Tuesday Update: 10/26/21

Things are starting to pick up. We’re getting reports of increased deer movement not just in Northeast Wisconsin, but all over the midwest. We should start seeing increased activity in the buck pool anytime. Speaking of…

Last Week

Mitch Dequaine ended the weeks-long drought and dropped a buck on Saturday that immediately put him into the lead despite the fact that his buck has yet to be measured. Based on the eye test I feel safe moving his buck to the top of the list thus far this season even with measurements pending.

Standings Update

1. Mitch Dequaine – Score TBD
2. Tom Williquette – Score TBD

Poll Question

Since most of the links section below deals with trail cams I’m going to use that theme for today’s poll question as well:

The Week Ahead

This looks to be another unseasonably warm week and Drury Outdoors’ Deer Cast is predicting that the next few days will be anywhere from OK to poor to bad. Not sure what the difference is between bad and poor since neither sounds particularly appealing, but according to their scale bad is worse than poor. Either way, it’s supposed to start getting down to freezing overnight again on Saturday night, and not surprisingly, the best hunting days for this area are projected to be Sunday and Monday. If you can sneak in a trip to the woods while the kids are trick or treating on Sunday that sounds like the way to go.

This Friday’s Raffle

This week’s raffle prize will be Bass Pro Shop gift cards courtesy of Bill and Sara at Seiltz Trucking. Stay tuned to the site on Friday for announcement of the winner.

Links

I received an e-mail from Field & Stream with their list of 50 Expert Tips for Hunting the Whitetail Rut. I rolled my eyes because I’ve heard it all a hundred times before, and then opened the link anyway because I’m a sucker for lists and deer hunting. As it turns out within the first 15-20 tips there were several I had never heard before. An informative and enjoyable read.

This week I want to talk trail cams for a minute. I’ve been hanging trail cams on my uncle’s hunting land for at least ten years now. The problem is, his land is over four hours from here. If I wanted to swap out SD cards I had to dedicate nine hours of driving. It was always a good excuse to get over to the land and check stands, cut some shooting lanes, and do some general wandering, but damn that’s a lot of driving.

A couple years ago modems became affordable for normal people like me and I purchased one with a compatible trail cam. When it works it’s amazing. All of the information without the driving and leaving my scent all over the woods. Inevitably something ends up snapping my USB cable or the batteries run out on the camera or modem. I bought a solar panel and a splitter to run power to both devices. Those continue to get ripped. Bears and critters are always messing something up. It’s not ideal.

This past year Moultrie released their Delta camera and it’s been a game changer. A good camera with modem built in at an affordable price. Only $100, or if you wait for the right sale you can get it cheaper. I got mine for $80. Easy setup with the Moultrie Mobile app. It’s been a game changer. Last weekend my friend and I walked the woods, found some active scrapes, and set up three cameras near them on our hunting property. We’ve spent every day since texting back and forth about the pictures that are constantly coming in. Within two days this guy showed up in the app and got us talking:

I’m not here advertising for Moultrie. It’s just the brand that I’m used to. A while back Shawn Thomas showed me what he’s doing with Cuddeback’s Cuddelink cameras and I was blown away. If you haven’t gotten in on cellular trail cams yet because of the cost or because you’re tech averse, now might be the time to to look into them. If you’d like to discuss, reach out. I’m always a fan of a good trail cam conversation.

Fun Stuff

We’re another week closer to November. Tom and Mitch got their bucks. Hopefully some of you join them this week. Good luck out there. If you have tips, ideas, comments, or general thoughts on any of this, please let me know.