Any campfire traditions??

[Manitoba Stickflinger]

I've always loved hunting alone and honestly feel I'm the best hunter I can be when hunting solo. That said, there is nothing like the time spent at the end of the day sharing stories, laughter, good food and drink, and ideas with our friends and fellow hunters.

I was just wondering about unique traditions, pranks, games, or whatever it is other groups of guys do to at the end of the day or at campfire time that makes it extra special?

Here's a couple things that I've enjoyed looking back on my group hunts....
 There's a group of us that would hunt deer each year for one week in Saskatchewan. One rule or "tradition" we had involved "story time" at the end of each day. When returning to camp no-one was allowed to look into trucks for dead deer or even ask how the day was until everyone was sitting around the fire (beverage of choice in hand). Numbers would be drawn from a hat, and stories would be told of the days events based on numerical order. If you had a shot/kill or awesome encounter you could pass on your turn in order to let the most exciting stories happen last. The period of time from when guys started getting back to camp until the stories started was probably the most awkward yet exciting time I've had in camp.

I'm fortunate to have a couple of really good friends that I hunt elk with that are all positive and fun guys regardless of how tough the hunting is. One game we play in camp is called "Serious Singer". The game can be ruined by someone with a good singing voice but lucky for us we all suck real bad! What we do is tune in a radio station and wait until a song comes on that one guy knows the lyrics to. This is where it gets fun....if it's your turn, you start singing the song like you really mean it, not being comical, but like you're professional and you're shooting a video. The idea is to try your best and go for as long as you can without laughing. Believe me...no-one wins. You realize how much of a loser you really are and it's a great time!!

Please share what it is that makes the fellowship of a campfire special...Thanks...Ryan

[Don Stokes]

When I hunted Colorado regularly, our guide made B52's whenever a kill was made. It didn't take many at 10,000 feet after hiking mountains all day! Nowadays I have some good friends from other states that I hunt with a couple of times a year, but we don't have any real traditions like you describe. Just getting together every year is our tradition, I guess. We've been doing it for more than 20 years.

[bigugly1]

One that I always enjoyed was food related. Big cast iron pan placed on coals, half a pound butter, three or four cans of peaches, a generous pour of maple syrup a good dump of brandy let simmer for awhile dump some oats in it for about 5 minutes then watch everyone devour. One I hated was getting my hat shot after I missed a deer, don't miss that camp....lol

[chinook907]

A bag of Hoody's salted peanuts around the fire. Pretty tasty, and the shucked hulls go right into the fire as we shoot the breeze.

[twitchstick]

I think one of the "traditions" that I have happens opening weekend of archery season. The frist weekend everyone camps together we have a big camp and a fire. It's like a family reunion everyone gets back together. Our deer and elk seasons start in august so everyones gardens are at peak of production and everyone brings lots of veggies. It's almost like a competition to what and how much you can grow. One friend showed up with a 30 gallon trash bag a green chilies one year,said he was sick of them. Then half ether grow or have butchard pig,beef,chickens,eggs ect.. let alone the wild game havest from the year before. I worked restaurants for years so everyone expects me to bring seafood or something special. For several years I would save up scrap king crab peaces a have a big boil. For years I was know as the crab guy by many in camp. The dutch ovens are always full in our camp and you will not leave hungry.

[wollelybugger]

Lot of tradition in Pa in the old times, everyone would head for the mountains to their hunting camps for good fool and card playing and some  drinking at some camps. Some of the camps were serious hunters and some camps they were there just to get away and have some fun. The deer were small but you would see 40 or 50 a day and lucky to see a spike. All the deer are gone because of a liberal doe season and most of the camps are falling in, some haven't been used for years.

[Mechslasher]

when i have friends come to hunt with me on my farm, good drink and good food is a must!  had a good friend down from n.c. this past weekend and a couple cousins.  we cooked up some bbq chicken, baked beans, french bread, salad, and a bacon, tater, and shrimp combo fried up in a 16" cast iron frying pan.  ate till i was almost sick.

[Bonebuster]

Wollelybugger, a sad fact...happend/is happening in Michigan as well.

A campfire tradition here at my house started kind of by accident. We have a youth hunt here that is during the last weekend in September. It is still quite warm then, even at night. When a deer is killed, it must be dealt with ASAP.

When my oldest son killed his first deer at the age of 11, we celebrated! Phone calls, pictures ect., and then we got down to the business of getting the deer in coolers of ice.

The deer was hanging in a group of trees we call "the pines", and it was full on dark before we got to business. I told my son to gather some wood and start a fire so I could see. He did just that. Before long, there was a plate with some salt and pepper, and various other spices and we rolled the inner loins in the spices, and roasted them over the fire on the same metal sticks we use for hot dogs when we go camping. We would roast thin sliced chunks and burn our lips...and then roast some more. A primal celebration at it`s finest. When the deer was safely chilled, we sat around the fire for hours, and talked of what had happened, and what was going to happen in the years to come.

