Lord have mercy! November 19, 2015, and our beloved deerseasons across America not only throttle on relentlessly, but lo and behold, I believe many of us are actually increasing our pursuits in intensity and passion. Can this be? Can we maintain this indefatigable predator pace? Can we possibly keep this madness up?
By Ted Nugent
I say hell yeah we can! And we shall, thank you very much.
Now I admit that the old backstrap addicted guitarplayer does indeed have painful bouts of occasional fatigue, and in fact, there were a few mornings in the last three months where, due to rainstorms mind you, (thank God!) that I actually suckerpunched the mean old alarm clock and squirmed deeper into my comfy down comforter and pulled the flannel sheets and warm wool blankets up tight against my chinny chin chin and faded back into big buck dreaming Neverland.
And manOman did it ever feel GOOOOOD!
Forever my average deerseason has been so very blessed with, for all practical purposes, unlimited doe tags in Michigan and unlimited buck and doe tags in Texas.
Can you say Hallelujah? I can and do daily.
Let me explain; The Michigan DNR has rightfully identified the severe agriculture damage and the unimaginable highway deer slaughter in the areas of my family traditional hunting grounds and the available antlerless tags are available accordingly. Though in actual tag numbers, there is a limit for sure, but, considering the number of legal hunting days that I have has always restricted sheer kill numbers by the days and opportunities, not the number of tags.
Can you say Living the Dream?
And in the deerhunting epicenter of the mighty Lone Star State of Texas, we have a statewide Managed Land Deer Permits system where land owners determine our own bag limits, based on, get this, the carrying capacity and sustain yield science of the given habitat on our lands.
Wild isn’t it!
So needless to say, I get to hunt every day and kill a large number of deer, the sacred venison of which I am able to not only feed my family throughout the year, but also donate to various charities, military heroes, neighbors, extended family and friends who cherish this phenomenal life sustaining pure venison protein as much as I do.
So when I say I hunt every day, I am not fibbing. I hunt everyday!
Like all deerhunters that I know, I get just as excited about hunting elk, moose, pronghorn, bear, caribou, bison, cougars, hogs, javelina, alligators, exotics, pheasants, rabbits, quail, dove, turkey, squirrels, grouse, woodcock, snipe, ducks, geese, cranes, crows, starlings, sparrows, woodchucks, raccoons, fox, bobcat, coyotes, ringtails, and of course the indescribable conservation joys of running my traplines in Michigan and Texas for all those wonderful varmints and furbearers.
Then of course there is all that fishing! I also hunt with a hook and line, and bait!
To some it may seem sacrilegious to hunt anything other than deer during the sacred deercrazed month of November, but there is a huge, emotional component to my hunting decisions; that would be my two amazing hunting dog buddies, Gonzo the black Lab and Happy my Yellow Lab/catahoula/black mouth cur killing machine.
Each midday is best described as a squirrel orgy with Happy displaying a fiery passion for treeing and barking, yapping and howling until dear old dad blasts the pesky limbrat out of the stratosphere into the happiest dog mouth on earth.
Then there is the miracle of those elusive Michigan swamp roosters, of which we lucked into four for a six day cattail wander.
And duck hunting! YOWZA! Love our waterfowling!
We have bagged many small game critters so far this season, and I spend every few days removing my precious game from the walk in cooler as I render them into family sized portions, dine on daily, lovingly wrap, label and place into the freezers.
I will share some killer recipes for all these hard earned various protein prizes in my ongoing future deeranddeerhunting.com NugeBlogs, but suffice it to say that swapping backstraps for mallard breasts or limbrat Etouffe’ once in a while is without question the greatest, healthiest and most delicious diet a human could possibly indulge in and celebrate.
They don’t call him Happy for nothing!
Enjoy the ongoing deer fun out there my BloodBrothers, but do not underestimate the equal joys of all that other hunting fun that is still going on out here. It’s all fun, sport, meat, trophy conservation perfection.
Next week is ThanXgiving, but at the Nugent house/deercamp, it’s a dynamo super ThanXgiving every day!
Multi-platinum guitar legend TED NUGENT has a new full-length album THE MUSIC MADE ME DO IT, on Round Hill Records. The album is available now for order everywhere, and the title track “The Music Made Me Do It” is available to download and stream wherever music is sold.
With more than 40 million albums sold, rock legend Ted Nugent is equally well known as the nation’s most outspoken proponent of our 1st and 2nd Amendment rights, conducting thousands of pro-gun, pro-freedom, pro-American interviews in major media worldwide. Nugent is a New York Times best-selling author whose works include Ted, White & Blue —The Nugent Manifesto; God, Guns & Rock ‘n’ Roll and Kill It & Grill It. This year, his award-winning Ted Nugent Spirit of the Wild TV show celebrates its 500th episode! For all things Nuge, visit www.tednugent.com