Buying several Kubota tractors, building a Camp, and maintaining 69 acres of recreational/hunting property.

Sometimes it is difficult for deciding where to place a trail camera in the woods.
I believe over time, perhaps years, the deployed cameras will be moved around to different locations.
This year, it was just educated guessing as it is a brand new camera setup.

I don't know what attracts does to this location, but we get frequent pictures of them here.
Feeding, sleeping, regurgitating and rechewing of food. Right in front of this camera.

IMG_1846686391 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

Do you see that little scrub tree in the right foreground in the above photo? Perhaps three feet tall?

One recent windy day, that camera sent me a barrage of pictures.
The pictures were showing the little scrub tree being blown around by the wind.
The wind blown scrub tree triggered the camera motion sensor.
I almost jumped into my Jeep, drove the 20 miles, walked into the woods, and cut down the little scrub tree. But something came up, and all I did was turn down the motion sensitivity setting on that particular camera using my trail camera smart phone app from home.

Sometime later, I got a barrage of pictures from that same camera, but this time a small racked buck was using the same small scrub tree as a licking branch.
Whitetail deer rub their saliva and facial scent glands on small tree branches.
It's a form of communication for whitetail deer. The "who is in the neighborhood" communication.
I think I will leave that small scrub tree alone, and just accept a few wind generated false pictures.

IMG_1889521281 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

IMG_1889817848 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

Lots of rain & wind recently, so not many incoming deer pictures.
This morning it was somewhat sunny, cooler and much less wind.
Several pictures arrived here at home, and finally, it seems the rut has started.
Bucks are on their feet during daylight hours, and cruising around for does willing to dance.
We haven't seen any Boone & Crockett bucks yet, but plenty of freezer type material.
The picture below with the spike buck chasing the doe, that is directly in front of the heated/insulated mobile shooting shack at just about 45 yards out. Regular gun season starts November 15th.
Shooting shack build/photos in previous pages in this thread.

IMG_1922661060 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

IMG_1922661061 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

IMG_1922709938 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

Several more pictures from later this afternoon.
This one is a VERY nice example of upstate NY/small piece of woods whitetail deer.
I hope I get another chance to see this one through a scope equipped with crosshairs!

Has anyone noticed the location here? Look up the page a bit for the nighttime buck pictures.
It's that same silly little scrub tree used as a licking branch.
The bigger buck here in this post is looking for the smaller buck that was there earlier, and wants to run him off, and breed the remaining does now starting into the rut.

It's wonderful when a plan comes together, and with some luck spilled on top, that makes the treat even sweeter!

IMG_1922986349 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

IMG_1922986350 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

The first visible/sticking snowfall at the recreational property this season.
Here at the house, green grass. Rec. property is similar elevation and around 20 miles away.
The white background really improves deer spotting!

IMG_1927677606 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

^^^^ I had to look up your location. Warrenton, VA
May into June this year, I did a 2500+ mile trip on my Harley Davidson Road King. Solo trip, just me.
From upstate NY south on I 81, east on I 64 to the middle of VA, then an overnight in a hotel.
Next day, east again on I 64 over near Richmond, southeast on VA 288 and then intersected with I 95.
Southbound traffic on I 95 averaged 85 to 90 mph. Middle of the week, not the weekend.
Not that I minded though.

By evening of the second day, I reached my destination, Charleston, SC.
I did some local stuff with my brother in Charleston, and we also did a one day trip down/back to North Florida, ~ 450 miles round trip. Several days later, back to upstate NY, in reverse order on the same roads.
I stayed both nights in central VA in/at Zion Crossroads. Brand spanking new Hilton Hotel.
Not to far from Warrenton, 60+ miles or so?
Pretty country there!

For the "distance covering" days, I averaged slightly more than 500 miles per day.

Straight line distance as the crow flies distance from New York City to Los Angeles, California?
About 2475 miles.
You don't realize zig zagging up and down the eastern seaboard that you can really rack up the miles.

So I have now completed a "bucket list" item, upstate NY to Florida round trip on a motorcycle.
For what it's worth, I am age 69.

