Here are a couple of write ups I did about just starting out hunting out west.

http://cornbeltoutdoors.blogspot.com/2017/01/january-19-western-big-game-hunting.html

http://cornbeltoutdoors.blogspot.com/2017/01/january-26-western-big-game-hunting.html

http://cornbeltoutdoors.blogspot.com/2017/02/february-2-western-big-game-hunting.html

There is a marina on the south side of the lake. I would concentrate on the dredge cut in the “little lake” area on the Ventura side. This will be the deepest part of the lake with varying contours. There is a submerged point off Woodford Island that is productive as can be Dodge’s point. Trolling the weedline on the north end of the lake has been productive also. July will be tough fishing as there is a TON of recreational boating on Clear Lake. Kevan Paul is a guide on the lake with an active FB page that will keep you up to speed on the current bite. Clear Lake has a very healthy Muskie population that you may also want to target.

Bird #2 of the 2017 season.

Tagged this Iowa gobbler the second day of the 1st season. 19.4 lbs. 10″ beard 1″ spurs.

You can read the story of the hunt here:

http://cornbeltoutdoors.blogspot.com/2017/04/april-20-iowa-turkey-hunting-day-1_20.html

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I was fortunate enough to connect this morning in Olmsted County on this 23 lb. Tom. Exciting hunt and the gobblers were really fired up this morning.

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.243 is a great pronghorn caliber. Head west and have fun!

When do left-over tags go on sale?

Team 4

Iowa Archery Season

Buck 8 pt- 6″ Tine

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Here is a study done by the University of Wyoming and published in a peer reviewed journal. This is scientific evidence of the negative impact CWD can have an a deer heard.

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0161127

Congrats Steve!

Team 4 Minnesota Doe

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TheFamousGrouse wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Pete S wrote:</div>
I can’t tell, was your tongue firmly embedded in your cheek when you typed this? when you say people from out of state would die to hunt in MN, what’s stopping them? maybe your job title has the initials D-N-R in it somewhere??? No offense, no one that I know that hunts WI ever says “boy I wish our deer herd compared to MN” Iowa and Illinois yes, MN-sorry.

Before we go too far down the “Woe Was Us” road, I have to ask: Do you currently hunt in any of the states the you point to as Deer Nirvanas?

I personally know a LOT of northern Wisconsin wishes that they HAD a deer heard. At all. Weather it compares to Minnesota, Mississippi, or Michigan, matters not, anything would be an improvement over the crashes they’ve had in some areas in northern WI. So while things aren’t perfect here, it could and is worse in some other states.

Sure, we’d all like to hunt the monsters in IA, IL, IN, etc, but the one thing holding most people back is that it’s all well and good to have huge deer, but unless you own a private farm down there or know somebody who does, it can be a LOT harder to actually HUNT anything, especially as a non-resident in those states. It certainly is nowhere near as simple as in MN where even a non-resident can buy an OTC tag.

So many people in MN have vastly more land to hunt available to them due to our large amounts of public land here in MN. It does you no good to have huge deer and good numbers if you can’t get access to an land to hunt them.

Great comment by Grouse. I grew up in Iowa and have hunted there for many years. The area that I grew up in had small wood lots, little public land, and smaller size farms relative to the larger parcels in the southern part of the state. Iowa is the mecca of deer hunting for many hunters, but the entire state of Iowa does not have 150″ bucks behind every tree. In fact, within my family and a combined 50 years of whitetail hunting between 4 people 149″ is the best deer any of us have ever harvested. With any game species the top end trophy animals relate to ideal habitat and management practices. The largest deer I have ever seen on the hoof occured the first year I moved to Minnesota on a small chunk of public land in Olmstead Co. With some slight changes to the season structure (moving the gun season out of the seeking and chasing phase of the rut) I think we can have our cake and eat it too (improved buck age structure, that are accesible to the majority of hunters through the fast public lands of MN.

