You Are What You Eat

I recently made a run to Miesfeld's in Sheboygan to fetch the last batch of venison from the 2024 deer season.  It took a while for everything to be processed; yet it's completed. 

Garlic summer sausage, snack sticks, wieners and bacon.  Yes, there is such a thing as deer bacon.  

I had previously taken an additional batch of venison to Marchant's Meats in Sturgeon Bay to have brats and regular summer made.  Much faster turn-around.  And by the time you read this all but the shares belonging to a couple of hunters will have been distributed and likely found its way to a summer grilling session. 

In case you're wondering about the economics it works out like this:

Four deer skinned, cut and wrapped was $520; split six ways is $87 a hunter.  Everyone received a generous helping of steaks, chops and burger.  On top of that there was another generous selection of brats, wieners, snack sticks, summer sausage and bacon.  $560 total ($381 Miesfeld's and $179 Marchant's) split six ways is $93 a hunter.  All-in that comes to $180 a hunter.  And if you've been paying attention to the price of meat lately this is a decent deal; considering the overall yield.  (Note to self - take photos next time). 

I take payment by check or Zelle®.

Fun Fact:  Three additional deer were donated to the food pantry network of northeast Wisconsin thru DNR's deer donation program. 

Milestone - Part Two

The number one animal appearing in the digital captures of Snapshot Wisconsin trail cameras is Odocoileus virginianus, the whitetail deer.

Same here.

Fun Fact: The top four animals captured here are as follows (in rank order) - Deer, Turkey, Cottontail and Racoon.

 

 

Variety

From the trail camera there are:  whitetail deer, screech owl, fox squirrel, a timber doodle, raccoon and a long beard gobbler.

Nice variety....... 

 

Better Safe Than Sorry

My trail cameras have been in their present locations for years.  Consequently, the local critters don't pay them much mind; at least as much as I can tell.

This inquisitive, yet hesitant, doe wasn't having any of it it however....

 

Trail Camera Collage

Some recent images from the trail camera trap line include:

A curious doe

A screech owl

A timber doodle (North American Woodcock)

A couple of gobblers 

And Wiley Coyote 

Affordable Housing

Inspected and cleaned nest boxes today. Fifty of them. 

 

Evicted four families of mice and in a Caddy Shack moment Jill was attacked by a squirrel hiding in a box.

 

After three decades of building these this is the final nest box design. Constructed of cedar they’re very durable. The right side wall flips-up for cleaning or inspection.   Took a page from Henry Ford's book on manufacturing - interchangeable parts make for efficient repairs.  Affordable housing for cavity nesting songbirds.

 

 

Our woods was thinned during COVID and now that the canopy has been opened all sorta natural regeneration is happening.  Like these spruce seedlings. 

 

The resident pileated woodpeckers are disassembling this snag.

 

 

Recently deceased coyote. I wonder what the backstory is.

 

 

Fetched a load of firewood from the north forty. Including a Smirnoff Ice bottle from the ditch.  Not from my tribe.

 

A whitetail that didn’t survive winter.   I wonder about the backstory. 

 

 

Me and my side kick catching some rays with a Guatemalan Lager

 

 

Whitetails

Whitetail deer today.

Singularly the most common critter photographed by our six patient trail cameras.

A minor deer stampede....

And some nice portraiture taken of a whitetail in the snow - Schnee Hirsch....  

 

Waving The White Flag

Haven't any idea what spooked this doe - but this is something most hunters grow accustomed-to.

The backside of a whitetail wagging their tail as the beat it out of Dodge.

 

The Red Rocket

From our walk this morning the Red Rocket cooled her jets long enough to pause and enjoy a whitetail leg bone treat.....

Serengeti

When I first uploaded this photo taken by trail camera #5 I thought - What the heck?  Is that animal a cross between a whitetail and a giraffe?  

If so, it was a monumental continental leap.

It is the result of a perfect combination of sunlight dappled through tree leaves and shadowed on a doe.

It's an interesting photographic result.

You never know what a trail camera will capture.  One day it might be alien spaceship thruster backwash; another day it is something found on the Serengeti.....

Trailmaster

I've blogged about this before.

More of the same.

Brushing-out the trails with the Rhino bush hog is that it is dusty, stinky and loud.  There is the roar of the diesel motor, the clanging and clattering of the blades and and gear box on the mower.  And the stink of diesel exhaust.  A curious phenomenon that comes with brushing-out trails is that the deer will emerge from nowhere and stand at a polite distance and watch me before moving-on.  

