I need some input from longtime hunters

[Don Stokes]

ron w's advice is good. This is my 51st bowhunting season at age 65, and I'm pumped. I've been where you are, Tom, and it will pass. The midday hours are good, too, sometimes better than early when the deer know hunters are in the woods early and late.

[Tom L]

Wow! Never thought I would get this much or this kind of response. Just goes to show there's a bunch of good folks here on TradGang. I am going to make some changes in how I think about my hunting. Always been one of those guys that says if you can't be there before daylight your not doing things right. I'm always telling people to have fun hunting, guess I need to take my own advise.

Tom

[ron w]

Anytime out in the woods is time well spent. Last year I went at 12:30 pm to sit for a couple of hours. Got there and the wind was wrong.....moved to another spot and got a shot 40 minutes later. Of course I missed but that's not the point....  

[Hoyt]

It's not very hard for me to talk myself out of going at 3:30am when I wake up..without alarm clock.

Lots of reasons why..
I can hunt anytime I want.
I'm 67 and done his for over 50yrs..the intensity is not what it used to be.
Lots of aches and pains from health problems

But the two main reason this yr are lack of deer
and it's so damn far to walk in up and down ridges to get to the good spots...then pack out the deer if I'm lucky.

Last wk I bought another XOP Hand Climbing Stand another XOP Loc On stand and 4 sections of XOP Climbing Sticks..I think more than anything just to pump myself up. I've got more stands than I can manage already.

I didn't hunt this morning was going this afternoon..and didn't. It's suppose to rain now for about the next 5 days.

But the thing that makes it hardest on my hunting is my dog. He knows exactly when I start to get ready and his whole demeanor and facial expression changes. He gets that sad look and will move to a corner of the bed and turn his head away or will go in the bathroom and pout.
He loves to go run the woods with me and it's hard to leave him. I just explain to him I'm going to get him a deer leg. He gives me a look of disgust..like "That's getting old."
 
 

[Ray Lyon]

Originally posted by Ron LaClair:
Roger Norris said,

   

  Puff out your chest a bit and feel privately superior to all those slugs who slept in.  

So Roger, don't expect this SLUG to have those delicious breakfast burritos ready for you when you come in from your morning hunt at Shrew Haven this year.      [/b]

Yup. When I'm seeing all those non slugs cruising back down the drive from the top of banana ridge at ten in the morning I'm sometimes watching deer watch the vehicles go by.  At that point I'm thankful I'm a slug.    :p    

[Jock Whisky]

Since 1973 hmmm.
How old are you Tom. I've been in exactly the same situation. I really believe it has to do with age. When I was younger it was "pitter patter up and at 'er". But as I got older ie in my mid 50's dragging my sorry butt out of bed was harder and harder.

The only thing that works for me is to launch myself out of bed. I can create a window of a few seconds where I get up quickly before the moment passes. Once I've done that it's easier to carry on.

[Jock Whisky]

PS...it also sounds like you enjoy the preparation and anticipation. So get up and move. As a buddy once said "you can sleep when you're dead."

[Tom L]

Originally posted by Jock Whisky:
PS...it also sounds like you enjoy the preparation and anticipation. So get up and move. As a buddy once said "you can sleep when you're dead."

I'm 61. My dad used to say "people die in the bed"
He was one of those people that only required about 5 hours of sleep a night. I didn't get that. I got being a night owl from my mom.   :rolleyes:

Tom

[hitman]

When I feel like staying in bed the thought crosses my mind that if I don't go the one I've been after will come through that day. Even after I go and he don't show I feel a lot better because I was there.

[Warchild]

I myself have noticed this phenomenon. I used to spring right up and hit the trail. I think part of it is getting older. As I get older, it seems that I have lost a little of my "Killer instinct". In the past it was easy to tell myself that getting up and out there was the only way that I was going to kill a buck and just the thought of that would get me going. Maybe it's a testosterone drop or maybe the fact that I have killed so many deer through the years, it's just more difficult....I still do it but it takes more effort. I notice also that if I'm on a hunt at the camp in the U.P., I don't seem to have the problem but just hunting the farm doesn't do it for me anymore.

[Marshallrobinson]

I hear you. I have always had the best luck in the morning and thats why I force myself up. Once I am walking around, I wake up, cant go back to sleep and after awhile, I just pack and go.
3 cheap wind up alarm clocks are located in the three adjoining rooms, so I have to get up to shut them all off and I have to do it fast as my wife (works nights) will kick my butt if I dont.  :D

[KentuckyTJ]

Yep, break the rules. Get out there when you want to. I believe the deer get conditioned to our early and late intrusions as the season goes on. Switching it up on them has to be a good thing.

Read my signature line below!

[Ron LaClair]

When I was young I would jump out of bed, throw down a cup of coffee and hit the woods before daylight. Now at 78 years old I love to wake up early, roll over and go back to sleep. I think it's definitely an age thing....  

[Roger Norris]

Originally posted by Ron LaClair:
Roger Norris said,

   

quote:   Puff out your chest a bit and feel privately superior to all those slugs who slept in.  

So Roger, don't expect this SLUG to have those delicious breakfast burritos ready for you when you come in from your morning hunt at Shrew Haven this year.    

And Ray....you can sit longer than anybody I ever met. We both know on a given hunt-day at Shrewhaven you are in the woods way more hours than me....and when the heck did you ever sleep in?

That's it. I'm overloading the woodstove, everyone is up at 3:00 this year  

[Ron LaClair]

Go ahead Roger, load up that stove, it won't bother me over in "Little Haven" tucked in Lobo's Lair     :D  

   

   

[Ray Lyon]

We'll be there soon enough Roger. Looking forward to the burrito and then sweating it off in the 'Sauna'.