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Legacy- 2016 Deer Season

Legacy

Legacy
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whaler1

whaler1

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Yes, it is trouble. I don't even scroll through the news feed anymore. If I see a post on the top I may like or comment, but that's it. I use it very little now. It's amazing how less irritated I am now, if you could believe that.lol

Lake Ontario salmon fishing charters

Face book doesn't exist in my house and I have three kids in college. It's never been in my house. Same deal with video games. Was never a rule against either, just never came in the door.

Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United

Xxx

Xxx

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I use sassafras for pepper sticks, jerky, hickory for ring bologna, I don't use any smoke to make hotdogs

BigWilly

BigWilly

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Ckawaki I decided to go with the hickory on these pepperoni sticks.

Marinating now in casings !!post-152786-14823718531439_thumb.jpg

2 hr dry in smoker no smoke to start at a 100* and then up it 20* and 2 to 3 hrs of smoke till its 140* then gona kill the smoke and get the internal temp to 155* to 160*.

Ice cold water to stop internal cooking temp and then hang !!

Stay tuned !

Any input is appreciated and thank you in advance.

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BigWilly

BigWilly

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Thank you!! Looking forward to it!!

We added pork fat trimmings and some fatty ground pork also and reground and mixed everything a couple times to before cure and seasonings and then mixed again and filled casings.

Next is summer sausage and snack sticks !!

Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United

Edited by BigWilly
Xxx

Xxx

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My old school smoke time is 30 to 45 mins. last time I smoked anything 2 hrs it tasted like the inside of a chimney. I'm not saying that's to long as I use a smoke house with green wood that may be more pungent? I tried the Cabela's brand stuff for a friend and used their directions they weren't fit to feed to the dog. My personal beliefs are these directions are for the small personal smokers. Not the outside wood stove pumping smoke into the house at 120 degrees with propane 30thou.btu with 25 to 50 pounds hanging!! When I make ring Bologna for the gun club I do 100lbs takes 3 1/2- 4hrs. LOL hope they tast as good as they look. Those casings mahogany colored? and I assume collagen, their the best, you don't have to worry about those splitting if the heat gets up on ya, that's why I have a 3" exhaust with a damper, so I can let heat out quick!! and I run the damper 1/2 open as the smoke pushes the moisture out of the meat and that moist air can escape, can't dry meat to a certain extent with 60% humidity inside. Best of luck smoking!!! It's legal.

Duckman1

Duckman1

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Willy i let the mixing set for a day in fridge and stuff and set another day. Yiu dont want to soak them in water. Iy will get into casing. I have always sprayed cold water on them untill they get down in temp then air dry with fan, refrigerate for a couple of days then freeze and eat. Another trick is when defrosting them wrap them in paper towel and defrost in fridge.

BigWilly

BigWilly

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Thanks for all the pointers very much appreciated. I am using a small 30" masterbuilt smoker.

No big smoke house by no means.

Lol. The casings are fiberus casings not the collagen casings.

Thanks Pap and Duckman1 !!

Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United

Xxx

Xxx

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Ah you went one step stronger, yea I can't remember the last time I ate whole pepperoni!! your on the right track, I thought a few times about getting one of those, but all I got was No Way DAD!! Your stuffs the best and it's not going to tast the same!! So I guess you know who won!! LOL even if I only do 15 pounds of jerky, which they like the sweet hot, I go through the same steps to get the final outcome. I do have a question for you fella's, do they exhaust smoke? Like could you do it in your garage?

Edited by pap
BigWilly

BigWilly

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Ah you went one step stronger, yea I can't remember the last time I ate whole pepperoni!! your on the right track, I thought a few times about getting one of those, but all I got was No Way DAD!! Your stuffs the best and it's not going to tast the same!! So I guess you know who won!! LOL

Pap I hope my kid says the same thing.

The only meat she will eat is "deer meat" as she calls it. Lol

I'm headed out to lite the smoker now.

Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United

BigWilly

BigWilly

Posted
Posted

Ah you went one step stronger, yea I can't remember the last time I ate whole pepperoni!! your on the right track, I thought a few times about getting one of those, but all I got was No Way DAD!! Your stuffs the best and it's not going to tast the same!! So I guess you know who won!! LOL

Pap I hope my kid says the same thing.

The only meat she will eat is "deer meat" as she calls it. Lol

I'm headed out to lite the smoker now.

Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United

Xxx

Xxx

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Pap I hope my kid says the same thing.

