This Long Beard weighed 15 lbs, had a 9.5 inch length beard, spur length 5/8" and 3/4" and the age of this bird is two years old. I believe the larger gobbler in the crowd was the second one but he was several yards beyond this Long Beard and did not offer a shot. Used a Porter's Dual Hen Custom box call with a walnut one piece base and a cedar lid. Also used an antique Lynch World Champion box call but the last series of yelps and cuts were from the Porter Dual Hens call shown in the pix above.

Also, when I got ready to unload my Remington 11-87 shotgun, the bolt would not retract to the rear and I could tell something was loose behind and under the bolt and took the barrel off while at the truck but was unable to move the bolt. It is a good thing that I did not need a second shot since I apparently had a single shot shotgun this morning for sure.

Upon arriving home and quickly removing the breasts from this ole boy and placing in cool salted water, later vacuum sealing, I proceeded to check the Remington 11-87 shotgun out and removed the two trigger plate pins on the receiver and removed the trigger group assembly and noticed that the sliding link which connects to the action spring plug of which that assembly has seven (7) parts and the other end is moved to the rearward by the action bar assembly was not in place (link) and couldn't see any reason why it would be in that position unless only one end of the (link) was connected into the action spring plug which could account for it cycling ok when loading and unloading the shotgun. I re-assembled the shotgun and cycled the action and everything was working as it should and hopefully will function as an auto loading shotgun tomorrow if needed. I should test fire the weapon before tomorrows hunt but hate the thoughts of firing those 5 buck a piece shells for a function test. Okay, I know I am frugal! Any weapon used for security reasons that has been taken apart for inspection and re-assembled, it is mandatory to do a test firing before said weapon is placed back into service.

UPDATE: I called Remington Arms Service Dept. in Madison, NC and they were aware of the link described above becoming disconnected from the plunger which is caused by the usage of extremely heavy loads; e.g. 2 1/4 oz. of shot and the inertia causes the link to actually go forward enough to allow the small rear prongs of the link to get out of the recess area of the plunger that is driven by the recoil spring in the stock. Remington modified the plunger by increasing the length to solve that problem with the extremely heavy shot loads. I ordered the part and the shotgun is ready for another season.

Web page updated by Bill aka Mickey Porter on 10-18-18.

ARCHERY, MUZZLELOADER AND REGULAR GUN SEASON 2011

Today is November 15, 2011 and this was the first archery season in decades that I did not harvested a deer with the ole stick n string. 

Opening morning found me in my favorite tree stand with the wind direction about nil and perfect when a good freezer spike buck came out at about daylight affording a quartering away shot of which I have made many times in the past with good success.  However, that morning, I shot a little too far back and the arrow exited very low on the opposite side, apparently taking out only a small portion of the right lung or at least that is my assessment of the shot.  The buck quickly ran from the immediate area and I did not hear him go down which is a bad sign; normally I hear them fall and thrash around a little. 

After getting down and checking the arrow, it was evident that I clipped the stomach area by the contents near the arrow and I decided to wait several hours before tracking the deer as it was very chilly that morning.  Once I started the track, I had not gone but about 40 or 50 yards before the deer was bleeding profusely and I was certain I would find this deer within a hundred yards.  See inserted pix:

After an hour or two of tracking and going about 500 yards,  the blood trail finally got to just a small droplet or minute speck and the reality was quickly setting in that I might not locate this deer after all.  The trail finally led into a four (4) year old thick cutover with a ton of small saplings and briers and the trail went cold and it was impossible to try and cut circles to pick up the trail again.  The last 40 yards of trailing, I was literally down on hands and knees following the sparse blood trail until it ran out.  I certainly did give it my best effort and it upsets me not to be able to recover an animal that I have killed and/or wounded; but it happens!

FREEZER BUCK

I harvested one small 5 point management buck for the freezer and saw the least amount of deer in a number of years.

This little management buck was harvested with my Remington BDL tiger stripe rifle chambered in my favorite caliber being the .270 Winchester.  I still have plenty of reloads that I did back in 1999 using 57 grains of H4831 powder and 130 grain soft point boattail Sierra bullets.  That powder/bullet combination is an awesome round.  I pulled the bullets on many of those reloads using the H4831 powder and resized the neck only and reloaded using the IMR 4831 powder which is a little hotter powder.

LEAVING ON A SPIRITUAL NOTE