The following year, my son scored again on the opener of the youth hunt. The deer went into the same tree, and without a word spoken, the campfire was being built. We enjoyed the same celebration. My youngest son, has had his deer done in the same fashion...with the same primal celebration and the same talks of what was and what will be.

And so it has been for five years now.

[Manitoba Stickflinger]

Thanks guys...that's some good stuff! Seems like good food is key!...and bring lots of old hats!

Kinda sad to hear about lost traditions yet inspiring to hear stories like Bonebuster's.

Keep em' comming!

[Don Stokes]

I guess cutting shirttails after a missed shot is a dying tradition, too. It was the norm at my first deer camp in the '60's, and I have to admit as a youngster it made me more careful shooting. The shirttails were nailed up on the camp house wall, with the owner's name and maybe some pithy comments written on them. Made for some good laughs!

And then there was bloodying the face of a hunter after his first kill.

[reddogge]

Don, probably the tradition of cutting shirt tails died when someone tried to cut a brand new Pendleton wool shirt given to the hunter by his wife and got punched.

We don't do hunting camp tradions but our group does a campfire tradion at the big multiday shoots like Baltimore Bowman Tradional Classic or ETAR.  We save our broken, delaminated or just lousy old bows and burn them in the fire.  Also arrows.  Great fun.  Goes well with beer.

[Paul WA]

At our campfires its Jim Beam and coke and a big bag of community peanuts...PR

[longarrow]

Good food, good drink, good (some bad!) tales and most of all Good Friends.

[Littlejake]

My campfire tradition is just to sit and stare into it.

[Orion]

My hunting group is small-- consists of two hunting partners, one of whom is my brother.  Almost always have at least one campfire during the hunt.  If not that, the Franklin stove inside the cabin is cooking.  

We start each hunt with a toast (double shot of bourbon) "to the hunt."  During the hunt, we start each evening with a recap of the day's events, and follow with reminiscing about hunts past. When we kill a deer, I make a huge cauldron of deer soup that we usually feed on for a couple of days.  BBQed deer ribs have also become a tradition.  

[Don Stokes]

reddogge, I once saw a guy sneak into camp and change shirts so they wouldn't cut his good one.

[T Lail]

my son and I have a tradition in that every deer or hog that we have ever field dressed is done with a knife that I got from my grand father over 35 years ago.....

[Killdeer]

Littlejake... me too!

Two things come to mind about the campfire traditions. The first, is that if my husband is in camp when it is first set up, he builds the first fire, and lights it with flint and steel.

 

The second is a certain stick. I found the stick about fifteen years ago, a striped maple, probably, but maple for sure, about my height, with a claw at the upper end. Over the years the claw has been used and burnt down some, but that is my fire stick still. Last hunt it served to pull the fly onto the cook shack which is a skosh taller than I.

When a deer is down and dragged into camp, it is hung, skinned and butchered there. A fire is mandatory, and the tenderloins (called weasels in my camp) are roasted on saplings, eaten as they are done, from the top down. Bite off the done part from the top, reset your stick and lean back with port and cigar. Scraps go to the spirits, which always hang about a fire. A fire is a place to gather and share something good, and we share with those whom we see and can't see.

woooo...ooo...ooooooooo    :eek:        
Killdeer      

Do not sit on my invisible friend.    

[Don Stokes]

Weasels? There's gotta be a story there...

[JAG]

For the last 20 plus years a group of friends met on opening weekend on the Tombigbee River, in west central Alabama.
We had food, campfires, stories and fun.  
The last weekend that we camped together we held "Kangroo Court".  I was normally the Judge.  We had a Proscutor, Defense and of course, alot of "offenders".  Each offender got with the Defense and decided on a Plea.  Of course I rejected most of the pleas, and they went before the court.  In all the years we only had one case that was proven not gulity.  It was a young man, that was there for the first time.  His Defense was good enough that we all agreed to let him go.  Most of the sentences were cleaning up the camp ground. (we camped at a Corps campground, which we kept clean anyway)
Some charges were trumped up.  Someone would "find" an arrow, and the owner was charged with shooting at game and not fessin' up.  The best one was one lady used the restroom from her treestand, and was accused of pig abuse ( from the piggies laughing so hard one died by fling itsself on an arrow she dropped)  She was convicted of the charge.  
The list of "crimes" could go on all night.  Everyone had fun and looked forwar to that last weekend and court.  Anyone not brought up on charges kinda felt left out.
Sad to say, most of our group are waiting on the "Other Side" with a campfire blazing waiting for "COURT" to resume!
JAG/Johnny