October 9th Deer Season Journal
Squirrel Season

October 9th was the opening day of squirrel season here in West Virginia. I haven’t had the excitement for squirrel season ever since I got hooked on bowhunting whitetail deer, but my kids like to go out and chase the bushytails. After dragging ourselves out of bed (I think that I had the hardest time) we were out of the house just before 8:00 AM. Along for the adventure were my 11 year old son, my 11 year old nephew and my 9 year old daughter. Our weapon was a trusty old .22LR that I had received back when I was a young fellow myself. I also had a 16 gauge shotgun available but since I figured that I would be carrying the gun a good bit anyway there was no need for me to have two.

After charging through the dry leaves to a good vantage point, I was shocked to see a squirrel after only a few minutes of sitting. That one eluded us, so after a few more minutes we decided that the action must be a little to the right closer to where we had seen the squirrel.

As the four of us stealthily moved through the woods to a new spot, a squirrel went up a tree no more than 30 yards ahead of us. As we brought our band of great hunters to a screeching stop the squirrel ran out a dead limb and stopped. After one practice shot, my son settled down and knocked the squirrel right off of the limb. How about that, we already had one squirrel in hand.

Over the next one and one-half hours we continued to stalk the elusive squirrel but to no avail. I had hoped that everyone would get a chance to take a shot, but the next few squirrels were just a little out of range. In the end we all had a good time and hopefully our adventures will increase their appreciation of hunting and the outdoors.

Bow season opens on October 16th but I have other commitments that will delay my opening day to the following week. The first day hasn't always been a big buck sighting day, but I have had some good luck shooting a doe on opening day the last few seasons. I’ll have to begin my doe harvest on the next weekend. Hopefully the next update will have pictures of a trophy doe that one of us has shot.

We put out 25 pounds of Imperial Whitetail 30-06 vitamin mineral supplements at two mineral sites. I wanted to see if the 30-06 had any attracting qualities. I'll be able to watch these sites during bow season since the mineral licks are both in close vicinity of two of my favorite stand sites.

Even if the vitamin mineral supplement does not attract deer in the daylight during hunting season, I do know that the deer use the sites a lot and will benefit from the vitamins and minerals.

I have been taking a lot of scouting camera pictures with my new EagleEye digital scouting camera. I had done a lot of research on digital scouting cameras before going with the EagleEye and have been very pleased to say the least. Over a two day period I got over 60 pictures on the camera and I was able to look at them each day. If your looking for a scouting camera, or are like me and have gotten tired of the film developing costs and the wait to see your pictures, take a good look at the EagleEye, I feel that it is the best digital scouting camera available.

We have identified at least five different bucks so far this fall from our pictures that are at least 8 pointers. I have not seen a buck yet that I’m looking to shoot, but there was a nice 8 point on our property last year that looked like one more year may take him over the top. I have not captured a picture of him yet this year, but as bucks get older they get more reclusive. It all comes down to being in the right place at the right time. It would be nice to get a picture of him to both re-assure us that he is there and just to see how big he has gotten after one more year. A little more mass and tine length would make it awfully hard to resist shooting him.

We have gotten some nice pictures of a decent 9 point that was a wide young 7 point last year. He has an odd rack, as he has only one small brow tine. He looks like next year he will be a real nice buck if he picks up some mass. I really enjoy watching the bucks grow from year to year.

One of the great things about our squirrel hunting adventure was getting to look for deer sign. I probably spent as much time looking for deer sign as I did looking for squirrels. We saw several fresh rubs and some were pretty nice. The largest trees rubbed were probably at least 5 inches in diameter.

There was one rub that had a large locust tree right across from it. The locust tree had some scuff marks on it that cause me to stand there and stare at for a while. I couldn’t convince myself that a whitetail buck had done this but sometimes it’s fun to hope. Even without the locust tree the rubs on the 5 inch diameter trees were promising. Maybe on our next visit I’ll try to set up our digital scouting camera in this area and find out what buck has been terrorizing these trees.

We put up a treestand at our other favorite spot this week and I put up a second stand in the tree right next to it for my son. The two trees are close enough together that we can use the same steps to get into both stands. We now have stands up in our two favorite spots and will be ready to hunt when our first opportunity arrives. After all, squirrel season ends for me when bow season begins.


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