1.) DParker - 11/24/2017

Or at least I learned something about some whitetails. My son and I went out for our traditional Thanksgiving morning rifle hunt yesterday, and in spite of being up to our eyeballs in deer (by public land standards) they were all either not legal or we couldn't get clear shots at them still, seeing 7 or 8 deer in one morning...not counting the two does who ran across the highway in front of us on the way to the unit...made for more activity than I'd seen the previous 2 seasons combined.

Anyhow...about an hour after getting setup in a good spot, the ice cream I had so unwisely treated myself the night before suddenly (and I do mean suddenly) decided that it was time for the two of us to part ways. I tried to reason with it, but it only became more insistent and impatient. So I grabbed retrieved the emergency roll from my pack and headed for a nearby tree...the time required to reach a more distant tree being a luxury I didn't have. After the jo was done I returned to seat, convinced that I'd just alerted every deer in the county to my presence. But no more than 5 minutes later I heard leaves crunching in the distance on about my 8 o'clock. I turned my chair around and watched as an immature buck with just barely a single fork on each little main beam came sauntering by while foraging, eventually passing within about 15 yds of me. I clearly looked out of place because he stopped and stared right at me about a dozen times, but I froze in place and he never busted me. Even more interestingly, he seemed to take absolutely no notice at all of the...aroma...that had been added to the usual forest scent menagerie.

Nearly an hour later a group of 3 or 4 does (I couldn't be sure of the count because there were so many trees in the way) passed by at the same casual pace about 50 yds behind me. Unfortunately the intervening made it impossible to ever get a clear shot at any of them.

I've many cases of them either ignoring or showing slight curiosity in human urine on the ground, but I really didn't expect to see them so utterly indifferent to...well...something more pungent, as it were.

I know, I know...crappy story, bro.

2.) Triton Rich - 11/25/2017

[B]Maybe the buck showed up so quickly thinking he had heard another buck grunting? [/B]:-)

3.) DParker - 11/25/2017

[QUOTE=Triton Rich;53337][B]Maybe the buck showed up so quickly thinking he had heard another buck grunting? [/B]:-)[/QUOTE]

A plausible theory, to be sure.

4.) bluecat - 11/25/2017

Are you sure it wasn't the white toilet paper flapping in the breeze. You might be on to something there DP.

5.) DParker - 11/25/2017

Maybe they thought I was a surrendering Frenchman, and therefor not a danger.

6.) DParker - 11/25/2017

I'm heading back out to the same area tomorrow morning, so in the interest of science...which requires repeatability of experimental results...I've opted to add a side order of Buffalo wings to tonight's pizza delivery.

7.) bluecat - 11/26/2017

You are adding variables...

8.) DParker - 11/26/2017

[QUOTE=bluecat;53342]You are adding variables...[/QUOTE]

Well, there goes my peer review and a shot at being published in [i]Nature[/i]. And the Nobel Prize is [i]right[/i] out.

9.) bluecat - 11/26/2017

You do exhibit a lot of intestinal fortitude in your quest.

10.) crookedeye - 11/26/2017

youre hunting storys are always the most exciting, its like i was in the woods there...

11.) billy b - 11/27/2017

I guess nothing happened today.