Hello Fellow Hunters! It has been about two months since I have posted and the reasons are legion, but stated succinctly, I have retired from the police services after 32 1/2 years, and also we went through lambing here, and ended up with a bottle feeder...Of course I took that chore on, and it becomes a love, even if you do have to get up and feed every two hours for the first week. It took pretty much all of our turkey season, and still, even though little Lily has grown from 5 lbs. to nearly forty, I still feed her about 90 ozs. of milk from the bottle a day, four times...Also, we have been haying so putting first cut in the barn has left little time for much other than changing cards in the cameras. Below are some pics I have weeded from the hundreds taken this spring, some rather graphic.Below, you see a doe at the end of April still in shaggy winter coat. Later on, you'll see some others also still in winter coats as late as June. That is New Hampshire for you!
The scourge of all deer herds in the east is the coyote, several times his western cousin's size. Some 70% of Eastern Coyotes have gray (timber) wolf blood. That's the reason they reach 70 or more lbs here...
Most of our deer came through the winter looking sleek, and well. This doe below is NOT! I have some dozen pictures of her, and was not sure she would make it. But she seems to be gaining weight on our whitetail clover. If she gives birth, not sure what kind of chance hers have of making it...
Below you see a recent trail picture of mom and babe..a future trophy maybe? I find that the little bucks usually precede their moms, while the girls follow. Just sayin'
Below is a fairly tragic example of why we hunt coyotes with such fervor. If you zoom in in this guy, you will see his belly absolutely stuffed, and in his mouth is the head, front quarters, and legs of a fawn. I just hope it's not the little guy above! Actually, if you check the picture dates, you'll see that it was not!
Here is that weaker doe again, a month later. I think she will make it through, but offspring? Doubt it...
This little gray fox is beautiful, and shiney. We don't bother them much because they are no harm, although they are pretty good at finding turkey nests...
Here you see a doe on June 9th still sporting most of her winter coat. Time to lose it girl, although we realize that preparation for temps as low as -40 degrees requires a lot of hollow hair and undercoat!
This young lady is the same doe as seen with the fawn. She is sleek, and healthy and has shed her winter coat. Obviously had a better wintering ground...
Each week I go out to a food plot and do something, anything, to improve it. Back in April, I went out to the West plot and girdled this hemlock to kill it. It is in lockstep with the white oak next to it and taking valuable nutrients form the nut bearing tree. When it is dead and dry, I will take it down and we'll burn it at camp fires.
Below are two different does, about a mile apart, but both sleek and healthy...not flanked out at all, so really hard to tell if they have birthed out yet. Here's hoping for a high fawn survival rate!
