Thursday, November 23, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
I thank God everyday that I’m a deerhunter! Swear to God I do! And you should too. What a powerfully dynamic, extremely lucky aliveness we live!
I have SO much to be thankful for, and of course it begins with health, family, country and freedom!
As I rise and shine all bright-eyed and bushytailed eager to go again on this ThanXgiving Day 2017 for my 58th day of nonstop hunting since late September, I often wonder if non-hunters truly grasp the concept of ThanXgiving as powerfully as we hunters do.
Can a sunrise on a walk in the park or on the beach be as moving as the ones we live from our deerstands, literally smack dab in the middle of its deadringer inner glow as an integral player in nature?
Can that store bought butterball provide anywhere near the deep appreciation that our haunch of hard-earned, hands-on, natural predator venison delivers to a hunting family?
I am convinced that even though hunting isn’t for everyone, I cannot imagine a lifestyle that comes anywhere close to hunting, so deeply intertwined with God’s miraculous creation and sense of individual fulfillment experienced as an independent procurer of one’s natural sustenance according to God’s tooth, fang and claw plan and design.
Let us give sincere thanks that we are Americans, where we the people choose our individual life, liberty and pursuit of backstrap happiness.
Give thanks for the hero warriors of the US Military for their dedication and sacrifice for good over evil.
Thursday, November 16, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
Dream on! Never stop believing, never stop dreaming! And I’m not talking Tinkerbell or Peter Pan dreams either. I’m talking big buck dreams from the big buck dreamlands in our dreamy little deerhunting heads!
I don’t have a crystal ball or a magical future predictor of any kind. In fact, I am always amazed at so many deerhunters whom I know that consistently predict which buck will show up where and when.
I strategize with all the smarts and experienced hunches I can muster, but it has always been a random roll of the dice for this old backstrapper.
I dream nonetheless and have on more than one occasion made some bold, cocky predictions of my own that unfortunately have never come to fruition.
But on November 2, 2017, the planets aligned, and my radar was on an alltime high and my luck meter pegged.
And it goes like this……
Thursday, November 9, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
I knew it was a perfect morning. Cold, overcast, dank, dark, solid, gentle west, southwest breeze and I was in a perfect tree at the edge of a perfect cattail marsh that I hadn’t hunted yet this fall. You know the feeling. I could smell it in the air. My predator instinct was at full mast and giddy!
Geese gurgled, splashed and squawked in the nearby pond, along with the occasional mallard quack and wood duck whistle.
Crows sounded off in the distance, a dog barked and a tractor cranked to life way yonder. The American bowhunters soundtrack was right on schedule. I even heard that lovely far away train whistle.
Able bodied SpiritWild VidCamDude in training Ethan Wiskur was at my side, cocked, locked and ready to rock doc! As a serious Michigan bowhunter his bad self, Ethan was in full-on stealth/kill mode and loving every soul cleansing minute of it. We sat there poised like deadly statues, ready to perform our predator duties for God.
Chipmunks, red squirrels and big, fat fox squirrels scurried about heather and yon, and birdlife was abuzz with winter preparations.
It was definitively soothing to say the least.
Sitting in one of my alltime favorite deerhunting ambush sets, I was slightly let down that we had not seen a single deer in the first two hours of our vigil. I know damn well it is all about “right place right time”, but still I was truly expecting more action.
Barely a flicker of nearly invisible white got my predator eye way off around 90 yards to the north, and we had game on!
My Bushnells showed me the rear half of a deer descending the ridge toward the marsh, but it was another fifteen minutes or so before the big doe was visible again below us.
Now there were two big swamp donkeys ever so slowly meandering and browsing our way taking their good old time.
After a nerve wracking long wait, the lead doe turned right to ascend the slope to my left, and when she paused at 12 yards with her head behind a tree, my 50-pound Mathews Halon came back gracefully, pin settling on her crease, and THWACKO! Thar she blows!
This terminally smacked she-deer exploded behind us on a deathrun while the 2nd doe flinched and watched her go.
Thursday, November 2, 2017
By: Ted Nugent I love life! I mean I really really love life! I love waking up every day! I love spring and summer and fall and winter. I love my wife and family and my dogs and my friends as much as a man can love anything. I love my guitars and love creating… Full Story
Thursday, October 19, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
It was thirty years ago this month that I walked with a giant for the very last time. Privileged beyond words to be the invited guest of the great Fred Bear at his beloved annual Grouse Haven deercamp in the big woods of Michigan, there was nothing in this world that could keep me away from spending such earth-moving time with the legendary bowhunter and conservation visionary.
My cherished times with Fred going all the way back to my youth were always incredibly special, but the magical setting of an autumn woodland colorfest during bowseason with The Man was literally off the charts exciting.
Surrounded by old hunting buddies and Bear Archery associates from around the country, the atmosphere verily glowed with the essence of the bowhunting life.
