Bowhunting journal
A quiet journal about the art and craft of hunting, and the dialogue with nature — one story at a time.
This July’s hunting weekend was a little different from the usual ones. After my 26-year-old Audi A4, on the way home last time, literally “breathed its last,” I had no way of getting to Somogy. But a very kind acquaintance of mine offered to drive me there, and to bring me home again on Monday….
The small pool shaped from the stump of a large poplar felled in a storm, mostly intended as a "birdbath," is proving very useful to big game as well during the great summer heat. Thanks to the recent smoothing work done with a milling disc (Kaindl Super-Carver V9 Milling Disc for Angle Grinder 115/125) to…
According to the footage, the red stag’s day began well before the wallowing, in the section of forest bordering the wallow. That’s the spot where I also have my automatic feeder and a bird waterer carved into an old, felled poplar stump. At 15:27, one of the wallow’s cameras caught him on the sun-drenched, duckweed-covered…
Moonlight-simulation lighting with cable-track movement for bowhunting Thermal night hunting is being used in more and more places, and it’s clearly reshaping animal behavior. Wherever such equipment is used regularly, the population has become extremely sensitive to changes in light, so that even an almost imperceptible shift in illumination can trigger a flight reaction. This…
The regular hunting weekend is here again. 🌿🏹 On Friday morning I replaced the post of the salt lick with a more interesting, more natural-looking, multi-branched ash bough. A natural, branching, crooked bough blends into the surroundings better, draws less attention, and animals approach it with more confidence too. (Of course, this is only my…
Life is starting to return to the Big Green Wallow . . . Today at 04:36 – while the camera was still in night, black-and-white mode – these fine young pigs arrived and spent more than an hour here, methodically picking up even the weekend’s few handfuls of corn. It’s been a long time since…
Around the "birdbath" made from a fallen poplar log, this young buck keeps showing up regularly. It’s a joy to watch how the game takes possession of the feeding, watering, and wallowing spots I’ve created on my hunting grounds by purposefully reshaping what nature already offered.
🌿 A Whitsun Forest – Game Management, Field Tuning, and a Bowhunter’s Patience I spent the Whitsun weekend not only hunting, but also tending the land, observing – and enjoying that rare quality of time you only get when you spend a whole day in the quiet of the forest, free of any expectations or…
Wallow Use and Mineral Requirements in Red Deer – Phenological and Wildlife Management Connections May as a Critical Phenological Window May is one of the most dynamic transitional periods in the ecosystem of temperate deciduous and mixed forests. For large forest game – especially red deer (Cervus elaphus) – this period represents several mutually reinforcing…
Second night Last night on the night stand I had a hunting experience full of life, full of moments worth living for. Already at 21:47, as the forest had wrapped itself in complete darkness, a serious sounder started moving toward the half-dried wallow. They lingered there for nearly two hours, where the ground was still…