The day started out like any other autumn weekend.  I loaded my hunting buddy, Tucker (a brittany), some water, food and the usual necessities for a short day of pheasant hunting, into my Suburban and headed off into the beautiful North Dakota countryside. 

Now, I said I was driving a Suburban, so it’s a given that I needed to get fuel, so I drove a few blocks to the nearest convienience store and started to gas up, leaving Tucker roaming in the cab, all the while wearing his flourecenent orange/yellow protective vest.   I noticed a car pull up next to my truck and a few times I noticed the passenger of the vehicle pointing at my dog and talking to the driver, who had gotten out to put fuel in the car.

I went inside to pick up a few last-minute provisions and pay and strolled back out to the truck.  The car that had been fueling next to me started to pull away, but stopped once it got past my Suburban.  I was approached by the passenger, who said she was admiring my dog while I was in the store.

To fully set the scene, I was dressed in hunting brush pants with protective layers on the front, a hunting shirt with a pheasant on the pocket and several orange patches on the shoulders and forearms.  Tucker had a protective vest, electronic collar and a bell (so I can tell where he is in heavy cover).  There was an unloaded shotgun on the front seat, a box of shells on the dashboard, a P.L.O.T.S. map on the center arm of the seat, and binoculars in the passenger seat.

The lady approached me and in a very pleasant manner asked if she could see Tucker.  I called him to the front seat, and he greeted her like he does everyone, rear-end waving back and forth and eagerly waiting to be petted.  She said she noticed the vest and asked if he was a rescue dog.  I said that we were headed out hunting, and the vest was so I could see him better and also to protect his coat and underside from fences and tangles.

Her demeanor instantly changed from pleasant to hostile.  She stepped back from the dog and me, and squared up, looking ready to argue.

The next words are so ignorant that I couldn’t make them up.  She said, and I quote, “How can you FORCE that dog to hunt?”

Force?  FORCE?  The last thing I have to do with Tucker to get him out hunting is FORCE him to come with.  She obviously missed the comical display today, or every other day we go hunting.  Tucker gets excited almost to the point of causing damage to our home.  He runs wildly through the house and whines constantly until I get fully dressed and can get him into the truck.  My wife and daughter stand by and laugh as he acts like a kid who can’t wait to go to McDonalds.  There is no FORCING him to go hunting.

I explained all of this to the woman, and she stated that she didn’t care for hunting and feels sorry for these dogs who are pushed beyond their physical means and mistreated. 

I could have done one of two things here.  I could have stayed at the gas station and had a discussion on the merits of hunting, the charateristics of this dog breed, and how my particular dog is treated.  Or, I could just end the discussion and leave, getting on with my fun day spent alone in the prairies of North Dakota with Tucker.

I simply stated that I did not wish to continue this discussion, got in my truck, and drove off.  I didn’t look back to see her expression, or if she had any more to say, but I did stop the truck later down the road to make sure no PETA stickers or other propaganda had been placed on my truck, which hadn’t.

So why write this blog post?  Simply for this… it could happen to you.  I’ve heard of this happening and never though it would be here in North Dakota, where the hunting heritage is pretty much taken for granted.  I thought about how much worse it could have been.  She could have let Tucker loose while I was inside, or worse yet, take him.  She could have sabotaged my vehicle and drove off.  She could have plastered my vehicle with anti-hunting propaganda messages. 

This anti-hunting movement is real.  It is invading further and further each and every day, and if allowed to continue to gain momentum, will destroy a valuable source of taxpayer dollars that go towards conservation, a source of commerce for small-towns  and income for many landowners, and a recreational activity for friends and families across the nation.

I regret not taking more time to argue with this woman, if only to make sure she heard the argument FOR hunting, and for me to continue to hear the counter-arguments.  Educate yourselves, educate your friends, educate your kids, and take your dogs hunting. 

But don’t FORCE them, that would be mean.

I’ve written before about my Brittany, Tucker, and usually have been talking about how well he does out hunting, and how great a companion he is.

But Friday, he was the most defiant, beligerant, simply bad hunting dog I’ve seen in a long time.

It was the weirdest thing.  He didn’t respond to the collar, whistle, or my commands.  He didn’t really concentrate on the CRP.  He just seemed to be content to run around out there and chase rabbits.

I’m really hoping that this was an isolated incident.  He has done this in much lesser degrees in the past, about once a year, so I’m hoping this might be it this year.

The only thing I can think of is that I’ve deer hunted the last couple of weeks and couldn’t take him out, so this was his way to show how pissed off he was for leaving him home with the women while the guys went out into the great North Dakota outdoors.

Have any of you experienced this sort of defiant behavior in your bird dogs?

An article in the New York Times is claiming that scientists have tapped into the brains of deer and they now know how they see.

Sound too good to be true?  I thought so too, but it looks like the makers or Gore-Tex rain gear have found out how to use computer-generated images to camouflage a hunter so well that deer will just simply think there’s nothing there.  Not a tree, not some grass… nothing.

