Grow the Hunt

My First Camping Trip

-By Brandon Wikman

As the summer heat begins to slowly melt into the coming fall season, there’s no better time than now to plan a camping trip with a friend or family!

I’ve put camping on the backburner for years. I’ve always wanted to camp somewhere other than my backyard. Last week my cousin and I finally said that enough was enough! We packed our tents, clothes, cooler, and food into the truck and headed to northern Wisconsin. The woodland parks of Wisconsin provide exceptional campsites for the public to enjoy. Camping out under the stars with a stoked and blazing fire nearby is what makes the outdoors surreal.

I assigned my cousin, Joe, to select a town where we’d stake camp. He picked a small village on the map that was known for a few of the finer things in life; camping, fishing, and tourist attractions. I was extremely excited to hear him say Hayward, Wis,!

Thousands of outdoor enthusiasts venture north every summer to experience the outdoorsy atmosphere Hayward provides. Barely 2,500 people call the city home, but the economy booms with forest loving campers, savvy fishermen, and a frenzy of visitors to the National Freshwater Fishing Hall of Fame.

Joe and I arrived at a local campground during the mid-morning. I unpacked the truck, while he pitched the tents. It was such a great feeling to be doing something I always wanted to experience, but never had the opportunity. The reason that my cousin and I never could make arrangements was because of conflicting work schedules, school, and other events planned during the typical frantic summer. We made up for lost time by planning an entire three days worth of sightseeing, fishing, and relaxing.

The first day we visited the National Freshwater Fishing Hall of Fame, where the world’s largest musky sculpture sits. The museum showcased an array of beautiful aquariums that detailed hundreds of fish species. A collection of ancient fishing lures hung vibrantly in every shape and size imaginable. The museum was a great escape into the world of fishing, which sparked an ambition to head to the nearest lake and try our luck.

Our campsite was conveniently located near a lakeshore and provided a perfect chance to sink a few lures into the water. We grabbed our fishing poles and fished off the beach. Joe and I fished for the entire evening pulling in schools of small bass. Each bass we caught was tossed back into the water. The glowing sunset foreboded darkness, which forced us back to the campsite where we started our fire and prepared dinner. The only proper dinner for two young men camping is hot dogs and bratwursts over an open flame.

We roasted our makeshift dinner over the glowing embers and flames with laughs of memories. A collection of deer hunting stories, good times, and bad times entertained our minds as we enjoyed the final scraps of our hearty dinner. It was an experience that soothed the soul and brought us both back to the wonderful world of the woods.

Camping is an enriching experience that brings you closer to not only Mother Nature, but also your loved ones. It provides an up close and personal intimacy with the forest that revitalizes the soul. Make your next vacation a camping trip. Bring a tent, backpack full of clothes, marshmallows, chocolate, and graham crackers for s’mores and leave with a greater appreciation for the outdoors!

Special Offer from Code Blue

Code Blue is offering a free bottle of Code Blue Buck Urine with the purchase of a Drop Time Scent Dispenser. This is a deadly combination during the early season. Trail the Code Blue Buck Urine into your stand, set the Drop Time to run in twenty-minute intervals and hang it near your stand.

Bucks run in bachelor groups throughout the summer while they are still in velvet. While they are in these bachelor groups bucks establish a kind of pecking order that will help determine what buck in the group is going to be the dominant one, but they also familiarize themselves with the other bucks in the group.

Deer are naturally curious animals so when you use Code Blue Buck Urine in the early bow season, bucks will come investigate and see who the new kid on the block is.

Take advantage of this great deal. Offer expires 7/30/09.

Redfish Redemption

-By Rich Miller

Friday afternoon my wife, my little boy, and I were packed in the truck and heading to Edisto Island for the weekend. They were going to hang out on the beach while my buddy Mark, his father Bobby, and I were going to try to get some revenge on the reds that put it on me last month. I couldn’t wait until we got there. Mark kept calling me last weekend telling me that I should be there and all about the fish he was catching.

