Hunting Season is Here...

And I haven't made a hunt yet. It makes me....Angry

Rawr

What kind of teacher has an exam scheduled for the Monday morning after opening weekend?? Oh, a fisheries teacher...that's who.

Yes, sadly I missed the opening weekend of archery season here in Florida due to having to study. I'm actually still in the process of it as I write this, but I'm taking a break from my 8 hour studying binge. I suppose I could have hunted had I studied last week, but who studies early? Honestly...

I made it out to Lochloosa WMA last Tuesday (and completely forgot about Tuesday Terrors...whoops) for a scouting trip. Lochloosa is home to the kevlar deer I encountered last year. Hopefully they're feeling a little less...arrow proof this year. Scouting around in a new spot this time and wasn't particularly impressed. What also turned me off on this particular spot was all the marking tape.

If any of you are public land hunters, you probably know what I'm talking about. Marking tape...It's simply omnipresent on a management area. I understand if you need to mark a trail, or maybe the entrance to your trail from a road. But this was ridiculous. Some guy had gone ahead and marked EVERYWHERE. The flagging didn't even lead anywhere. I think he just marked off an enormous area in hopes of deterring other hunters from hanging a stand near by. I usually rip this kind of flagging down, but seeing as how I had no intention of hunting there due to the lack of deer, I left it up. Still...It irks me.

I'll probably end up hanging a stand in the same general area where I shot the doe last fall. I had a brief moment of clear thinking last week and realized that I could reach an area I had picked out on GoogleEarth by making bookmarks and then manually entering their coordinates on my GPS. I'll try this out and will be making my first hunt of this season come Tuesday.

Wish me luck!