Today was the annual Thanksgiving Day hunt, and I was able to hunt with my dad and friend Donny. It was a chilly morning, and the wind howled out of the northwest. I did a lot of thinking last night and chose to go to a place I hadn’t been to in a couple of years. Something in my gut told me to go there.
As I made my way across a few ridges in the darkness, I searched for a blow-down I sat in the last time I went to this place. Luckily, I found it in the pitch black and nestled into it. The woods were loud, and I knew I would be able to hear a deer coming for a long way. The snow is hard and crunchy. It has made still-hunting a little difficult. Although it’s not impossible to sneak up on a deer, it definitely takes some adjusting to make good use of your time.
By the time the morning had passed, I had seen five does but no bucks. Donny didn’t see any deer and Dad saw a few. He saw a huge deer and figured he was going to get a crack at it. When it got closer to him, he couldn’t believe it was a doe.
The wind got increasingly stronger throughout the day, and it’s supposed to be a nuisance over the next few days. I’m not a big fan of the wind in the Adirondacks. Although Dad and I have killed some good deer in heavy wind, it seems that they don’t move like they do in the Midwest when the wind blows. In the Midwest, the wind doesn’t seem to affect them at all. It makes it easier to remain optimistic when you know there’s no difference in deer movement between a calm day and a windy day.