Pat McSharry wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>TheFamousGrouse wrote:</div>

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Pat McSharry wrote:</div>

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Pete S wrote:</div>
since I’m a simple guy, I’ll keep this simple – take the rifles out of hunters hands during the rut. I don’t know of too many big game seasons where they are allowed to use rifles during the peak of breeding

This is my only complaint. We all know that rifle hunting is a strong tradition in MN, and it has always opened the 2nd Saturday in November. If we changed the season to late November a lot more 2-3 year old bucks would live another year. I also would like to see a drawing for NR rifle hunters – they have to apply for a tag.

I’m not sure this is a given in the modern era that moving to the end of November would automatically get the bulk of the hunting away from the rut.

It is always speculative to say when the peak of the rut is, but IMO the rut activity that we see has been spread out over a much longer period of time and the intensity seems much lower and I wonder how much the warming weather trends drive this?

Deer hunting in Zone 1 especially used to be in what I’d call “early winter” and from when I first started hunting in 1983 to the late 1990s, we never went beyond the second weekend in my area of Zone 1 without having significant snowfall and the average daytime high was in the upper 20s to low 30s during the entire season.

Fast forward to the 2000s and we have rarely seen even passing snow and we routinely have daytime highs in the 50s or warmer for almost the whole season.

Is it the case that if the season were to open after, say, November 20, there is a high probability the rut is over in most places?

Grouse

Well that’s where things get to be kind of tricky. What most people classify as the “rut” (when you see the most daylight activity of bucks seeking does, checking scrapes, rubbing, fighting, even chasing) is actually the seeking and chasing phases of the rut and not the peak breeding time. The peak breeding time is not when you will necessarily see the most activity. It’s actually probably the hardest phase of the rut to hunt. Bucks can be locked down with does for up to 72 hours and will only move when they move.

Pulling the season further away from the seeking and chasing phase of the rut would definitely have a big impact. From my interactions with deer in the woods and the research I have done, the seeking and chasing phases of the rut are typically somewhere between October 25th to November 15th. So is the rut over after November 20th? Absolutely not. I would however say that the peak of the seeking and chasing phases are over.

The phases do overlap and a lot of it has to do with when the does in your area go into estrous so it’s not a fail safe rule of thumb by any means. My opinion is that peak breeding is usually always around mid November.

Please realize that this is my opinion as well. Their are a lot of different theories on this.

I like the idea of a drawing for NR gun hunters!

I would also like to see a quotain regards to anterless deer. For example deer permit area 343 is in a managed zone. Every resident in Rochester could theoretically purchase a regular and bonus tag. Set a quota for antlerless tags (like most other states do) permit area specific. Ex. Permit area 343 has a quota of 500 antlerless tags sold either first come first serve or through a drawing.

I’m in again to defend the title!

There are numerous trout streams less than an hour drive from Rochester that provide great fishing and the scenery is unbeatable.

I would love to see the IDO guys do a Wyoming show. Fly fishing on the Miracle Mile perhaps??

Kyle Kolbet
Iowa Doe
Team 10

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I will be in Iowa (God’s Country) for the opener. Hunting North Central/North East Iowa.

Kyle Kolbet
WY Mule Deer Buck
4×5
Team 10

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I will be heading to SW North Dakota for the opener this weekend. Roadside reports have been promising with a 30+% increase in birds. ROOOOOOOOSTER!

Just found a Savage 220 on sale at Scheels in Omaha,NE. Can’t wait to get that thing to the range and run a few rounds through it. I am sure it will be much more accurate than my smoothbore Browning A5 12ga.

Awesome elk! Congrats! Was this a DIY hunt or guided hunt? Public or private land. That is a great bull! That is definitely on my bucket list. Congrats again!

I’d like to participate.

Wyoming-Mule Deer and Pronghorn(Doe)

I have had really good results with Frigid Forage-Big-N-Beasty.

I am going to try a few mock scrapes at a few of my hunting locations this year as well. I am going to try to start them this week. I have read that that find a good licking branch and putting some pre orbital scent on the branch will then entice the bucks to make a “natural scrape” in that area. I will be interested to see how it works. Report back with your findings!