Grouse Hollow Journal for December 17, 2015

Grouse Hollow Journal for December 17, 2015 by Greg Koelker

Deer Hunt ‘15 continued . . .

Chuck was making bacon and eggs for breakfast on the second day of Gun Deer Season when we came upstairs.  Barb is a wonderful hostess and cook and baker, but she also has a bunch of calves to feed and care for - some bottle fed even, so she runs a farm for a living, and has a great many chores to do around the hunt and El and Chuck try to pick up the food slack.  It was 9 degrees outside.

El and I went to our usual stands and had similar luck to opening morning, but there was a lot more shooting in the area this morning.  After one barrage nearby, I watched a coyote race across the river bottom a quarter-of-a-mile away.  The wind was blowing, and the sky was red at sunrise; we could actually see the sun, sort of, through layers of dappled clouds.  

The first drive of the day was through Barb and Chuck’s woods.  I have the somewhat dubious distinction of being the oldest member of our hunting party, so I stand a lot.  I was posted on the creek bottom.  Not long into the drive, I heard a shot up the hill.  With my senses on high alert, I observed a flying pheasant skirt the brush to my right and disappear down the bottom.  Then I saw a deer running in the cedars and brush along the hill in the sunlight.  It didn’t make a sound in the snow. I probably couldn’t have seen it without the snow.  I picked a sort of clear spot along its path and took the shot.  The deer kicked out its back legs, ran thirty yards and collapsed.  It was an 8-point buck.  There were two other bucks taken on the drive up top.  After the drive was over, I shot a coyote coming along the opposite hillside.  

I shot another buck later.  It was a nice 9-pointer kicked out by some other party.  Ellen and nephews Nick, Brian, and friend Travis were great about helping me recover the second buck that expired high up on a very steep, snow covered hillside that I dare say, I probably would have spent the entire rest of the day trying to ascend.  By the end of the day Sunday, we had 9 deer hanging in Bill’s walk-in cooler.  

Our group butchered ten deer on Monday at Burton, starting a little later in the morning.  Chuck brought in a doe taken that morning.  Brother-in-law Dave Fure is the deer skinner, working with a sharp knife, reciprocating saw, a deer hoist, and years of experience, he slits, cuts, scrapes, and pulls the hide off each critter to where it can be clamped by the pliers-like hide puller tool that tightens on the skin when the hoist chain pulls it tight.  Dave uses the electronic hoist to lift the carcass and pull the hide off free.  He uses the reciprocating saw to remove legs and cut the ribs and hind quarters into pieces that can be hauled into the heated shed to be boned out into containers for steak and trim.

In the shed, Sports Center or CMT was on the big screen. Sometimes there were dogs and small children underfoot.  There are tables in rows with cutting boards, grinders, a sausage stuffer, a freezer, and a well equipped kitchenette.  Everyone takes on a job or two.  I prefer deboning hams.  The conversations run from stories of the hunt, jokes, the Packers and Badgers and Bears and Vikings and even romance, but no politics - too many sharp objects around.  The romance? Well, our college student nephew Jordan Fure’s girlfriend Brooke came to help with the butchering - for a second year.  I suggested that, “It must be serious,” and they just smiled.  While the deboning, burger grinding, and steak cutting is going on, El’s sister Kathy Russell fries the venison tenderloins in butter, onion, and garlic for lunch.  The aroma is just what you might imagine - savory, pungent, to die for.  There is soup and cookies, and more.  After that sumptuous lunch, the sausage stuffing and packaging begins.  The grinders mix chunks of seasoned venison and pork together to make bulk sausage, smoked rope sausage, and sausage patties.  Dave takes a cooler or two of trim to Dickeyville to Hauber’s Meats to be made into summer sausage.  Ellen and Barb and her sister Lori Fure worked on trimming and cutting and butterflying chops.  I ran the taper as we filled bags labeled venison steak, venison chops, venison tidbits, venison sausage, and venison burger.  By 4 p.m. the rope sausages were in the smoker and people were pitching in to clean the utensils and area.

Ellen and I were loaded and headed north by 4:30.  The deep snow in Grant County giving way to an inch or two by Prairie du Chien and hardly any here at Grouse Hollow.  Scout was ecstatic, almost exploding out of her skin to see us.  She had to inspect the truck and trailer to see who or what had been about us.  After we unloaded the truck into the kitchen and shed, I tossed a tennis ball for her before giving her a special dish of chow with treats.

The DNR report on gun deer season accidents and fatalities attributed to the deer hunt is disturbing.  It would appear, most were preventable with the application of a little common sense.  Every hunter safety graduate has the fundamentals of TABK drilled into them: Treat every gun as if it is loaded; Always point the muzzle in a safe direction; Be certain of your target and what is beyond; Keep your finger out of the trigger guard until you are ready to shoot.  

Until next time, get out -  there is no Holiday Hunt for antlerless deer this week, but you can plan your own holiday hunt for small game, wild turkey, ruffed grouse, pheasant, archery deer, fox, coyote, or maybe just take a hike maybe dropping by your deer stands to see if any visitors of the whitetail kind have made an appearance.  Enjoy.