PXL_20250605_193659344 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

Yeah, The Interstate highways are a double edged sword. Especially I 95 and I 81 near Harrisburg, PA.
If I had taken the back roads between upstate NY and Charleston SC, I figured about four to five days in each direction. I only had about nine days total available for the trip blocked out on my calendar.
So I did what I did for maximizing time off the Harley and sitting around relaxing with my brother.
It also is kind of fun flying down the Interstate at speed. I tuck an Apple iPod in my leather motorcycle coat inside pocket, and listen to 32GB of stored music. It's amazing how fast the time goes by.

You actually have to set reminders to stop for fuel and a bottle of water.
The further south you go, the easier it becomes for getting dehydrated.
Even keeping up with I 95 traffic, the six gallon fuel tank lasts for many miles.
It becomes mandatory at every fuel stop, fill the bike, chug a liter of cold water, take a leak, walk around some. 25 to 30 minutes off the bike, and climb back on and go for another 200 to 250 miles.

And you are correct. The trip planning, was to get on I 95 south of Richmond.
Doing the trip in both directions as I did it, completely avoided the metro mess starting at Wilmington,
Baltimore, DC & suburbs, and down to Richmond.

Deer season, opening day for rifle season kicked off with a "BANG" on Saturday, November 15th.
My adult son, and another hunter, a great friend, hunted with me on the hunting/recreational property.
My son (age 43) successfully harvested his first deer ever, a nice big doe by 07:15AM.

My friend harvested a four point buck and a nice big doe, both by 11:00AM.
Tagged out by 2PM on opening day!

The buck required blood tracking on dead forest floor wet leaves (the snow melted) and it was a great learning opportunity for my son. The buck ran around a quarter mile before expiring, and it took several hours before it was located. It was a very tough tracking situation, one of the worst/most difficult that I have ever seen. Very minimal blood spots on wet leaves. When field dressing the buck, only one lung was hit, and both the entrance and exit bullet holes were about the size of a # 2 yellow pencil.

Here in New York State, they are "pushing" lead free deer hunting ammunition, and some locations require it. So far that lead free ammo thing is only a "request" when hunting on privately owned land.
I was not impressed at all with the lead free projectile performance my friend used in his 30-06 rifle.
He "bought into" the lead free ammo "Kool Aid" rhetoric, and now understands why I laughed at him when he told me his story about the State paying for his $85 box of lead free rifle ammo, 20 rounds in the box.
The State actually paid for the box of lead free ammo, via a rebate coupon.

I spent a wonderful weekend with my son!
My deer hunting duration for opening day weekend was only 1.5 hours.
The remainder of the time was spent doing multiple deer dragging with the little Honda ATV, tracking the buck, and gutting/loading deer carcasses into vehicles. Several deer went to the commercial processor.

Sunday weather was vile, and my son & I stayed inside the cabin near the big wood stove.
I have until January 1st for harvesting a deer of my own.
I do have photos of the weekend events, but in keeping with Forum Rules regarding hunting posts, and blood covered photos, and also complying with the requests and wishes of the Forum Owners and Moderators, I will not post them here. PM for pictures! Afterall, this is the Kubota Forum!

We heat our home with wood pellets.
I spent so much time doing hunting season preparations this year that I slacked off preparing for winter.
We already had three tons of pellets at the house and needed two more tons for winter completion.
Back about a week and a half ago, the local highway departments started flinging road salt.

Normally, when the salt hits the roads, I'm done using the bigger two of my three trailers.
I keep one "cheap" Carry-On trailer out for hauling the little Honda ATV back from the recreational property when we are finished with muzzleloader season on January 1st.
I had "almost" decided to haul the remaining two tons of pellets in the Toyota Tacoma pickup bed,
with a half ton load of bagged pellets filling the short box bed to capacity.
Four round trips for the two tons. Certainly not optimal!

Recently we had almost an inch of rain over several days and all the visible road salt was washed away.