As we were getting closer to the island on Friday the skies were looking darker, and by the time we hit the little town of Ravenel the clouds unloaded on us. It was raining so hard we had to slow to a crawl. When we finally arrived at Mark’s, the storms were still in the area and they hung around until dark. The storms had knocked us out of an afternoon of fishing.

Saturday morning, we were easing the boat off of the trailer as the sun was starting to make its daily appearance. The wind was blowing out of the south and seemed to be blowing hard, as it normally does down there. We started off at one of Mark’s hot spots that we call Big Buck Point. We call it that because the first time he and his dad fished there a big buck ran across the marsh and came right by them.

The week before Mark had caught several fish at Big Buck Point and it is usually a productive area. As we started fishing, I think it was Mark’s second cast, he caught a flounder. Even though it wasn’t big enough to keep, it gave us a positive start. As the day went on the water kept getting dingier until it turned just plain muddy. We were not sure why it was so muddy. We didn’t know if it was the wind or the incoming tide, but we couldn’t get the fish to do anything.

After moving around a few times we were able to find some water that was a little clearer. By this time the tide had come in and we were looking for fish tailing in the grass while feeding on fiddler crabs. The water was clearer at this place but the wind was still blowing, and that made it difficult to see the fish. After poling around for nearly an hour we spotted several fish feeding and tried to get as close to them as possible. After making several cast to them they just disappeared and we never saw another fish.

Determined not to let the fish get the best of us we were back on the water Sunday morning bright and early. We didn’t go back to Big Buck Point because the wind was blowing hard again. We opted for a spot that we thought might be protected from the wind with hopes that the water might not be so muddy.

We were fishing an incoming tide and the water was just starting to get up on the oyster banks when I caught a flounder that was about 16-inches, and finally the monkey was off of my back. After I landed the flounder the fishing turned on. Bobby caught a trout and I had another flounder on, but this one came off right at the boat. Not too long after that Mark caught a keeper redfish and before lunch we had caught several more reds that were keepers and a couple more that were too big to keep.

Now isn’t this our luck? The fish were really eating it up Sunday and we didn’t have very long to fish because Bobby and I had a long drive back to Anderson ahead of us.

As the tide started getting into the grass, we left this spot and ran back to where we could see the fish tailing. When we pulled up, the wind died down and the water was clear. We spotted a few fish but they spooked as soon as we cast to them. We started heading out to the point where we had seen the fish tailing on Saturday and I was just blindly casting along the edge of the grass when I had a monster red come out of the grass and inhale my Yum Money Minnow swim bait. It was on! As we got him in the boat we knew right away that he was way too big to keep, and while I was releasing him, Bobby made a cast in the same little area. As soon as his bait hit the water it was inhaled by an 18-inch red that was a keeper.

By this time our wives were waiting on us to load the cars and hit the road so we headed to the landing feeling pretty good about our live well full of fish, especially after the kind of day we had on Saturday.

It is amazing how different the fish can be in just one day. The good thing is that we had some fish to bring home on this trip. It would have been a long ride home knowing that I had spent another weekend down there and still had not caught a fish. Not to mention I would have had to listen to Mark and Bobby tell me how I brought them bad luck. Instead, in the closing hours of the trip I got what I had driven down there for, a little “redfish redemption”!

Making Summer Successful

-By Brandon Wikman

Summer seems to strike a golden chord with savvy archers awaiting the opener. It is a time when we prep ourselves mentally and physically for the dawning of a new season that lies only weeks ahead. Our goals are set, anticipation is high, and now we sit tight, holding on to last year’s cherished memories. These recollections will soon evolve into this year’s fresh moments of enlightenment as we move into the later stages of summer.

