Days like
this are worth the price of admission; and they offer the hunter the
opportunity to savor the woods’ serene early autumn splendor.
Savor,
indeed, with the mixed pungency of drying corn stalks, ripened earth and a brew
of various types of hardwoods on the cusp of shedding their leaves in preparation
for a long winter’s nap.
A
cloud-filled sky was moving rather swiftly west to east, thwarting the
necessary light to finish the remaining minutes of the second day of Ohio’s
two-day, antlerless-only, muzzle-loading-only deer-hunting season.
Warmer that
was Day One, Day Two was never-the-less comfortable enough that allowed for the
deliberate leaving behind of a fleece vest. Also not needed was any requirement
for long-john underwear.
Then again,
a couple of pre-dawn mornings had sapped the strength of Ashtabula County’s
normally ubiquitous buzzing/biting insect population. That was a good thing,
too, especially since I had left my Thermacell bug repelling gizmo back in the
SUV along with the fleece vest.
Hope’s
propellers spun pretty reliably, given that several hours earlier the landowner’s
son had missed one doe as it tried a sneak out of the standing corn. And when
the muzzle-loader had gone “bang,” the doe bolted untouched. Yet the noise was
load enough to startle another half-dozen or so deer to vacate the same field.
Such was my
confidence that I might find the deer oozing their way back into the same corn
patch, tracing a strait-as-an-arrow rusted logging pathway to the free and
abundant meal.
Thing was,
Day One had not gone particularly well, either. I had spent 11 ½ hours in a
hunting blind. All for naught as I failed to so much as even see a deer, let
alone one absent the prohibitive set of antlers demanded by law for this
special and early deer-hunting season.
So I figured
a change of scenery was in order, and given the encouraging prospects of what
the landowner’s son encountered I placed my chips down on the table.
Yet there
are no assurances when it comes to hunting white-tailed deer. That’s true
whether the hunt happens in Ohio, Texas, Wisconsin or wherever. Ditto that
second weather the hunt occurs in Guernsey County, Adams County or Ashtabula
County.
So I packed
up my meager stash of muzzle-loading supplies and hiked the short distance from
the woodlot’s far southwest corner to the SUV, waiting on a tractor path
turn-around.
Hey, it
happens, yeah it does. But I will say this; Day Two was one of those times when
I felt especially blessed and privileged to be a hunter. Thus, no apologies are
necessary, either.
UPDATE –
Here is the harvest data for Ohio’s recently held two-day/antlerless-only/muzzle-loading-only
deer-hunting season.
All figures
and comments are supplied by the Ohio Division of Wildlife.
COLUMBUS, OH –
Ohio’s muzzleloader hunters checked 6,613 antlerless white-tailed deer during a
two-day season, Oct. 11-12, according to the Ohio Department of Natural
Resources (ODNR). That is an 18 percent increase from 2013, when hunters
checked 5,608 deer, the first year for the antlerless muzzleloader season.
The Ohio counties that
reported the most checked deer during the 2014 antlerless-only muzzleloader
season: Ashtabula (228), Columbiana (180), Coshocton (177), Licking (164),
Tuscarawas (151), Guernsey (150), Trumbull (147), Stark (145), Knox (143) and
Adams (142).
An additional 1,313 deer
were harvested by archery hunters on Oct. 11-12. The total number of antlerless
deer checked by hunters during the two days was 7,926, a 21 percent increase
from 2013 (6,553).
Editor’s Note:
A list of all white-tailed deer checked by muzzleloader hunters during the 2014
antlerless muzzleloader hunting season, Oct. 11-12, is shown below. The first
number following the county’s name shows the harvest numbers for the antlerless
muzzleloader hunting season in 2014, and the 2013 harvest numbers are in
parentheses. The antlerless muzzleloader harvest numbers do not include archery
numbers.
Adams: 142 (135); Allen:
41 (46); Ashland: 141 (111); Ashtabula: 228 (200); Athens: 133 (117); Auglaize:
42 (39); Belmont: 75 (99); Brown: 88 (94); Butler: 62 (57); Carroll: 133 (120);
Champaign: 51 (36); Clark: 39 (28); Clermont: 76 (91); Clinton: 39 (34);
Columbiana: 180 (128); Coshocton: 177 (138); Crawford: 41 (32); Cuyahoga: 4
(5); Darke: 41 (26); Defiance: 65 (48); Delaware: 64 (38); Erie: 30 (25);
Fairfield: 81 (51); Fayette: 12 (7); Franklin: 29 (9); Fulton: 26 (29); Gallia:
93 (60); Geauga: 60 (63); Greene: 20 (26); Guernsey: 150 (144); Hamilton: 19
(18); Hancock: 33 (31); Hardin: 42 (43); Harrison: 115 (115); Henry: 28 (14);
Highland: 100 (79); Hocking: 109 (103); Holmes: 103 (89); Huron: 96 (80); Jackson:
85 (62); Jefferson: 75 (82); Knox: 143 (141); Lake: 25 (18); Lawrence: 56 (54);
Licking: 164 (164); Logan: 102 (77); Lorain: 115 (83); Lucas: 19 (28); Madison:
14 (19); Mahoning: 100 (75); Marion: 27 (27); Medina: 80 (68); Meigs: 128 (88);
Mercer: 36 (26); Miami: 34 (20); Monroe: 59 (68); Montgomery: 25 (18); Morgan:
108 (65); Morrow: 56 (53); Muskingum: 136 (143); Noble: 79 (83); Ottawa: 24
(10); Paulding: 53 (56); Perry: 92 (54); Pickaway: 23 (18); Pike: 64 (51);
Portage: 86 (64); Preble: 44 (41); Putnam: 32 (33); Richland: 98 (105); Ross:
94 (85); Sandusky: 41 (27); Scioto: 59 (64); Seneca: 83 (69); Shelby: 63 (63);
Stark: 145 (66); Summit: 20 (9); Trumbull: 147 (117); Tuscarawas: 151 (115);
Union: 58 (32); Van Wert: 20 (19); Vinton: 129 (79); Warren: 45 (39);
Washington: 65 (72); Wayne: 104 (83); Williams: 69 (93); Wood: 42 (16) and
Wyandot: 88 (58).Total: 6,613 (5,608).
- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn
JFrischk@Ameritech.net
Jeff
is the retired News-Herald reporter who covered the earth sciences,
the area's three county park systems and the outdoors for the newspaper.
During his 30 years with The News-Herald Jeff was the recipient of more
than 100 state, regional and national journalism awards. He also is a
columnist and features writer for the Ohio Outdoor News, which is
published every other week and details the outdoors happenings in the
state.
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