 From the trail camera trapline there were these photos.  Me mowing out the field of view on camera #3 and then immediately after I exited the scene a doe and her fawn checking it out.

Go figure...

 

Trailmaster

Brushing-out the trails with the Rhino bush hog is that it is dusty, stinky and loud.  There is the roar of the diesel motor, the clanging and clattering of the blades and and gear box on the mower.  And the stink of diesel exhaust.  A curious phenomenon that comes with brushing-out trails is that the deer will emerge from nowhere and stand at a polite distance and watch me before moving-on.  

From the trail camera trapline there were these photos.  Me mowing out the field of view on camera #5 and then 20 minutes later mama and the twins checking it out.

Go figure...

A Deer Behind Every Tree

Plenty of deer on the landscape around these parts.  And the numbers are going to increase when the does begin birthing their fawns. 

Sure, it's an exaggeration; but some days it feels like there's a deer behind every tree.....

Renewable Resource

Our group of five hunters killed nine whitetails last year.  We processed four for ourselves and donated the remaining five to the food pantry network here in Door County.  Venison burger is wholesome and popular fare with needful families. 

I'm certain my neighbors had successful hunts as well.

Anyway, it would appear that we didn't make much of dent in the local whitetail herd as there have been ample images of does, fawns and a few dandy bucks continuing to show on the trail camera trapline.

It is the gift that keeps on giving.....

 

A New Set Of Choppers

In a bizarre twist of the tale of man bites dog Francis Wharton lived in the wilds of Little Fort, British Columbia in the 1950s - 60s.

 

 

Far from civilization the resourceful Wharton found himself in need of upper dentures. 

Extracting the teeth from a deer and filing them down, Wharton set the deer's teeth in a base of plastic wood using household cement to keep them in place. 

Then he ate the deer...with its own teeth. 

If you are traveling nearby, make a point to visit the Museum of Healthcare in Kingston, Ontario.

His home built choppers are on display there.

Trail Camera Action

Daytime deer movement.

It's a beautiful thing to see...

 

Wildlife Selfies

From the trail camera trap line there are velvet bucks, a coyote, a brood flock and a groundskeeper....

Trail Camera Bonus

While we were vacationing in Eastern Europe and interesting development was occurring here.  Something that was unexpected.  One of the trail cameras was patiently documenting the kill/discovery of a whitetail deer by a pair of coyotes.  It was nothing short pf a remarkable coincidence.  An unchoreographed sequence of photographs captured over five days.  I couldn't have staged it better if I tried. 

 

After we returned home I went out to fetch the SD cards on the trail camera trap line and I came across the remains of the deer laying within the field of view of a trail camera. The camera is circled in the image.

 

Examining the skeletal remains and judging from the size of the bones and the skull this appeared to be a yearling doe (born in spring 2022). Likely cause of death was predation by coyote.

 

Do I know that for sure?   Nope. Nevertheless, the photographic evidence is beyond circumstantial. 

 

What I do not know is if the deceased was crippled by a collision with a vehicle, weakened by winter and lack of browse (unlikely in farmland country) or otherwise compromised only to succumb to the whim of Ma Nature.

 

Nature can be a cruel mother. Yet that's how things work. Everything on the landscape is someone else's dinner.

 

These images document what unfolded.

 

Everyone eats whitetails....

 

Of hundreds of digital images here are a select number that capture what unfolded.

 

The event unfolded like this with a pair of coyotes lounging-about in the snow.  Then, over the course of about 20 minutes, they alternately feed-upon and drag a deer carcass into view.  What are the odds of this happening spontaneously?

 

For following morning the first to arrive on the scene are the crows, followed by additional avian predators.

 

 

Bald eagles - both adult and juvenile 

 

And, of course the coyotes returned

There were nocturnal visitations

 

More daylight visitors

 

Crows in a standoff with a juvenile bald eagle

And nocturnal

This alternated on and off...

 

 

 

Including a visitor from the arctic circle who winters here - The rough-legged hawk 

 

 

Curious deer and turkeys paid a call

And on the fifth day the batteries died

 

Almost 20 years of trail camera monitoring and I've never had something like this unfold.  I'm not one to anthropomorphize things but it's almost like these coyotes were doing me a solid favor.