Chats around the campfire and fireplace, dining, sitting back sharing hunting tales and lies, making the rounds spreading corn and sugar beets at all the various deerstands, shooting our bows at the range and just classic deercamp hanging out and camaraderie was all so damn special there are no words to describe the magical aura and pulsations of it all.
Old Doug Walker was there. Bob Munger, Dick Mauch, Erv Wagner, Sheriff Bob Blevins, Sherwood Schock, Hap Fling, Dick Lattimer, Frank Scott, Astronaut Joe Engle, so many good friends and A list players from the original days of bowhunting’s rebirth. Every year was the bowhunting camp to end all bowhunting camps.
On that October day 1987 thirty years ago, Fred and I had the rare moment to have some time alone together as everyone else headed to their deerstands. Doing everything I could to be sure I wasn’t being a pest to Fred, I would always opt to stick around camp with him instead of hunting some mornings and afternoons.
Those that knew Fred were well aware of his great sense of humor and there was never a dull moment with him.
Thursday, October 12, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
The conditions were just right for our bowhunting dreams. It was a wonderful, dark, dreary, overcast, cold, breezy, grey cloud October afternoon, and inspired by the hunter friendly weather, I headed into the wind for my favorite west woods treestand a couple hours earlier than usual.
Not really expecting to encounter deer on the way in, typically I would just casually stroll through the ½ mile of enchanting deerwoods at a leisurely somewhat alert pace to my stand. I didn’t exactly walk along with my radar turned off like a citykid, but I also didn’t sneak in perfect deadly stealth mode either.
This day felt different, you know, a bowhunter’s sixth sense kind of thing, and with a better tuned in, more focused situational ‘bowhunter’ awareness, I did my very best Fred Bear predator approach and took my time, more like outright stalking than just still hunting.
Staying in the shadows, I only took a few ultra-slow, cautious steps at a time, and never stepped on anything I could step over.
I moved with my eyes 10 times more than with my feet and forced myself to stand still and probe the forest with the utmost of attentiveness. Like Fred and other master bowhunters taught us, I looked for horizontal lines and parts of a deer instead of the whole animal.
I reminded myself to look for a flicker of white or a quiver of an ear or head more than a deer’s body.
Not surprisingly the rewards were instantaneous with nonstop increased sightings of birds, squirrels and always titillating flora a fauna.
More than ounce I was inspired to increase my pace and get the walk to my stand over with, excited to get settled in for what had become over many years my standard operating treestand ambush procedure.
But I resisted the urge and kept my movement slow and easy.
Tuesday, September 26, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
Oh my God, glory glory hallelujah, here it comes! The moment of truth is glowing on the ever-approaching horizon and is nearly upon us, and the bloodbrotherhood of reasoning predators of the mystical flight of the arrow everywhere are dangerously cocked, locked and oh so ready to ROCK doc!
I know! I know! Many bowhunters across America celebrated the mythical season of harvest opener in numerous states many weeks and even months ago, but come on! You must admit that early seasons being as exciting as they are, they surely do not compare with the magic month of October!
We salute the many states that sensibly open their early archery deerseasons in the month of September, some even in July and August for goodness sakes, but with the historical traditional opener kicking off either on the closest Saturday to October or on October 1st itself, we all must admit that good old October fall days feel, smell, stimulate, inspire, motivate, electrify and call our name like the ultimate real McCoy of hunting season excitement just a little more powerfully.
Being so fortunate to be born in Detroit Michigan, the land of Fred Bear, way back in 1948, October 1st will always be the day of days for this old bowhunter. Even though we can still expect plenty of undesirably warm days, October nonetheless is the month when the weather and spirit at least starts to feel like hunting season.
Tuesday, September 12, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
I gotta tell ya, this social media phenomenon is something else, isn’t it! I am anything but a high-tech guy, (crowbars, hatchets, guitars and sharp sticks being my specialty) but I can figure most things out eventually, and once I got this facebook thing down, look out world!
Communicating freely with tens of MILLIONS of people around the world at the touch of a finger everyday certainly has unlimited pluses. And of course, like everything in life, with pluses comes an inescapable flurry of minuses. But in my nonstop communication on facebook the positives surely far outweigh the negatives and the lunatic fringe is always left hanging there by their own noose of stupidity and hate for all the world to see.
It all works out rather nicely in the end.
Now that hunting season 2017 is upon us and building steam, I hear from a lot of fellow hunters out there on a daily basis. I hear from dyed in the wool oldtimers like you and me and also from many newcomers eager to live and learn everything about our amazing sport.
Though everyone readily grasps the inescapable dynamic of the inherent frustrations that are inevitable in the “roll the dice” hunting lifestyle, there certainly still remains a lot of pain in the rear-end frustration out there nonetheless.
It’s called hunting, not shooting afterall.
From what I can tell, most everybody understands and works hard at all the basics like scouting, practicing, picking the best ambush stand sites, scent and sound control and a well-rounded understanding of game, gear, equipment, shooting and how to best use it all in our inexhaustible quest for life, liberty and the pursuit of backstrap happiness.
