After a long wait... allow me to introduce... Weight!

Posted by Bo Parker | Posted in , , | Posted on Friday, July 30, 2010

Scott and I got out last night to hopefully get some more velvet footage. We didn't have long to wait before the first two bucks showed up. They were little guys, but we instantly felt like it would be a good night. Not long after the little fellas exited the field, one of the big boys showed up. He's an absolutely perfectly symmetrical 8 point that is really wide. We call him "Weight" for the wide eight. We're quite certain that his inside spread is over 20" and it may be even a couple of inches better than that.

Best guess is that he's in the low to mid 140's and is definitely mature. These trail camera pictures were taken on a little knob that kind of makes his back look bowed. He's actually quite sway backed and had the appearance (on video) of an old buck. We're positive that he's at least 4 years old and could very possibly be older than that.

He fed within 100 yards of us for almost an hour last night and we got some really good velvet footage of him. Hopefully, it will be available on one of the first Great Plains Show episodes on midwestwhitetail.com.

We haven't captured the footage, so we don't have any stills from last night to show just yet. M&M, an even larger buck, showed up a little before dark too. He never got closer than 300 yards, but it was still nice to see another bruiser on this farm. So far, we've managed to get footage of 4 definite shooters on this farm. Wind permitting, I think I have an idea of where we might be on the evening of 9/15...

We hope you guys are all taking advantage of this "easy" summer hunting. There is really no better time to inventory your herd than right now!!!

Bo, great post on "Weight".  Definitely can't wait to see him in about six weeks.  Since I still have your Nikon, here are a couple of the pictures we took of him while filming.  He's a big dude!

Hot Summer Nights

Posted by Bo Parker | Posted in , , | Posted on Sunday, July 25, 2010

Scott and I have managed to get out to film some velvet a few times this summer. What a great past time it is! We've managed to film several nice bucks this summer and we've still got a month and a half left to gather more footage. We've seen some pretty good bachelor groups running together, and one particular threesome has us really excited. "Weight", "Tilt", and "M&M" are regular evening visitors on a farm that is new to us this year. All 3 bucks appear to be at least 4 years old and are very healthy. At this point, we're fairly certain that all of them will go over 140". Scott captured a few still images from some of the footage, but you'll have to wait for the good close ups and footage on our midwestwhitetail.com Great Plains Show prostaff page. Look for it next month!

a fleeting glimpse of "Weight" and "M&M"

"Tilt" posed for us for a little while

"Tilt" got his name due to the way that his rack appears to be tilted back. He's going to carry some great mass!


We've been noticing quite a bit of antler growth in the past few weeks as well. "Right Hook" has come on strong in the past 3 weeks and is ending up where we hoped he would. He may even have a few more inches yet to grow. We're really liking the looks of his main beams. He reminds us a little of a KS hit list buck that we know very well.


"Right Hook" is under debate right now. We know another year would do him a lot of good, but he'd make some nice wall art this year. I just keep remembering what "First Pull" did when I passed him last year. What do you guys think?



Speaking of KS, we haven't even started that hitlist yet. We had camera/squirrel trouble the first go around, and we still have 3 weeks before our next trip to the farm. We've got our fingers and toes crossed that the next card pull down there produces some shooters for us.

Summer Sweat

Posted by Scott Mensing | Posted in , , | Posted on Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Over the past couple of weeks, Bo and I have been busy scouting new properties, running trail cams, filming velvet, hanging stands, building blinds, fighting horrible cases of poison ivy, and everything else it takes to get ready for September 15.  We have a few new properties that we have been given permission to bow hunt this year and I think we'd forgotten just how much work it can be getting a new property ready for the season.  With all of the new properties, our resources are being maxxed out, especially tree stands.  So one thing that we've decided to do more of this year is building "natural" ground blinds.  We needed to cut down a few trees and numerous limbs for a couple stand setups so we simply used that debris to build ourselves a roomy, inconspicuous blind.  We still have a little bit more work to do on them, but they will be ready when season starts.

We've also been pretty busy keeping up with salt licks and trail cams.  This year's summer scouting has been difficult due to cameras being stolen or eating by squirrels, but we have managed to pick up pictures of half a dozen or so hit list bucks for the coming season.  We've been really happy with how the bucks have responded to the salt lick recipe we posted earlier and the wet weather in our area has kept them going strong.

