A Day Enjoying The Outdoors

I finally did it. I took vacation. I'm not sure how often I will be posting. I have a lot of things I want/need to do.

Yesterday I went to Resthaven Wildlife Area in Castalia. I started out at the hand trap range to prepare for bird hunting. It's been a long time since I've shot clays. I didn't do too bad considering. I hit about 20 out of 50. My brother didn't fare so well, he only hit 2 out of 50. I have a New England Firearms 12ga single-shot shotgun. It's very similar to shooting a cannon. I have a shoulder hickey from the recoil. It doesn't feel too good today. I expect my arm to fall off shortly.

I also took my dog along. He's a 5 year old black lab/rottweiler mix. He's my pet, not a hunting dog. He can barely find his food much less track animals. This would be his first experience with gunshots. Surprisingly enough, he wasn't gun-shy. He felt uneasy about the gunshots, but he didn't bolt. He just laid down in my truck for a while. After several shots, he become accustomed to the gunshots and was right there with us while we were shooting. Usually you have to train them as pups to get them used to gunshots. Nevertheless; he won't be flushing out pheasants any time soon.

After the hand trap range, we went fishing at the ponds. I caught a largemouth bass and a bluegill, my brother caught the same. Fishing wasn't going too well so we headed to the dove fields.

After wading through waist-high soybeans, I was pretty much exhausted. I only saw one dove, I missed. My brother claims to have seen five, he missed all of them. It shouldn't be too shocking considering his performance at the hand trap range.

I completely forgot about the early goose hunting season. The 15th was the last day of the early season. I almost went and got the necessary licenses to hunt waterfowl, but I didn't. Toward the end of the day, I had 10 Canadian geese fly low over my head. It would've been nice to have a goose dinner on my vacation.

If anyone needs to wonder why wildlife areas with public hunting is shrinking, you can point the finger at PETA (for the obvious reasons) and lazy hunters. At the hand trap range, I picked up approximately three dozen shotgun shells that weren't mine. It was even worse in the dove fields. In some spots there were piles of shells. It doesn't take that much effort to bend over and pick up your spent shells. Money that could be spent on improving or expanding public wildlife areas now have to be used to clean up after lazy hunters. I wish there were more game wardens there to dole out hefty fines to those hunters.

Wednesday, I may be heading to Clarksfield. Apparently, someone knows a spot near a grain silo where 100's of doves congregate. I hope so, those tasty morsels are making my mouth water.