The psychologists who worked with Gore to develop it — Jay Neitz, an animal-vision expert at the Medical College of Wisconsin, and Timothy O’Neill, who pioneered the United States Army’s digital camouflage as a researcher at West Point — say they’re confident the deer will be fooled.

“A camouflage that makes a person look like a tree can work if you’re in a place where other trees look like that,” Dr. Neitz says. “But what if you’re somewhere else, or if the deer sees you move? This new camouflage is a totally different approach. It fools the deer’s vision system at its roots, so that it doesn’t recognize the person as anything.”

Expect the new camo patters to start showing up for next fall’s deer season.

Read the entire NYT article here.

The response from hunters to a postcard reminder to file mandatory reports on deer, elk and pronghorn hunt results overloaded the Idaho Fish and Game Web site and telephone lines on the evening of November 10.

Some hunters were unable to file their reports, and Fish and Game regrets the inconvenience. The problem has been resolved.

It’s important that Fish and Game receives the hunter reports. Hunters may file them online at www.idaho-hunt.com or by telephone at 1 877-268-9365, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. These are the only ways to receive confirmation that the report has been received.

Hunters are required to file a report, even if they didn’t harvest an animal, within 10 days of the kill or the end of the hunting season.

To reduce paper, mailing and postage costs, Fish and Game will send out only one reminder postcard per household. Fish and Game also has eliminated the 80,000 reminder letters that would have gone out in December and January.

Instead Fish and Game will conduct a random telephone survey of some hunters whose reports have not been received after their hunts have ended.

Fish and Game needs the hunter reports in a timely manner to help make decisions for the coming 2009 hunting season. Biologists rely on the reports to estimate the number of animals harvested and the hunter’s success rate.

All reports need to be analyzed by the end of January in time for Fish and Game to make recommendations on season changes by March 2009.

I hate to post things like this, but if this accident can help save lives, it needs to get out.

An upstate toddler was killed by a stray bullet when a New York City deer hunter fired his rifle too close to her grandparents’ Hudson Valley home.

Edward Taibi, 45, of Queens was being held without bail Monday after arraignment on a second-degree manslaughter charge in the town of Bethel court. Taibi was hunting from a tree stand Sunday afternoon in rural Sullivan County when he shot a deer. He came down from the stand and fired the .30-caliber rifle again about 400 feet away from a trailer home in Swan Lake, a small community just south of the Catskill Mountains.

The bullet hit 16-month-old Charly Skala in the upper body. She was flown to Westchester Medical Center, where she died. Police said the child’s parents live in nearby Woodburne.

Taibi is friends with the owner of the neighboring property and had hunted there before, said State Police Lt. Pierce Gallagher.

His case was assigned to the Sullivan Legal Aid Bureau, where attorney Jeff Bradley said Monday it was too soon to comment on the case.

Several neighbors declined comment Monday afternoon when reached by The Associated Press.

The rifle season for deer opened Saturday in the region that includes Sullivan County. Under state law, it’s illegal to discharge a firearm or bow within 500 feet of any occupied residence or business unless the hunter owns or leases the property, or has the owner’s consent, according to Maureen Wren of the state Department of Environmental Conservation.

Swan Lake is about 85 miles northwest of New York City.

Remember everyone, be ABSOLUTELY POSITIVE what is beyond your target before you squeeze that trigger.  This was an accident, but one that may have been preventable.  Mr. Taibi did not try to kill little Charly, but he should have looked beyond to see the trailer home.

Safety first!

The North Dakota deer rifle season started last Friday, November 7th, but a fall blizzard dumped 9-15 inches of snow across most of the western part of the state, paralyzing much of the deer hunting.

I personally didn’t leave my home in Mandan until late Friday for Dickinson, and didn’t get any hunting in that day.

What I saw on Saturday was nothing short of amazing.  With the cutting of much of the CRP, and many of the draws and tree rows snowed over, herds of whitetail deer were sprinkled across the landscape, sometimes gathering 30-50 at a time.  Of course they were miles away from the main roads, and the section lines were blow in and impassible (see image above).

Even the pheasants were forced out of the cover in an attempt to get warm and find food.  After seeing literally thousands of pheasants in the fields I had to take a photo out the window. You’ll have to click on it to enlarge, but this is a small sampling of the number of birds forced from habitat due to the weather.

Now, back to the deer hunting.

We knew that to get to the deer we would have to take some chances and walk in to the back side of some hills.  But since the roads were in such tough shape, that meant walking in, and back out, all through wind-blown hard-packed snow that was waist deep at times.

But then we saw the muley.  He was standing on posted land, proud as hell, at the end of a tree row.  He was watching some does, and seemed oblivious to the traffic on the road to his west.

After debating for nearly an hour, I finally decided to call the landowner and get permission.  He generously granted us access, and less than 1/2 hour later, he was down.

At 39 years old I finally got my first mule deer, and the biggest deer I’ve ever shot.  He’s not a monster by any means, but a respectable buck for my area and North Dakota in general.

Take a look.

Remember that monster whitetail that was videoed in Wisconsin a couple of weeks back?

