Camp Chicken In The Snow

Hope everyone had a very Happy New Year!

Yesterday, Arlene and I decided that we had better get up to camp and check out the snow level on the trailer. It is unseasonably warm here, 35 degrees and rain in the forecast for the next four days. Snow can get very heavy when it gets rain on top of it. So we loaded up the snowshoes and a shovel and headed out about 10 am.

When we turned off the highway onto the secondary road, Arlene spotted a large bird sitting the very top of a large tree in a field we usually see deer in. It was an eagle! We were pretty excited. Actually, there were three eagles, two mature birds and an adolecent bird. They weren't close enough for any photos though.

The road in was plowed and there was a nice parking spot at our gate that was plowed out. Many thanks to Dana Gaylor who keeps the seasonal road our camps are on, plowed out in the winter.

We strapped on our shoes and started in the camp lane stopping to take a few pictures. I just wish it had sunny instead of cloudy and gloomy.

I had taken my new gun with me to do a little shooting at camp. It is a Firestorm .22 handgun that is exactly the same as my Firestorm .380 pistol. I bought it to practice with because .22 ammo is a lot cheaper than .380. It is a sweet little handgun and shoots really nice. After shooting a couple of clips, I got to work climbing up on the trailer to shovel off the show. It's a really cool view from up there.

Once we got the trailer cleaned off, we decided to take a walk back through the woods to Arlene's shack. There were lots of deer tracks in the meadow on the way to her shack. You could see where the deer were digging in the snow to get down to the grass underneath. There were even several places where you could see where a deer had bedded down and made impressions in the snow. I love tromping around the woods in the snow and looking at all of the tracks the animals have left. It is always neat to see what has been traveling around and where the animals are going.

After we snowshoed back to the car, we took off our shoes and walked down the road to Wayne's gate to see if the deer were crossing the road to come into the meadow. I am quite surprised to see them spending the winter in camp. Normally, the deer head for the big deer yards in the cedar swamps but I guess with very little snow last winter and this winter, they are hanging around. They may hang out in the thick balsam swamp on the lower 40 acres. They could winter there pretty well as it has thick balsam and poplar and some good water sources.

On our way back out the road, we stopped and took some pictures of the snow hanging in the trees. It was very beautiful with all the snow.

It was pretty snowy on the old camp road. The trees were really beautiful.

Here is me in the nice new hooded camo sweatshirt I got with the Cabela's gift card that Chris, Judy and Ross gave me for Christmas. I also got a pullover camo sweatshirt, camo T-shirt and a cool little .22 target that spins around when you hit the little metal turkey on it. Many thanks guys for some great gifts.

This is a really nice shot of Arlene!