The only meat she will eat is "deer meat" as she calls it. Lol

I'm headed out to lite the smoker now.

Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United

That's really cool though!! My two ate everything under the sun, now there 12 going on 21, now it's I don't like this, that the other thing. Starting to get under my skin!! I know you two never acted like this before, must be a girly school thing?

BigWilly

BigWilly

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Pap I had it it like you did.

If you don't clean your plate off totally no matter what it is your nite was over go to bed. Or sit there and squeeze your nose fork it up and swallow !!!! Lol.

I to had split pea soup days that where ruff. Lmao

Green beans were tuff nites for me.

Lol. My 4 yr old daughter hunts with me fishes with me we catch frogs,crayfish, snakes, you name it she loves it!! She has no problem running a skidsteer sitting on my lap or standing up in front of me and drive a 100 hp + Ag full cab tractor pulling a 4 bottom or discs or planter. She also loves picking rocks in the spring out the fields cause she always finds cool ones for her collection. Lol.

If I load a deer in my truck you can bet she is helping push it into to the bed of the truck!!

With out me asking she loves

" boy days ". LOL

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DJ 17

DJ 17

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My twin 5 year olds love to clean fish. Daniel likes to hand them over so they can be fileted and his sister Kyleigh just has to touch the eyes of every fish!  They also love to help in the garden or whatever other chores need to be done.  They are getting the idea that the sooner the work gets done, the sooner we all get to play.  Last week I was running the snowb lower and they were each on a shovel working on the steps and the garage doors. Love it!

Xxx

Xxx

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Man that's super guys, mine were like that up to last year!! Now everything's gross, feels slimy, I believe this is school related, buy others that never did this before. So pier pressure is a factor. Before they had never acted like this. They had both hands in the blood, and gutted their own fish, now everything is gross, I know they are capable just can't stand this negative attitude. Hope it's just a fad their going through.for now they are showing kind of normal activity!! I hope It's over The boat that's another story! My girls are twins also. 11 years old going to be 12 in February

Edited by pap
Legacy

Legacy

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Well, put another season in the books! Its crazy how long the season seems and then just like that, its over. Im sure my wife is glad its over! Nice thing about deer season is it cuts the off season for fishing in half. So we will be fishing in 3 months!

This season has been a lot different for me. I took a different approach and decided to stop playing around and get very aggressive this year. I saw a record number of deer this season and I owe it to being aggressive. I stopped being conservative with sets and just put them where I thought they needed to be. This year I moved more stands in season then I ever have in all other years combined. Although it didnt exactly put deer on the ground for me it did give me chances that I would have never had. No doubt a grunt tube continues to be the best tool in my pack. It was responsible for putting 3 shooters within bow range of my tree (2 during bow season and one during gun season). I did not seal the deal with any of those three deer but it solidified the importance of calling and how effective it really is. Dont ever leave home without it. Cameras have also become an important part of the game. The truth is you cant shoot them if they arent there and cameras prove this. Used correctly, they really can be great tool to help you judge your resident deer herd.

 

Here's some great camera footage on a primary scrape

 

Here's some season highlights

 

The biggest moments of the season came from sharing the woods with my 14 year old kid. With two seasons under his belt, one of my goals this year was to get him in a good position to harvest his first deer. On October 3, he started off the season by missing a 6pt with his bow. His quote to me after missing was I never felt my heart beat so fast, I guess thats what they call buck fever. Wow that happened fast A couple weeks later during youth weekend he missed a doe. Mid October and hes 0 for 2. But he stuck with it. He saw a bunch of deer in bow season and later he was busted drawing his bow on a doe. But it finally came together for him during the regular season and he shot a 7pt and a button buck on opening morning. Pretty awesome dad/son moment!! That made my season. One thing that is important that I did realize during the season is that I needed to make sure that I was promoting hunting properly to him. I certainly dont want him thinking he needs to shoot a Pope & Young buck to be considered successful and I refuse to give him restrictions on what he can harvest. Someday he will enter my hunting grounds with the same QDM ideology but not anytime soon. I will continue to teach him about QDM but I think its important for him to enjoy success and let him naturally strive for bigger deer. The best news for me is this past year, I really saw him anticipating the upcoming season and now that hes had a bit of success I know hes hooked!!!

