Ron Ashbaugh
UKC Forum Member
Registered: Dec 2003
Location: Mercer PA
Posts: 4837 |
Not sure if its a highlight, but it was a great night in 2007
Last night in North MO was about a perfect night for a coonhunt. The weather was about 32 degrees calm as calm gets, and the moon had been rising at about 11:00 PM so the woods were dark. We were expecting a nasty winter ice storm the next day so I figured the coon would be on the move.
With the price of gas being what it is and my financial status being what it is, I have been hunting out of my 95 Toyota Paseo two door coop. My dad helped me build a small wood platform that sits on the back seat covered with a cushion from a chair long since thrown away. That is covered with an old Ducks Unlimited camo bed comforter. My two dogs.....MR.T (buckeye JakeX Pine Top Dolly) and an old walker female whose best days have past LOVE riding in that car. They have been from NC to PA several times, and from MO to PA twice. When I pull up and let them off the chains, they automatically get in. I get to ride with MR. T's head on my shoulder most of the way no matter how far we are going.
Back to the story. Since I am stil out of state here in MO, I decided this year to shoot enough coon to pay for my tag. My goal was 20. Heading out tonight between PA and MO I had 15 in the freezer. I am a walk hunter mostly and last night was no different. We park the car on mostly public land, set the GPS, turn out, and hunt until we run out of light, turn on the GPS and walk back. I was in a 4500 hundred acre plot of ground with a large river that doubles back through and some nice planted fields (The MO DNR does an OUTSTANDING job with their land)
I turn them out in the parking lot and strike a track right off the back. They double back across the access road and are from what I can tell holed up behind me. I had in through a NASTY briar patch and see the coon in a little bitty tree, unfortunately the dogs are 50 yards more in on a hole. I head in to get them and see if they will tree the coon I can see, and low and behold right in my light that coon climbs down and takes off. Now I am really losing it. Yelling and screaming at those dogs to get on that track. For the life of them in the next 5 minutes it is like that coon was never there. I am so frustrated I am about to sling my trusty rifle in a field.
I got back and pull them boogering devils out of that briar patch and put them back on a walking road next to a cornfield. MR. T hits a track about 30 yards from me and pulls up treed within 50. I am betting it is the same coon, one down.....I let them chew on him for a minute, tell them my coon and send them off hunting again. While they get going I skin..I like this system, it keeps me busy and gives them time to hunt. About 1/2 way though this coon, I hear them strike a good distance away. I finish what I am doing, put the hide in my game pouch, and head in their direction. They are several bean and corn fields away treed right on the edge close to the river. They have a big den. I light up the old GPS and figure I should probably start working my way back towards the car. I don't like to get too far from "home base" expecially when I have no idea where I am at. I cut the dogs and try to send them townards the car, but they have other ideas. They stike again within about 100 yards, and run a nice track. They pull pu on the edge of a standing corn field. As I head in I see the coon lying up in a crotch of a tree. I get settled for my good shot or two or three, and out rolls coon #2.
We follow the same routine, I skin, they hunt, and they are both working tracks on different sides of a pond surrounded by frozen March grass. The old dog trees and I decide to head to her. About 1/2 T-trees and she decides to go to him. I catch her on the way and send her back to her tree.....bad idea, its SLICK. So now we have MR. T treed on the other side of the pond, and he also has decided to pull up slick..I figue it is time to call it a night. We head out to a field road and I am just walking without leashes toward the gravel road where the car is about 3/4 of a mile in. The dogs have a different idea.
Not more than 1/4 mile later MR. T strikes and is running hard in another still standing corn field. He is pushing the track good and I see him cross the field road into the timber. 75 yards into the timber he SLAMS The tree and usually when he sounds like he did I load the rifle. On the way in throgh some NASTY brush and briars I see a coon 50 yards from where they are treed looking at me both barrels. Thinking the worst I start looking up their broken of old tree. Low and behold is the biggest coon I have ever shot or see shot. HE WAS HUGE. A couple shots later, he is on the ground and I am just in awe. I carry his butt back out to the trail I was on and get to work on the skinning of this brute while MR.T hangs out to watch. When I finish and put this boy in my game pouch, my bag is heavy. So heavy that it is pulling my jacket back against me and I cannot get into my pockets. I figure it is time to go home, when I hear MR. T strike about 1/4 mile in directly in front of me.
Knowing I am never going to call him off, I start towards him. about half way in (another pond with that blasted marsh grass) he and the old gal have treed. When I get there the tree is just humungous. I am talking giant like 5 feet across. I start shining with little hope as the coon could be anywhere. I cannot find it so just for kicks I pull out my old deer bleat call I use as a squaller. I hit it hard and the coons looks with both eyes. He is a smart one though and before I can shoot he is moving and not looking. After a ton of squalling and coaxing, I finally get him to look for another second and can see where he is. I get a bullet in him, but he is on the move. Now as murpy's law might happen, my light starts to go dead so all I can see is his random looks as he crawls out a branch to what he thinks is his escape.
Lucky for me, my brothers wife happened to buy me a little LED flashlight on Black Friday. HE gave it to me on a hunt and I stuck it in my pocket. I get it out and shine the coon missing a couple times. The clip is out and I am handfeeding shells. Luck prevailed however and my one shot proved to be enough and the coon came out with just enough life that the dogs could handle him. HE is another nice size boar. I CHAIN the dogs this time and skin the coon adding it to my overly heavy bounty now and with our AAA LED light and a GPS we head back to the PASEO with a great night, a great memory, a goal accomplished, and a story to tell.....
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The fun is over once you pull the trigger
Ron Ashbaugh
CROOKED FOOT KENNELS
Last edited by Ron Ashbaugh on 05-28-2010 at 08:08 PM
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05-27-2010 04:13 PM