This time of the year is always my most difficult time to cope with. Like many hunters, my calendar counts down the days until opening weekend of archery season. Deer season couldn’t come any sooner, but as it often does for many of us, by September we are wishing we’d put an extra few days of planting food plots, checking cameras, and scouting. Instead of daydreaming about the season, take action to make it the best hunt of your life by successfully preparing a game plan.

During different stages of the day, my mind departs and wanders into the forest. My imagination strolls down deer trails, overlooks hunting property from a birds-eye-view, and plants rich food plots in areas I’d never step camouflage boot in. During the afternoon grind reality splinters the ceiling of my office into tiny fragments of ideas and chunks of drywall clobber me over the head bringing an unsettled ambition to create one more nutritious plot, hang another stand, and burn more gas taking rides around the block with my binoculars strung around my neck. It is these small innovations of strategy that will make us all more successful hunters.

During the next few weeks I will be taking advantage of the extra time by hanging a few more stands around a freshly planted food plot that will be monitored by my handy game camera. Deer are constantly mowing greens right now. You will find bucks juicing-up on protein rich foods that will help them build muscle for the November brawls that lie ahead. Does are not so different. They are inhaling masses of soybean, alfalfa, and clover, which helps them feed their young. I’ve always found that placing my trail camera along field edges during this time of year yields many more photos.

As the shadows of dusk blanket the horizon, mature whitetails step foot into the limelight. It is a perfect time burn a few miles and ignite buck fever by driving around the areas you hunt. I will often times park behind brush or a wall of trees to remain hidden as I drool at the velvet covered bone from the eye-piece of my spotting scope. There’s nothing like glassing fields that are speckled with monster whitetail and knowing your tree stand’s only yards away. You must ask yourself, “Are you ready?”

Many hunters sit back and relax as opening day pulls the carpet from beneath their spotless boots. Prepare yourself now so you can pull the rug from beneath that buck’s hooves!

Minimum Age Requirements for Hunters?

We ran across a post on the Winded Bowhunter’s web site. After reading an article on MSNBC regarding the minimum age requirements for hunters, he posed an interesting question: Should there be an age requirement for hunting without supervision?

We all want to pass down the hunting tradition and, as many hunters know, your first trip into the woods alone is a right of passage.

Do you think that there should be laws that set a minimum age to hunt without supervision? If so, what should the age be? Or, should the decision be left up to parents? Sign in and let us know what you think.

Bluegrass Breakdown

-By Rich Miller

Last week I was invited to Kentucky for a Knight & Hale Pro Staff meeting. I was really excited about going up there for several reasons. We were going to be checking out the new products for next year and I was going to get to see and hang out with some of my good friends from across the country that I don’t see very often. The meeting was held at the awesome Whitetail Creek Lodge. Other than our meetings we shot our bows on the 3-D range, fished in the pond right in front of our cabin, and thanks to Jim Strelec we ate like kings every afternoon; that man can do wonders with a black iron pot and open flame.

While I was there having a great time with all of my friends, my truck decided that it didn’t want to cooperate anymore and something in the motor was making it bellow white smoke from the exhaust. Being six hours away from home wasn’t the place for this to happen. After calling several different dealerships it was determined that I wasn’t going to be going home on Sunday as planned. It was going to be at least Tuesday before they could get it fixed.

Even though I was a long way from home I guess it could have been worse because I did have my good friend Jim Strelec there. He offered me a place to stay until my truck was ready for the road again. Since I was going to be there with nothing else to do I figured I might as well make it as productive as possible and check out some of the local hunting opportunities.

In this day and age hunting clubs, outfitters, and leasing land can be tough on a hunter’s wallet. I have always been a do-it-yourself type hunter whether it is deer, duck, or turkey hunting. I have found places all across the country and have had pretty good success on public ground for all types of game. It requires a little work and research, but there are places out there and many of the people that use them are not going to talk about them and give away their secrets. Some of these areas are draw hunts and you have to apply for them early, but there are also a lot of over the counter tags available.

