walked nearly 3 miles tonight and didn' t even start to feel tired. Hope I can do the same at 10,000+ feet elevation next month!

AK NIMROD

hi all well i got back from the 2nd trip up the haul rd. cold, ice on river, very windy headed south the next am big dunkin had trouble with his sev tech once he got it going well ( after a trip to fbnks to get all new throttle and steering system) head down river to meet up with me and his dad and wind gust spun him into a sweeper and damaged his prop and cage around prop. then weather got cold and too much ice in river to make me comfortable running the jet boat .....afraid i would damage my engine so i bailed and mike and his dad went with paul to help him get a moose on his permit.
juno grl ...get well soon
abm- i would report that class to fish and game as to how it was unsafe, and so poor.
hoping to get out the first part of the week for sheep.

later pat

Phish-On!

beej - Have you got all the hot turkey spots scoped-out down there for next Spring? You' ve been down there long enough now to have the public vs. private land areas scouted. The word is that all the turkey that are so hard to find down South come out to show off for the humans during deer hunting season!

ABM - Sounds like between the effects of Ma Nature and SEAK, the geese all scooted through the Pass! His goose exploits sounded like fun - even to a non-arrow person like me. Too bad you didn' t get a crack at them.

Nim - Sorry to hear about that last trip not working out. Bum deal. BTW, have you ventilated any Pike lately? Got to keep those buggers from spreading!

We got some termination dust above 2,800 to 3,000 feet during this past week. Kind of a shock to look up behind town in the morning and see it! I didn' t think it was THAT cold. I' m sure it scared the hell out of the tourists. I was wondering how many local goat hunters were dealing with it - I know of at least one party that had zipped over to William Henry Bay (or Endicott River, maybe) just about the time the northerly came up in Lynn Canal. I' m sure I' ll hear all about it. Good luck your next time out-

AK NIMROD

phish-on- no have not chased the pike but if the sun comes out in the next couple days i might.

beej99

Phish,

I have one spot of private land here in AL that I hunt. It just doesn' t have any turkey. however, the spot I have up in TN (about 40 minutes away) is chocked full of them. Hopefully they will make themselves known during deer season, because up in TN, there is a fall turkey season! two birds, either sex. Also the land I hunt in Missouri (private) has a fall turkey season and is full of them. Last time we trekked up there to get our stands ready, we ended up flushing about 15 turkey when we drove into one of the fields. Opening day of deer next week!!! Hopefully I finally get my first bowkill!

Beej