Hunting Riverside

It's finally here, summer, and it is hot! 29 C is hot for me, that's around 84 F and i know there are hotter places but this takes the lick out of me. The fish are biting though, walleye are being caught steadily, making for great fish frys. we cook pieces coated in our special batter and over the fire in hot grease. man is that good, everybody loves it.
Going to plant our garden this week as the danger of frost is low now. A late start means there will be fresh garden veggies for this fall waterfowl hunt. Fresh killed game and garden fresh vegetables, good eating!
We had a great spring hunt regardless of the weather. All the hunters were great sportsman and hunkered down and hunted hard even though conditions were poor. There are some big bears who will live to see another day and some that won't, and that's hunting! Our bird hunts are starting to take final shape for this fall with tons and tons of ducks nesting and groups of bachelors. Grouse are doing very well as well the rabbit population has exploded. The 2 seem to cycle together for as long as i can remember. I've hunted them both since i was around 4 with my bow and arrow and pellet gun then the .22. There generally hit highs and lows together, probably due to the same predation and weather conditions.
Big plans for my big boat too, hopefully they will be done soon and we can use it for some serious work. Too hot inside right now, no a/c in here, going outside to catch the last of the daylight hour.
Over and out,

It is a very cold late spring, none the likes of any i remember seeing. It is still freezing at night and some days, still ice on the small lakes and 2 ft on the big lake. Can't launch a boat yet but the river is open, just not my boat launch. Going to be an interesting spring hunt, the season opens tomorrow but i am glad we don't start for another 2 weeks. We plan it that way just incase such as this happens, and it paid off. The bears are our moving around and starting to hit the baits but nothing crazy. I think our first hunters will be surprised as they were here last year and what a difference.
We'll still have a good time and skin some big bears but it will make life more interesting. For one preparation is difficult as i normally have all the little things taken care of and most of the big projects by now. We are about 3 weeks behind normal so i have a lot of work to do in a short time. The other is spring is ugly till it warms up and things start to grow, right now it is ugly. No greenery yet and ground is wet, frost still coming out of the ground causing boils and everywhere is wet and muddy. That's spring and we are getting the extended version.
I know of a some bear hunters hitting the baits on Monday morning, April 27th, so if anybody reading this wants some updates give me a call. 1-866-214-8402

Hello All,

Ran Across this article, thought I would share this with all of my followers:

Hunting trip flies by at 3,000 gph

I’m not going to tell you that last weekend’s goose hunt was great because it wasn‘t. It was almost unbelievable!

We had geese in the air over our decoys 30 minutes before shooting time, 30 minutes before sun up, at sun up and for the next hour and a half. that’s around 21⁄2 hours of constant geese in the air over our decoys.

When there are a few birds to a flock and a few flocks, it’s easy to get an accurate count of the number. When the flocks turn into a stream, counting birds is like weighing a fish after it got off. Having time that morning, I put together the following formula.

Flying from south to north in a two-minute frame there were four flocks of geese. Each flock had around 25 birds giving us 100 geese every two minutes. Two times five gives you 10 minutes and 500 geese. Six times ten gives you 3,000 geese per hour, about 7,500 for the time we were hunting and that’s only the geese flying in a line directly in front of me and at telephone pole height. Not counted were the flocks that came into our decoys nor the geese behind us or above us or the ones we could not see in the dark or hear in the clouds. In other numbers “one heck of a bunch of geese.”

Five of us limited out on Canada geese and harvested four different varieties of Canada geese from two of the largest — one was banded — down to several of the small mallard duck size. The smaller Canadas winter in Oklahoma, and as all the geese we saw were coming up from the south we wondered if they were riding warm air up from the Salt Plains or the watershed ponds of Barber County?

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A spring bear hunt is available for up to 5 hunters for the prime hunting week of May 24th, 2009.
There will be no one else in camp for that week and the bear baits are all to yourselves. That's good bear huntin.
$2600.00 per hunter, license and taxes included.
Good price too.
Call Gildas 1-204-524-2472 or email riversidelodge@xplornet.com

Feb 15th, 2009 Sold!
Still some space available for 2010,11

Have you ever smelled some of the Deer lures/attractants in a bottle? Many have a familiar smell right. Kind of like licorice?
I used to work in the animal feed business and something we would use from time to time was Anice seed. It is what alot of those Deer scents are made of. It is also what black licorice is made of.
Take some black licorice candy with you on your next hunt and eat as a snack. Best cover scent going and tasty too.