After talking to couple of people in the area I found out about an area that is known as the Land Between the Lakes in Kentucky. It is somewhere in the neighborhood of 170,000 acres that for the most part is all open to the public. So I got a map and with some help from Jim and his pickup we did some riding and scouting. It didn’t take long before we started seeing deer pretty regularly in some of the fields and crossing the roads. Everywhere we went it was beautiful and looked as if the place had been made for deer and turkey. The bottoms were grown up in native grasses or either planted in corn with hardwood ridges bounding up each side full of virgin hardwoods. I found several great looking areas that will be good places to start looking if I get to come back this fall. From talking to some of the locals I feel like a hunter has the opportunity to take a trophy class animal while hunting there.

Tags can be purchased over the counter and are pretty reasonably priced for the opportunity to hunt deer of this caliber. When planning these do-it-yourself hunts add a couple of extra days to scout and learn the areas so you can try to pinpoint the animals before you waste your time hunting unproductive areas. Another trick is to contact the state wildlife department and find out when the rut normally occurs and plan your hunt around that time. This kind of hunting is going to require a lot of foot work but for the hunter who can’t afford the high dollar outfitters a hunt like this can turn into a hunt of a lifetime. If you make this an annual trip with a couple of hunting buddies it will get better every year from the knowledge that you gain from the previous years. Like I have always said you can’t kill’em sitting at home on the couch, so give yourself a chance and get in the woods!

Opening Weekend at Wik's World Camp

-By Brandon Wikman

Months of endless planning, tireless preparation, and continuous perseverance made last weekend’s camp a total success. A classroom full of eager kids and a handful of great volunteers helped create a once in a lifetime experience for the next generation of outdoors people.

This marked the 2nd annual Wik’s World Outdoors Camp experience. Now that I had the first year under my belt and a firm understanding of scheduling, seminars, and interactive sessions, I was able to create an entire day’s worth of outdoors lessons.

I added a few new demonstrations and attractions to this year’s camp. A new addition to the seminar room was the replica of Bob Decker’s giant deer, which was shot last fall in Buffalo County, Wisconsin. The hunting community knew the walking Wisconsin record throughout last summer by its nickname, which was called the legendary Field and Stream Buck. Decker was kind enough to let me showcase his Wisconsin non-typical record whitetail at the camp for hundreds of dazzled eyes to see. The buck scored a whopping 233-¼ inches. Teenagers stood motionless in awe gazing at the famous buck. It gave kids a new meaning to how big whitetail can grow.

This year also benchmarked an assortment of entirely new sessions for participants to engage in. The camp offers a program for people to learn how to photograph their trophy deer or turkey. We give great instructions on how to clean up the expired animal, how to position it for eye-pleasing pictures, and also what to look for in an aesthetic frame of mind.

The importance and understanding of deer calling is another critical topic we unveiled this year. We teach campers the basic fundamentals of calling techniques, vocabulary, and when to use each type of call. Campers are able to grunt, snort, and wheeze their way through the 20-minute demo and learn how to coax a monster buck into range. Deer calling wasn’t the only new tips and techniques section that was added.

We were lucky enough to have a professional game trapper and antique collector brief kids on the sport of trapping. Bob White of Adams, Wisconsin, brought a truckload of different traps that ranged in sizes, shapes, and styles. Many of his traps date back to the late 1800’s. He collects all kinds of fascinating gear and products that the kids absolutely loved.

The day ends with a blast, boom, and bang as we break out the shotguns and bust clay pigeons. Many participants have never had the opportunity of firing bb’s into the fragile orange colored disk gliding through the air. During the first few attempts, the clay pigeons left the thrower untouched. By the time we wrapped the session up, there were clay pigeon fragments scattered everywhere. It only took a little practice before the kids found there mark and became confident behind the shotgun.

