Deer Season 2010

Dad and I arrived on Sunday to open camp and start the furnace. It was a beautiful crisp November day. While the camp was warming up a bit, we took a drive around Leetonia to see how many guys were in the woods. We noticed that one of the camps was not even open this year for Deer Season. Most of it's members have died or are too old to come up anymore. The younger generation just didn't take over. It was really sad to see this as we always enjoyed chatting with these guys each hunting season. Back in the 70's it was common for there to be 10-15 guys in the camp. After a nice dinner of lasagna, my brother showed up and the three of us eagerly awaited the 4am alarm on Monday. After breakfast, we all went to our traditional first day spots and listened as the yelling of the first deer drive began across the hollow. Almost immediately, the shooting began. There was quite a lot of shooting today...more than the past few years. Unfortunately, none of the shooting was ours. I saw a few doe, and my brother saw several bear (the one's we didn't see last week in bear season). Nevertheless, a bad day of hunting (in my opinion, there is no such thing)is always better than a good day at work. I realized as I sat in my tree stand that this was my 36th consecutive first day of deer season in Tioga County. I've never missed an opening day since I was 12 and was able to hunt. We are really fortunate to have such a wonderful place to return to each year. Hearing the Tuesday forecast of 3" of rain and flooding, we decided to drive home Monday night. I went back to work today and saved my personal day for another day when the weather would not be so awful. We'll be up next week for the final few days of the season.