I hooked up the big double axle trailer to my Jeep and made a quick trip out to Tractor Supply for the final two tons of pellets. After unloading the pellets, I fired up the BX 2370 and towed the two bigger trailers out behind the barn where they will sit for the entire winter.

I devote one barn/garage bay for storing the pair of BX machines.
During warm weather, the BX 25 is in the back of the bay, and the BX2370 mower is right by the bay door.
I swapped the two machines around, BX 2370 to the rear of the bay, and the BX 25 by the bay door.

Since I was on a "roll" on that nice warm gift of a day, I removed the tooth bar from the FEL bucket and installed the Edge Tamer "skis" so my lawn and blacktop driveway doesn't get torn up removing snow.

As the BX 2370 was being parked in the back of the bay, I noticed the hour meter on the new instrument
cluster displayed 96 hours. Here in upstate NY, mowing season is about six months long.
One acre lot at the house, slightly less than two acres at the recreational property/cabin.

The BX 2370 which had been purchased just as winter ended had mowed for the entire mowing season
with minimal maintenance. No fluids added, several pumps of grease in the mower deck spindle grease
fittings, and one replacement fuse. I mow a strip of lawn across the road from my house, and one day when returning back across the road, I "bounced" on the seat and it popped the fuse powering the safety systems. After replacing the fuse, I was unable to get the fuse to fail again.

I believe the BX 2370 has now "proved" itself. It is a great addition to the fleet of equipment!

PXL_20250512_222827861 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

Now with a full winter supply of pellets, let it snow!

PXL_20251108_222103429 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

PXL_20251108_222121766 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

PXL_20251126_191929074 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

After I got the wood heating pellets situation squared away at the house, I managed to get some more time out in the deer woods. On Saturday, December 6th I had an opportunity for doing some handgun deer hunting. That fancy heated/insulated portable blind shown much earlier in this thread?
I was in the seat less than one minute before a deer harvesting opportunity was presented.
You don't always need that big heavy bulky rifle.
I used a Ruger Super Blackhawk Hunter revolver in .44 Magnum and now have some venison for the freezer.
PM if you want blood/guts pictures!

This is what I used. The scope is a Leupold 2.5 x 8 extended eye relief handgun scope.
I even used my reloaded ammo.
The regular deer hunting season is finished now and black powder/muzzleloader started today.
There are a half dozen or so closed season days bracketing Christmas, but in total, the black powder/muzzleloader season is about two more weeks and ends January 1st.

PXL_20251011_003505348 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

Even though there are a few more days of black powder/muzzleloader season, I am done for the year.
My Girlfriend has been experiencing some back issues for over six months now, and she is scheduled for some fairly invasive spine surgery early in January. Many appointments in the next ten days or so.

I did decide to run the trail camera system through the remainder of the winter.

Several of the components in the trail camera system are rough on batteries.
The "Home" camera inside the cabin, since it is sending out images & reports multiple times per day over the cellular network, it uses up four "D" alkaline batteries in 50 to 60 days.
I purchased a 120 VAC power cube with a cord.
It plugs into the bottom of the camera and utilizes cabin power instead of the internal four "D" batteries.

The camera doing surveillance for the cabin, it is the focal point for all the other trail cameras in the woods. It has all the other camera images going through it heading for the unit inside the cabin.
This camera is 15 feet up in a tree for camera anti-theft, and also due to the ground contour near the cabin.
This particular camera, it's a real pain for changing the internal batteries, and you need a good ladder.

I purchased a remote battery box for the camera up high in the tree. I also purchased a special mesh/metal armored cord, ten feet in length. it connects the camera high up in the tree and the remote battery box.
This allows having the remote battery box at "face" height on the back side of the tree, and out of casual view. Now I don't need a ladder for changing out batteries. The remote battery box holds six alkaline
"D" cells. Power is always routed from the remote battery box first, then the internal camera batteries.
Daily reports also give you real time remaining battery power expressed as a percentage.

It was a very good deer season for us this year!
We learned more about deer movement on the property in the previous ~ 3 months utilizing the cameras,
compared to the prior 20+ years.

Happy Holidays to all the OTT Members & Guests!