Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Oh relax!! I bet you had the gloves on and ready to fight. Sorry to disappoint you, but I simply want to know what may be some annoying things about hunting in the south. There Is never anything wrong with hunting period, but what do you have to deal with that you wished you didn't in the south.

Here's what comes to mind for hunting in the northeast:

Wake up at 3:30am. Check the weather channel and it's 17 degrees out and 2 degrees with the windchill factor. Nice north wind of 20 mph. Go outside and scrape 3 inches of ice off your truck. You get to your hunting spot just about the same time the truck finally decides to start heating up.

Get out and get dressed. Takes about 30 minutes to put on all your crap to stay warm. You can't possibly put anymore layers of clothes on and you're still shaking like a leaf. Off you go to waddle toyour stand.You feel like the abdominal snowman because you have so muchcrap on.You go to turn on your flashlight but the batteries are dead. Dang things only lasted 2 days in the cold. Walking through the snowcovered field you step in numerous puddles that are concealed by the snow. You get to your stand and your boots and pants are giant camo icicles.

Finally get to your stand and your nostril hair is frozen. You climb up the ladder stand. Get to the top and your gloves are now wet from the snow on the rungs. Your seat has about 15 inches of snow to be scraped off. Nothing quite like stand 20 feet in the air on metal with frozen boots shoveling snow! You sit down and the cold frozen metal makes the loudest creek noise you ever want to hear in the woods. There is now way in heck you could ever stand on the shooting platform that is now a small hockey rink.

Off and finally hunting! Get all settled in and you realize you are insane for being out in this weather. Snow is pelting you in the face. You need to get up every 15 minutes and shake off. The dang squirell insist on climbing the tree above your head and knocking snow off the limbs and sending them down your back. You are starting to get seasick because your tree is swaying so bad in the wind. You just tell yourself you can survive at least 2 hours.

Cool a deer is coming towards you. You quietly grab your gun and go to raise it. This takes some sort of gumby like manuever with all the gear you are wearing. Finally after 3 or 4 attempts to shoulder your gun you figure out the right position. You get your gun up and put your face to it and your scope is fogged/snowed over. Great! Quickly and quietly clean it out and go through the shouldering the gun again. Bingo! Success! You shot a nice doe.

Go to call your buddy on the 2 way radio to tell him and the batteries are dead in that too. Now if you can make it down the tree in one piece it will be a very good day. Make it down and your gloves are soaked and freazing. The cold doesnt' seem to bother you at the moment because you just shot a deer. You now hope you can find your deer before it is covered in snow. No problem... you follow a bloodtrail that Helen Keller could follow. You recover your animal and now the fun part.

You have to field dress it and "transport" it out of the woods. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh yes time to take that parka, jacket, sweater, sweatshirt, longsleeve shirt, turtle neck, and gloves off!! OK so now you are cold again and the excitement of killing the deer doesn't quite let you ignore the fact of being frozen anymore.

The deer is gutted and time to drag. Only takes about 3 hours this time for you and your buddy to get the deer back to the truck. Nothing like dragging 150 lbs. through 2 feet of snow. Now you are sweating your butt off. The wind is wipping harder and the snow is coming at you sideways. Most likely will be sick for a few days after this. The deer is strapped to the top of the truck;) and off you go to the butchers.

Another day in the woods in the northeast.

God I love hunting!!!:D

So what is it for you in the south that you have to deal with? Things that can bite you and kill you? The bugs? The heat?

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Early in the season the heat and the skeeters are bad. Not a lot of complaints here, but the biggest would be where I hunt the rut starts around the middle of January and is just getting good when the season ends the first of February. I would like for the season to start a couple of weeks later and end the middle of February. Havn't seen a heavy snow since '74.:)

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Simply put - It was 80 freakin' degrees on Saturday. Yes, that was this Saturday, DECEMBER 3. Nothing like hunting with mosquitos and sweat. This week it will be in the 30's. I love our weather here.

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

:)Wake up at 5:30, put on camo Tee shirt and camo shorts. Spray from head to toe with Deep Woods Off, put on bugsuit, go to basement. Start 4wheeler, place coffee in cupholder, ride 3 minutes to stand with coffee and rifle slung over shoulder. Park 4wheeler, walk two minutes, climb into stand. Finish cup of coffee just as daylight approaches, see LOTS of deer.