 

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To my surprise, I didnt lay eyes on a shooter buck until October 30. I had a dozen shooters on camera from a six different properties but yet zero daylight footage. The action that the first half of bow season lacked, the second half made up for. From October 30- November 18, I laid eyes 15 shooters (this includes multiple sightings of the same bucks). I had repeated run ins with a big 8pt. The first time, I grunted him into bow ranged but he approached me from downwind and quickly figured me out. After two more sightings, I hung a stand on his entry point to the field. The second night in the set, I spotted him walking the deer trail just inside the woods that is parallel to the field. Some aggressive grunting got his attention, he made a scrape, and he quickly walked out to the field. My arrow sailed a foot over his back and I missed him at 31 yards after clipping a branch. It was a brand new stand and I never really did much trimming. That would be the only shot I took during the archery season. Plenty of chances at does but in the end, archery season = tag soup. Lots of chasing this year. I had over a dozen days that I witnessed chasing this year and that was more than I have ever seen in the woods. One of those days was Thanksgiving morning. I could hear the chaos of chasing in the thicket behind me and caught a glimpse of the biggest buck I have on camera this season. After they disappeared, I picked up the grunt tube and started doing a series of tending grunts. Before I had a chance to put the call down I had a very wide racked, short tined, shooter 10 point run to my tree. He looked like he hit a brick wall once he caught my wind and was gone before I knew what to do. Shotgun season has a tendency to burn me out and after the first week, I gave myself some time off. The last couple of weeks of the regular season I only hunted a handful of times. Once again I had my chances at does but in the end, regular season = tag soup. I was optimistic for muzzleloader season because with snow on the ground, deer would be easy to pattern. Prime food sources are the answer and I was pretty sure I had one. The second afternoon of the muzzleloader season I had a 150 class buck walk across the north end of the field. As I reached for my binoculars, I lost sight of him in the woods. With all of my attention on where he was I didnt notice the doe standing 50 yards to my right. Once it raised its head, I quickly realized that it wasnt a doe but instead a shooter buck. He continued out into the field and gave me a 55 yard broadside shot. My first kill with a muzzleloader and my biggest buck to date. No tag soup for me! With all tags valid I continued to hunt that same setup in hopes of another shot at that giant. On the last hunt of the season he made another appearance. Almost step for step where he walked a week ago but he made his way across the field with no chance at a shot. Great deer to see to end the season though!

 

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PICT0045_zps2h9eenuh.jpg

 

 

My season in numbers

Bow Season

October 1 -November 18 (49 day season)

63 hunts (32 am and 31 pm)

297 total deer sightings (80 antlered bucks including 15 shooters)

Best days- November 2-15

Opportunities= missed good 8pt @ 31 yards

Regular Season

November 19- December 11 (23 day season)

14 hunts (9 am and 5 pm)

37 total deer sightings (4 antlered bucks including 2 shooters)

Best day- Thanksgiving morning

Opportunities= wide and busted up 10pt couldn’t get a good clean shot

Muzzleloader Season

December 12- 20 (9 day season)

5 hunts (5 pm)

24 total deer sightings (7 antlered bucks including 3 shooters)

Best days- December 13 and December 20

Opportunities- Shot big 10 and also saw biggest deer of the season on two occasions

 

 

The season may have just ended but I am already thinking of the next. Each year I make myself a list of hunting notes for the next season and for the first time this past year I actually completed it. I am hoping to do the same before next season. Probably a good idea for every avid hunter to do. I have some posted signs to put up, apple trees to trim, trees to cut, stands to move, etc. I think i am also purchasing new cameras. The biggest thing to do is scouting some new ground with snow on the ground. Hopefully I can get to that after the holidays.

 

I wanted to say thanks to everyone who has followed this thread and also to those who have contributed. It really has been fun to do a play by play of the season. See you all again in 2017!

Xxx

Xxx

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This has been by far the best thread ever started and followed by thousands, who contributed positive words, spoke by true sportsman showing great sportsmanship producing 140 pages and 2,797 posts, I've joined Lou in 2012, 4 and very close to 5 years on this site. I do believe legacy has set a new record for LOU and will be Awfully damn hard to beat this awesome thread. This thread had places in it that now matter what where or who you had a place to fit in. Congrats to all that contributed, whether with knowledge or being a little on the radical side, we only had one hick up, that got resolved quickly!! I hope most all have some venison to chew on this winter, of not you didn't venture to far off the couch, and if it was due to a ailments there's a lot out there and I don't think there's one guy on here that wouldn't give you some. Thanks guys have a great holiday and happy new year!! PAP THANKS LEGACY!!!

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