Whitetail Deer hunting is a many things to many people. All deer hunters try to understand deer behaviour to some degree. The most common instructional information and "How to" material will speak in general about mostly Agriculture Adapted Deer. The whitetail deer are a complicated creature but not a lot different than most warm blooded critters when it comes to adapting to an area for survival. In fact because of human progress the deer have adapted to live and thrive in most agricultural areas. It provides a food source that is carefully maintained to acheive optimum yeild. With some close attention to our habits they have learned to share what little cover is left, with us humans. And the wild predators are generally afraid of us and so we also provide a certain degree of protection. That becomes the reverse effect during hunting seasons when we become the predator.

Long story short, most of the stuff we are told by deer biologists, specialists and scientists does not apply to real wilderness deer.(I could now use some support from the people who know what i am talking about.) I have itemized the main points of difference below. It is a different breed of deer that inhabit the true massive forests and swamps of Canada. There aren't many places like that if you look at the Whitetail's most northernly range. The areas that are still as wild as they were hundreds of years ago are generally inhospitable to a person trying to carve out a living. There are easier places to live, so that largely reduces the human factor and presence. But, that is where the deer originated from. It is genitically built for the food sources and terrain of the wild bush. So a hunt in the real wilds here at Riverside Lodge will provide an incredible experiencre unlike many places. It enables you to become the predator and harvest a buck while he is at his weakest, the Rut.

7 Facts about Fair Chase Hunting Our Wilderness Deer.

1. Wilderness deer need to be on their feet to cover ground to find hot does. So they are moving a lot more giving us an opportunity all day long and each day. Each stand show different deer from day to day. (In Agriculture areas and/or baited areas, the deer don't need to travel much so they will bed down part of the day and not as many new deer will show everyday). Therefore 11;00- 3;00 can be the best time to be in the woods.

2. Food source dictates where does want to be, and bucks follow. In Agriculture areas areas that changes every year. In wilderness areas it doesn't, so natural/historical trails and routes produce every year. Old scrape/rub lines are there for a reason and are used every year. Habitual use of areas for cover, food and travel.

3. We can use weather as a tool more than a hindrance in the wilderness. Deer don't like thin ice, so youcan funnel them even more during the early part of the season before the ice thinkens. Cold weather will drive the does to feed more and be more active making the bucks need to travel a lot more. A worn out buck will start to take shortcuts, which can lead to his demise when dropping his guard and responding to calls and scents and recent doe activity. Warm weather is very poor during the Rut but it can also narrow down the funnels and crossings. It also can make sitting more comfortable for the hunter.

4. In AG areas the deer are used to humans, in fact they expect them. In wilderness areas the deer have sometimes never seen a human so they are not sure what to think and certainly are not watchful for us.

5. Wolves are the main danger for these deer, from the time they opened their eyes their mother taught them to survive by avoiding wolves, not humans.

6. In wilderness areas you will get the opportunity to see and hunt deer that behave naturally.

7.Deer travel with the wind?(this one gets me the most looks)

MOST Deer in the wilderness travel with the wind!!! Not into it. They want to know what is behind them not so much what is in front of them, they can see in front, but don't want to be ambushed from behind. They will sometimes, bust your scent but will not run blindly in any direction without knowing what is out there, so be ready for it to stop. Still practice scent control and noise control to try be invisible as possible! Scent control is always important, never cheap out on it. Just be prepared for deer coming in with the wind.

There’s young bucks out there in the hunt, and we’re not talking the four-legged variety.

Youth hunters, between the ages of 12 and 17, have increased substantially in the last decade or so, thanks in no small part to an organized effort to get them involved in the sport...

.....The introduction of a youth licence for $10 – which allows them to hunt various species under certain conditions – made it more affordable for youth.

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