As the day came to a close after hours of learning how to scout for deer, minimize human odor, score antler, build food plots, and position stands, the parents arrived to join our pizza party, award ceremony, and shopped at the Wik’s World Gear store. The exclusive camp store offers breathtaking woodcarvings that were custom crafted by the hands of Kurt Mallo, who owns Burnt Elk Log Décor. I also added a Wik’s World line of clothing apparel alongside my good friend, Dan Schafer’s famous Rut Junkie line.

Opening weekend of camp was an absolute blast for instructors, participants, and myself. I will be hosting the event for the next three weekends and anticipate more instructive learning, shared memories, and times well spent in the outdoors with good people.

Late Season Food Plot Prep

Jacob Edison, Managing Editor for Deer and Deer Hunting Magazine just posted a blog on the Rub Line reminding hunters that now is the time to start preparing your late season food plots by spraying them. Killing off the warm-season grasses from your late-season food plots now will make them that much easier to put in the ground at the end of the month.

Be sure to check out our complete line of ATV sprayers.

Whitetail Vocabulary Lesson

-By Brandon Wikman

Whitetail deer have a wide assortment of both verbal and nonverbal means of communication. They’re language and lingo has been carefully studied by animal biologists since the early years of the late 1800’s. Deer have a very unique style of engaging in conversation. Many of us have already heard of the basic converse from deer to deer. A whitetail’s vocabulary ranges from bleats, grunt, bellows, and bawls. The list below details the most popular whitetail dialect. You will generate a fresh idea of deer verbalization and a typical time frame of season they communicate.

Contact Call - Also referred to as the ‘lost call.’ The contact call can be matched to the idea of the kee-kee-run call made by wild turkey. Both whitetail and turkey share the same concepts of locating fellow members of their family or group. A doe will make a loud and deep bleat two to three times every 15 minutes. You may use this calling technique as a way to mimic a confused doe. It is perfect to use while walking into your setup to cover your noise while still-hunting. Deer usually speak this language during the pre-rut, which runs throughout the entire month of October.

Doe Grunts - Differ from buck grunts in several ways. Doe grunts are a deer’s way of saying “Hey…come here.” The doe grunt is used to persuade fellow deer in the area to come. You must keep this calling technique soft to mimic the call perfectly. The louder you make the grunt, the more aggressive it sounds. Doe have been known to use this lingo throughout the month of October as well.

Breeding Bellow - One of my favorite calls. This hyper doe gurgle will be heard during the heat of the rut. Many people think that the bellow and the “estrous bleat” are the same. The converse differentiates greatly; in fact, the ‘estrous bleat’ means, “I will be ready to breed soon.” The bellow means, “I’m ready to breed right now!” I’ve used this calling technique with the combination of rattling to coax in many mature bucks. You will not hear doe make this call during the early season. The primary time of this communication will be heard during the breeding season in November.

Tending Grunt - Another breeding-style call made by high-strung bucks. The grunt is a rapid succession of mini-grunts in a staccato pattern. You may have heard this call while sitting in your tree stand and suddenly catch a glimpse of a buck trailing a doe. A buck will typically produce 10-20 soft tending grunts during any moment of chase. I’ve watched many professional hunters on video mimic this call with a follow-up of an estrous bleat leading into a rattling session.

One key of success to the art of calling is to create a surreal situation. Adding realism in your calling will give you the upper hand when calling to deer that have been called to before. Be creative and try new strategies. I’ve heard of people scratching the bark off the tree you’re sitting in with antlers when rattling. My cousin has dropped rocks from his stand to mock the sounds of hoof traffic before banging together antlers of tossing out grunts.

Game calling has always been popular in duck and turkey hunting. Bring your grunt tube into the woods during every hunt. You never know when you may want to break it out and bring the big buck into range!

Pre-Season Chores

Mark Kayser recently posted a blog on Outdoor Life’s Big Buck Zone reminding us that whitetail archery season is just around the corner, starting within the next two months in most places. Check out the list of chores that he posted that need to be done now if you want to put your tag on an early season buck.

What type of chores do you “Grow the Hunt” readers have left to do?