From the Woods to the Man Cave
A Deer Camp Surprise You’d Never Expect
November in Wisconsin is a particularly special time, especially if you're a whitetail hunter. The changing colors autumn brings and the shorter days and cooler air seep into our bones; if you're a bowhunter, the whitetail rut is the most magical time to be in the deer woods. November is also when most states' rifle hunting season kicks off. In Wisconsin, the rifle season opener might as well be a state holiday (in fact, I'm not sure why it isn't yet.) Over 600K hunters get out their blaze orange hunting gear and hang it on the clothesline for a few days to prepare for the hunt. It's like a symbolic flag of honor, along with putting your blaze orange hunting hat in the dash of your pickup truck as a nod to other passersby on the highway.
As tradition would have it, the Okayest Hunter crew takes off work the Friday before the WI gun deer opener to meet in the woods and "scout" our hunting spots for the morning opener. Shocker; we typically all end up in the spots we hunted last year. It begs the question, are we really scouting? We've been hunting the same stretch of public hunting land for over 10 years. What we're actually doing is catching up and seeing the woods come to life with memories of seasons past. It's one of my favorite things about deer camp. Then we all head back to the tailgates and crack open a few cold ones.
Something new happened a few years ago on one of our seemingly pointless scouting missions.
As someone who has spent countless hours and miles trekking for shed antlers, I've never found an antler while actively looking for them. The last thing I thought I'd see was an antler lying before me in November. A time of year that is not typically optimal for finding them. Indeed, the squirrels and mice would have chewed them up by now if other shed hunters hadn't already picked them up to add to their piles.
"Holy Shit! I found one!"
My buddies, and Dad trailing behind me were incredibly confused since we weren't actively looking for something other than a hunting spot. Not something that you'd expect to be that excited about.
"Oh, that's what all the hooting and hollering is all about," - My Dad.
I finally found my first shed antler! The saying, "You find it when you're not looking," finally made sense to me. The last thing I would have expected to find was a shed antler and here it was, with minimal squirrel damage. It was a four-point side, indicating a symmetrical match to another four-point side of a nice 8-point shooter buck! This was some of the best scouting we'd done over the years to validate there were indeed some dandies in the area!
When I returned home after a great weekend at deer camp, I proudly displayed the antler on our coffee bar. Little did I know at the time there was a better way and place to showcase one of my fondest memories. The Okayest Hunter podcast studio also serves as my "man cave" and home office when I'm not podcasting. It's where all my whitetail keepsakes go to make the most of my little trophy room.
The antler is now proudly displayed between our cherished Fred Bear print and the Okayest Hunter sign. Having this antler mounted on the wall is a hell of a conversation piece. This is especially true since the antler is in a frame on our live-stream video podcast and gets talked about often as a result. As a deer hunter, you can never speak about your trophies, ie. memories enough, and this RH1 from RackHub provides me that opportunity far more than if it were just sitting by my coffee machine.