But when we've had any free time at all in the evenings, we've been running out to properties close to the house to film some velvet and try get a slight edge on some of those giants before the Opener comes around.  We have been lucky enough to film a few different hit listers, but you'll have to wait for the Midwest Whitetail show in August to come out for that footage! 

More Mouths To Feed

Posted by Scott Mensing | Posted in , | Posted on Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Over the years we've gotten numerous trail camera photos of single fawns with their mothers and even the set of twins every now and then.  But this year, we were lucky enough to get multiple pictures of a set of tripletts.  I'm not sure how rare this is, but on this particular property, this is the first time I can remember seeing tripletts.  Hopefully all three are bucks with good genes!

We also got a couple different pictures with a set of twins in the same area.  With all of these new mouths to feed, either the farmer is going to need to plant more crops or we're going to have to practice some QDM this fall.......my vote is for the latter....fresh backstraps!!

"First Pull" Continues to Grow

Posted by Scott Mensing | Posted in , | Posted on Sunday, July 11, 2010

During the past week we have pulled a few more cards and been very pleasantly surprised to see "First Pull" show up on a new salt like and hitting it multiple times.  "FP" is a buck we had nicknamed "Big 7" last year.  Bo and another hunter on our property both had encounters with this buck during last years season, but decided let him walk.  He had the body of a mature whitetail, but his rack last year just did not seem to match his body.  We were really hoping he would hit his potential this year.....and it's amazing what a difference a year can make.  Here are a few pictures of FP during the 2009 season.






































This year, First Pull has simply exploded.  Its tough to get a good idea of a gross score when they're still in velvet, but we're thinking that he should be in the mid 140s as a main frame seven point.  He has three or four good kickers that are also helping bring up the total.  It is going to be a lot of fun watching FP develop over the season and hopefully we can get him patterned by using trail cams and have a good shot at him come September.



















































A New Property Means New Bucks

Posted by Scott Mensing | Posted in , | Posted on Sunday, July 04, 2010

Bo and I are fortunate enough to have a couple new properties to archery hunt this year.  All of which just happen to be within 15 minutes of both of our homes, so we'll be spending quite a bit of time on each of the properties over the course of the season.  But as we all know, running trail cams on a brand new piece of land is exciting......you just never know what to expect!  Our main goal is to simply get a glimpse of the herds.  In the coming months, we will move cameras around to help give us some insight on stand placements, but for now, we're having a great time just getting an idea on the type of deer we can expect to see during season.

Well on one of the properties that is actually only a couple of miles for each of our houses, the first card pull only yielded does.  But the second card pull was MUCH different.  Between the two cameras, we ended up getting pictures of at least 10 different bucks in four days, most of which were two years old and older.  Out of the nearly 200 pictures, we got two potential target bucks for the upcoming season.  The first buck has been named "Right Hook" due to the hook on his brow time and the second buck is currently unnamed (but if he keeps growing, he'll get named awfully quick!).

Right Hook definitely likes the camera.  We got multiple pics each day and night of this buck.  Hopefully he will stick to his daylight movements into September and we can get a really close look at him on stand.  He looks to have good length and mass for this early in the season.






























The unnamed buck showed up the evening prior to us pulling the card so hopefully he is continuing to visit the lick and we'll have some better pictures of him on the next pull.  We only got one picture of him straight on.  All of the other pictures he had his head buried into the lick!




























Coastal Georgia Trip

Posted by Bo Parker | Posted in | Posted on Thursday, July 01, 2010

It's been a couple of weeks now since we got back from vacation in Georgia. We spent a week in my old stomping grounds of Coastal Georgia in Glynn and Camden counties. We had a fantastic time, my daughter got baptized, Scott caught his first saltwater fish, and I hit the big 3-0. It was nice to go home and spend some quality time with family and friends and eat some fresh seafood!!! Of course, Scott and I still spent quite a bit of time talking about the upcoming season and all of the preseason work that is yet to be done. We had a blast and were actually able to relax for a change!

Now it's time to get back to work. There are lots of stands to be hung, lanes to be trimmed, food plots to be installed, and dreams to be made!