We probably won't even have kept track of him... but his body was such that made him easily to identify. Even as a younger deer, he was leary to walk around in daylight, and usually hung out in the "thick"
Here is a shed from 2009
The pair
In 2010, again his body exploded and he made some decent gains on his rack. He was a portly fella and was a little more visable in 2010 then he was in 2009. I tagged out early in 2010 and at this point he was still not on my radar. But, with the gains in his rack I was excited to see what he would look like at 4yrs of age if he survived! I didn't really try to pick apart his core bedding areas yet on the property I had access to... I think it may have helped by staying out to have him settle in. I would estimate that I have over 500 trailcam pictures of him... between 3-5yrs of age... maybe 5-10% were in daylight!
Sheds from 2010
2011 is the first year I started a roughly 2 acre food plot on my lease. I mowed the 2 acres with a pull behind mow on a 4 wheeler, sprayed with gly x2, and then hired a farmer to till it for me. I had no idea what I was doing but I read a bunch and ended up with this....
I also rented a walk behind Billy Goat and ended up creating this travel cooridor in the thick brush to the inside corner of my ag field/food plot (I named this cooridor after hunting it the past few years... "death alley"
) Little did I know this cooridor was one of the best things I did... the edge it created did indeed direct even more travel to the inside corner and doe groups instantly took up bedding on the edges deeper into the brush. Over time, with the help of the landowner, we extended this cut nearly 200 yards. The first yr I just broadcast brassicas in the cut and they came up pretty decent
Like clock work... chubs showed up on cameras
[bbvideo=425,350]http://vid258.photobucket.com/albums/hh257/jjbeaman33/Chubsvid_zpspv9jfznh.mp4[/bbvideo]
Here is one of the VERY few daylight photos I had of him between ages 3-6 (this is the inside corner of brush and ag field). Once I tag out or have burned the stand... I love to put a camera in this location (I do belive I saw him once in 2011 run a doe out into the open at last light)
Late season tank
His range at this point was definetly larger then when he was ages 6-8
Sheds from age 4
At now 5yr of age.... with years worth of sheds and history, he was my main focus on my lease. But up to this point, his core was still too big to pin him down..... (to be continued)