[:'(] It's too dang hot to drag one out once sunrise comes, so watch the deer, plan on which one to take when it gets cooler. Then WAIT and WAIT and WAIT for some cooler weather (which comes a month or so later)[:@].

[&:]Wake up a month or so later, when it FINALLY cools down, see the frost in the yard, get back in bed and wait til it warms up. :):):)

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Heat ...sweat ...Skeeters ...snakes ...chiggers ...ticks ...poison oak ... black flies ...just to name a few.

dd

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Here in OK it's a crap shoot every year. Some years it's in the 70s, some in the 20's. The only gripe I have is that sometimes the higher temps force me to go after a deer that ordinarily I'd leave overnight, if I'm worried about recovering the deer. I can imagine some of what you're talking about, because I spent the winter of 93-94 in Saratoga Springs. The first time in my life that I stepped outside in really frigid weather and my nose hair froze in about 5 seconds, I just about had a fit. Didn't know what the hell was going on!

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

LOL

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

There is nothing like walking to the stand in the afternoon and getting so damn hot that when you get there you take off your shirt, your shoes, and your socks in an attempt to cool down.......

-john

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Thought the shooting houses in Texas were air conditioned?[8D]

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Me too!!! It's hard gutting them when they are frozen solid.

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

LOL. Well around here I've never had that particular problem. We usually have to worry about the meat goin bad because it's too warm.

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Big Cypress Preserve in South Florida. Archery season in September. 85 to 90 degrees and 85 to 90% humidity.

Get up at 3:00 am. Don't have to check the weather, cause I already know. Scent free soaps, deoderants, dirt scented clothes and snake boots, coffee and breakfast, and load up the truck. I'm already sweating through my clothes before I leave the house by 4:00 am.

Drive an hour to the check station and another 1/2 hour to where I go into the swamp. It is now 5:30 am. Put on my bug suit, gloves, treestand harness, headlamp and 50 pounds of gear on my back (including 10 pounds of water).

Walk 1/2 to 3/4 of a mile through muck and (if I'm lucky) only knee high water to get to my stand location. Try to get there before first light. Soaking wet from a combination of my own fluids and the swamp. Lots of snakes. Mosquitoes carrying off small mammals. Biting flies, chiggers and ticks. Spiders the size of ATV's.

Climb up the tree and set up. Wait all day and not see a single deer. Climb down from the tree and go through the same steps in reverse. Repeat tomorrow, enduring the ridicule of friends and family who, after a month start talking to me in a slow and calming manner.

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Amen DoctorDeath, and don't forget the thermacell and snake boots!

dog1

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

In the Dakotas where I hunt deer, it has been on opening morning from 75 degrees to -15 degrees so you never know what to expect. However the one thing that we seldom if ever have is bugs of any kind. Usually by opening day there have been several hard freezes killing off those pesky critters. Although we can have both temp. extremes, its usually very nice with temps in the 40's to low 50's in then daytime and mid 20's at night. Warm enough to hunt in comfort and cold enough at night to cool the meat down well. My average day of hunting will include driving out along the river breaks and finding a spot to watch the edges of the winter wheat field where the deer come out to feed or go down in to bed down. Its mostly Mule deer and its pretty easy hunting. The deer numbers are very high right now. This year I bought eight Mule deer does tage and filled six of them the first week. I have two left but had to stop to get these processed before I finish up. Just got them all done up this week. I have until Jan. 10th to hunt yet.

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Heat..sweat...Skeeters...rattle snakes..coral snakes...moccocins...chiggers ...ticks ...poison oak ... poison ivy......black flies ...no seeums......fire ants....black widows.....brown recluse....and gators!
Then you have to watch for FL cougers and black bears. Both protected byFL law!