Well, if you don’t here’s the video.

And now to the real star of this post… the GUY WHO SHOT THAT DEER!

Yep, that’s right kids, that deer on the video was harvested in Wisconsin, with a bow, by Mr. Bob Decker.  Congrats Bob on a massive whitetail!

Image from www.leadertelegram.com

I’ve lived in North Dakota most all of my life.  During that time I’ve lived in four different cities, and have hunted and fished in most of the rest.

And yet nearly every weekend during hunting season I get lost… and love every minute of it.

Patrick McMannus wrote several stories about the art of getting lost.

You see, the best part of being lost in North Dakota is that you can only do it once in a particular location.  Our state is criss-crossed with neatly layed out minimum maintenance “section” lines, marking 1 mile units of land.  In the rare case that a landowner has plowed up a section line or the road has disappeared due to non-use, you just drive to the second mile.

And while I have my usual hunting spots and landmarks, occasionally I see that section line I haven’t been on before, and it looks like it will get me where I want to be, so I take it.  But it doesn’t always work out.

Yesterday I ended up on a road I had never been on.  And then another, and another, and another until I ended up taking a 10-mile drive to the very point I had started.

But was it worth the drive?  Yep.  First, I learned never to take that road again.  But more importantly, I saw some amazing country (unfortunatly posted) that was home to some whitetail does, a lonely coyote, a couple of rooster pheasants, and one really big snow owl.  If I hadn’t taken that little detour I wound’t have seen any of those things.

But have I ever been in danger being lost in ND?   Yes.  Hunting in the Badlands of SW North Dakota, I got caught in a freak snow storm.  The day started out at 60 degrees and we were hunting turkeys.  The hunt took us about two miles from the road and then the temp dropped and it started to rain.  And then it started snowing. Not “normal” snow, but that huge-flake, stick-to-anything type of snow.  And within minutes the entire countryside was covered with a sparkling blanket of fresh snow.

For a moment, I was pretty scared.  I tried to find the vehicle, or the road, or anything that might give us a hint on how to get back.  No luck, so I had to scramble up a clay butte, not an easy task carrying a shotgun and in fresh Badlands mud, and start looking.  Minutes went by as I scanned the countryside with my binoculars, and then I saw it… a telephone pole.  That had to be by the road, so I scanned right and saw another, and then a few more, and after a few moments I saw what looked like two tires.   My truck had been completely covered with the sticky snow, except for the tires and a small spot on the windshield.

We started the 2-mile hike back to the truck, got in and got the hell out of there.

That was scary, and could have been life threatening in a more extreme circumstance.  But it illustrates the best part of being lost… the story.  If you don’t get lost, you don’t have any stories.

So go ahead, get lost once in a while.  You might see someting interesting, and you’ll have something to talk about next time you and your buddies get together.

I’m not an overly religious man, so take this little story I’m about to tell you any way you like.

We were hunting west of Dickinson, ND this weekend, and noticed that in the middle of a CRP field there was a stell crucifix welded to a metal fence post and stuck in the ground.  We didn’t think much of it, but asked the landowner when we got back and he told us a little story.

Seems that in the 60’s his grandfather owned the land, and year after year his crop and home were damaged by extreme hail, a staple of mid-summer North Dakota weather.

Out of desperation, he welded a crucifix to a metal fence post and stuck it in the middle of his field. 

And, if you believe him, the field and the house have not been victimized by any hail damage since.  No crop claims, not damage to homes or vehicles, nothing.

Now whether you believe the story or not isn’t important to me.  I’m sure there’s been hail on the property.  There might even been a few storms that left some vehicles dented or some corn knocked over. 

But here’s the real important part.  You don’t get to hear stories like that unless you put yourself in a position to hear them.  I’ve driven past the field 1,000 times and never saw the cross.  Once you’re knee-deep in CRP and see a cross in the center of it you just have to get the story.  Getting outdoors and aquiring stories like this is what makes hunting a unique endeavor.  It provides a mechanism for people of different cultures and livelihoods to mingle and share experiences.

The Bismarck Tribune is reporting that a legend in Dakota hunting and fishing died Sunday at 67 years old.

Tony Dean (pictured) was the host of several television and radio shows, and also contributed to numerous websites and magazines, including TonyDean.com and Dakota Country Magazine.

He was a champion of the North and South Dakota sportsmen, and a staunch defender of conservation.  His mellow voice will be dearly missed on tv and radio, and his biting intelligence will leave a void in the defense of the welfare of habitat and wildlife.

I’ve always said that Mr. Dean had it figured out.  Somehow he managed to figure out a way to make a living hunting and fishing the Great Plains.  It seems unfair that his life was cut short by something as trivial as an appendix surgery.

Dean won more than 160 regional and national awards for his programs. He also served as a press secretary for former South Dakota Gov. Frank Farrar.

Godspeed Tony Dean.  You have enriched the lives of so many, and will live on in our memories.

Below is a link to Tony’s last Dakota Backroads audio show from 10/3/2008.

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