We have a couple of creeks that cross our place. When it rains they are impassable, but during most of the year, there are a couple of low-water crossings where it is easy to walk across -- often on dry ground.
The rains have been unseasonably heavy this fall and the opportunities to walk around in the woods have been few because the first hurdle is to cross a creek. Earlier this week it was impassable, but yesterday the water was down and I was able to walk across on the muddy, but firm bottom.
It is deer season and although I don't normally hunt them, I will sometimes carry a rifle with me when I walk the woods. It is more for the possible opportunity to shoot a feral hog than anything. We also keep a couple of game cameras up during this time of year to get an idea of the wildlife coming to the game feeders or just passing through on one of the many trails through the forest.
The easiest way for me to get the photos off of the cameras is to carry a laptop with me. I usually carry it in an old backpack. When I get to one of the cameras I remove the SD card and plug it into the reader which then allows me to transfer the pictures. Yesterday, with the water down, I decided to download the photos from the cameras.
I was wearing the backpack with my old "clunker" laptop which weighs more than the newer models, along with a full water bottle and a couple of boxes of shells for the 30-30 which I also carried. After checking the camera, which I have to cross the creek to get to, I decided to head off through the woods and see what kind of tracks there were on the trails and then to see if the crossing on the second creek was passable -- it's a pretty good hike to the 2nd creek crossing. Sure enough it was below the old concrete slab and I walked across.
That put me on the southwest part of our place which is about as wild as it was the day it was created. It has never been farmed like much of the area around here, and is one of the few hills in the area. Although right on the creek, it is close to the highest point on our place. There is good grass there and huge oak trees which line the creek. It is a very steep drop to the creek in many places and it is a very picturesque area. I enjoy going back there because it is like stepping back in time.
Sure enough, as I quietly walked up the hill from the creek, I spied a young whitetail buck grazing. He looked at me and I stopped. We watched each other for a couple of minutes before he decided to bound off into the woods that line the creek to the south. He acted as though it wasn't even deer season and I suspect he had not been hunted.
As I walked further across the hill and headed north toward some of the more beautiful areas along the creek, I jumped another whitetail buck. This one had a fairly large antler spread and appeared to have at least 8 points. I watched him bound off into the woods along the creek and decided to follow him for a ways.
As I headed out onto a point where a game crossing fords the creek, I found the log "bridge" in the photo above. I seriously thought about attempting to walk across it because it would have saved me over a 1/2 mile walk from going back around by the slab crossing. The log was plenty wide and if it had been hewn flat on the top I wouldn't have hesitated. If I had been even 10 years younger I likely would have chanced it.
I have found that my balance just isn't what it once was. I could just see myself landing in that muddy water with a backpack full of laptop and a 30-30 in my hand and decided against attempting the crossing. It did make for a great photo though. The leaves you see floating in the creek are 6 to 10 inches in diameter. I don't know what kind of tree they come from but, they are huge.
No comments:
Post a Comment