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

snakes, thorns, wasps, illeagal immigrants and the occasional drug smugler

Id would probably say the average temperatures during our deer season in south texas would be in the mid 40's in the morning warming up to around 75. During december it will be in the 30's in the morning and I get pretty cold, I dunno what I would do if I had to hunt in 10 degree temperatures. I guess I would be used to it being so cold by the time deer season rolled around

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Hey Reb, how about those crazy red ants

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

NY thought I would die laughing,you make the bugs and heat seem like child play.I'll take our Southern winters anytime.Great story.Oh and stepping in the middle of a quail covey in the dark,really gets the heart pumping.LOL

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

NY for me the "benefits" of hunting in the south is that we are overpopulated with deer and underpopulated with people so "typically" you see many of one and few of the others. I know in states like NY and Penn you are one in a virtual army of blaze orange on opening weekend and the deer are running for their lives and every 10 acre woodlot has 10 hunters in it. Other than a slight uptick in the noise caused by the occasional gunfire and the "wamm wamm wamm" noise of buckshot mudders up and down the highways, deer season in the south is hardly noticable from anyother fall/winter morning. Another benefit is our seaons last for MONTHS and many occupations are "put on hold" from Oct until the end of January. The construction industry suffers a real slowdown in this part of the country at this time of year because so many craftsmen practically take the last quarter of the year off and deerhunt.

The negatives of hunting in the south? Well see the 30pages of responses too my "dead deer in public view" thread, :Dand there are MANY knuckle draggers in our midst who don't get excited about hunting unless they are poaching. Especially if it is on the biggest landowners property. These "humanoids" just LOOOOOOVE trespassing and get plumb giddy about roadhunting on such property. They are a constant headache but after a few of them get hauled through the courtsystem (or even come up missing! ) they typically get the message and eventually go elsewhere.

Blasting into a pack of loose hounds that are trespassingwhile running deerare also a GREAT way to practice ones running shots and keeps the ol reflexes alive and well,
RA

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

and more and more skeeters and and heat.

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

:D:D:DYou mean Fire Ants!:D:D:D

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

That was great, NYBH!!! :D[8D]

It brought back memories of the stories I have heard from my dad, uncles, etc... when they used to hunt in upstate NY way back when. (Man, I wish I was born 10 years earlier so I could have gone hunting with them [&o])

Here in Virginia, it's a combination of both the north and south. (In the north, you freeze your a$$ off in 2 1/2 feet of snow and -20 degree temps. In the south, you roast with 80 degrees temps and get tormented by bugs and snakes and chiggers...) Here in Virginia, it's a guessing game on how to dress, so you end up bringing two sets of camo clothes in your truck! Ibringmy heavy insulated camo jumpsuit when it's late Nov & Dec, but always wear my standard camo pants, shirt, jacket. I always have a set of thermal long johns in my backpack in case the weather takes a turn for the worse and the temps drop down suddenly.

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Yeh the quail will get you going BUT wait till your walking up the mountian and all of a sudden a flock of turkeys come off the roost ...MAN you talk ABOUT having a heart attack ...sounds like a helicopter ten feet above you ...

dd

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

DD, it happens here too!:D:D

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Yeah Reb.
I hated those things. Scared the poop outa me

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Ditto minus the snow in 74, I wasent born for another 9 years... But it sucks being carried off by the skeeters every afternoon as well as the yellow fliesand the ticks and waspthat are here almost year round and then theres the fire ants that live every where and in everything you touch,and our deer may be smaller but they sure are alot easier to drag out of the woods. other then that I cant complain

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

whats worse is when you do a heck of a job sneaking into your spot and you set up at the base of a tree and about the time it gets light enough to see, the turkeys see you and take off, now THAT is worse than kickin them up, and on top of scarin ya, they also scare the deer that may be just out of sight...also in WV we thought temperatures were way too hot last year when they hit mid 40s, personally i hate the temperature game because i always sweat (no matter what the temperature) until i get settled into my spot, then i freezewith the waterno matter how many layers i have on

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Hmm.. let's see. Heat, heat,heat, mosquitoes that are making off with rabbits, thorns, oh ya and did I mention heat.:D:D:DLast saturday it was 84 degrees, this friday it is going to be 25!

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

1. Over exposure to deet.

2. Not wasting time to bother with a moccasin in a water holebecause deer season is just a week away, and you are checking for wasps in a stand you have not been too in a while.

3. Having the sun beat down on your rubber boots and cooking your feetabout 2 o'clock in the afternoon while pondering whether to get out of the tree and get the extra hat you leftat the 4-wheeler that is not sweaty.

4. Wearing a face net. Not for conceilment, but to keep the mosquitoes off you face.

5. Waking up, and finding a bracelet of mosquito bites around your wrist from the only spot of exposed skin.

The list is longer, but there is nothing like looking at the weather and seeing a forcasted High of less than 60 degrees.

C. Davis

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

We must have it good in the middle, here in NC.Of course, when I'm wearing four layers of clothes in 40 degree weather, sometimes I still get too cold to sit any longer. What I really hate, though, is bagging on just before shootin' light ends. That's when the temperature gets below freezing. That's when ya gotta start hosing out the deer carcass. Oh joy.

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

well....here in Illinois it aint too nice...and we sure aren't "northerners"!!! Friday when I hunted it was 9 degrees....and the wind was directly in my face at 15+ mph....no idea what that wind chill came out to, but all i know is that i constantly had to wipe my eyes cause they were watering and I was worried they would freeze...and yes, my noise hairs froze too, I hate that, but its better than consistently running.....
And this morning I took my younger sister to high school and the Chevy Suburban temperature gauge said a nice old 1....yep 1.....thats a nice number....

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

I've hunted the swamps in fla and and gamelands in NC and and fla was the worst. Usually archery season is during the wet season and the misqitos are so loud buzzing around your head that your so deaften by anything around. I found it very difficult to sit motionless with all the misquitos, as I am allergic to deet. I also had to go through this little cut to get to my stand and there was a cottonmouth in this wake of water, I encountered him a couple times but he kept putting the slip on me but I always felt uneasy when crossing this area having to use a flashlight. After a hurricane came through one time, my stand area was about a foot under water and I actually had a gator come by and I stood up and got into position to shoot, thinking it was a deer coming in on me. Hunting was pretty easy though as the deer and hogs would work there way to high land and if you knew where the acorns and persimines were, you would have a shooting gallery, thing about it was, is I was always constantly wet from wading. It wasalso a challenge to get the game back in time due to the high temps
I realy don't miss it now and get invites to go back down, but I much rather hunt in freezing, snowy weather here. One advantage about the south is I don;t think they have too many griz or cougars that will would ruin your day. ;)

Bobby

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

theres nothing worse then sittin in the stand during bow season and having that same mosquito landing on your ear over and over again. that pisses me off so bad.

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Yeh the skeeters are the worse ...I killed one this year that I had mounted ...weighed 12lbs and looked like a B-52!

dd

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

I hunt and love NY. Upstate NY not NY city.
The only thing I think about when I am that cold is how warm my hands will be when I gut that deer.:D

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

I feel downright blessed ! :)
Being located in the middle of the temp zones can make getting dressed a guessing game at times , but the worst I'll have to face is mild heat , ticks , and maybe a few mosquitoes come October first . A little spritz of Permanone and some light clothing under my 3-D suit and I'm good to go . A month later and I may have to switch to slightly heavier clothing , then another month before the Winter duds might be needed . Once the late season sets in I just snuggle up in a comfy lawn chair in my pop-up blind over an alcohol heater and wait for the deer to come in to me . No deer live in my 10 acres of woods , but once they hoover up all the acorns in the surrounding woods , which there aren't much of since I live in the middle of several farms , my place is the next place they come to for their vittles .

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Well anytime I feel like complaining about the weather, I'm gonna remember some of theses posts. I hunt in WV and it really is not that bad in regard to temps too hot or cold. This year was the coldest we have had in a while (one day was about 17 with a 15 mph wind)

Once you shoot a deer though in WV, the drag is usually always up-hill....at least where I hunt. This is probably my biggest complaint. Other than that WV is "Almost Heaven" when it comes to hunting..........IMO

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

Amen Gus,
Although the Friday after Thanksgiving was downright polar. I'll take the 15-40 degrees anytime after some of the stuff i hear about on here.
Now pulling the deer uphill I can do without but it if your are going to hunt WV you are going to be draggin a deer uphill.

RE: Things that are wrong with southern hunting
 

heck man ; in my part of the state in the swamps ; the only thing we have to look for art the"GATORS" , they have eaten everything else.;) [8D] [&:] [&:]. some times now the worst thing to watch for are the bobie traps the drug dealers have set to protect there crops.[:@][:@][:@][:@]