During turkey season I also had the opportunity to help guide 3 purple heart recipients at a buddy's ranch in Atoka County. Unfortunately we didn't get any turkeys for the guys caught some fish and 1 vet killed a nice wild hog. We talked about some of our favorite wild game recipes and I told them I would share my venison roast recipe with them (and you).
Next deer season, don’t grind up all your venison. Tell your processor (and if it’s Doug at Ernie’s Meat Market, he’ll be familiar) to cut all the 2 lb roasts out of your quarters and try this recipe:
Place vegetables (carrots, potatoes, onions, etc) on the bottom of a crock pot. Liberally sprinkle all sides of a roast with Cavender’s All Purpose Greek Seasoning. Place the roast on top of the vegetables. Pour in a can of Cream of Mushroom soup and a can of French Onion soup. Add a few button mushrooms if you so desire. Cook on high for 8-10 hours. You will be unable to lift the roast out of the crock pot without it falling apart. If you don’t like it, ya need to quit deer hunting!!
I apologize for my absence but it was turkey season; a guy's gotta have his priorities. I killed two birds in Oklahoma and one in Tennessee. The Tennessee harvest ended my quest for an Eastern longbeard. Though I had killed 2 Easterns prior to this bird, the first was a jake and the second had beard rot.
Eastern Gobbler
So I'm out turkey hunting yesterday evening (I needed the gobbler to come 5 more yards to close the deal) and my wife shoots this big boar under 1 of our feeders. About a 50 yard shot with a .243. He never even wiggled!! Way to go, Steph!
Steph with boar
Check out some photographs I took at my acreage last weekend!
purple bouquet
fern w/ moss
dogwood bloom1
dogwood bloom2
unknown bloom
yellow bouquet
dolly on a hot day
red flowering bush
yellow - main w/ satellites
Last Sunday I had the opportunity for another first; catching wild hogs with dogs! We hunted a 1,200 acre ranch in Atoka County that is loaded with hogs. We ended up with 8; 4 we killed and 4 we captured alive.
For those of you who have never done this, it is a good adrenaline pumper! The guys released the "bay" or "strike" dogs first. We would walk along behind them waiting to hear them bark. If they start barking, they've found and are surrounding one or more hogs. We then walk up within 50 yards or so of the hog(s) and the guys release the pit bulldogs. The bulldogs are "catch" dogs. These dogs go in and grab the hog by the ears or the jowels and hold on for dear life. The hunter then comes in and picks up the back legs of the hog and tip it over on its side.
Once on its side, the hunter immediately places a knee behind the head and a knee close to the mid-section of the body. We then tied them up using hobbles right front leg to left back leg and visa versa. Then we drove up to them and threw them in the back of an ATV.
a full load
1st hog
boar
Last Thursday evening I had a classic "Turtle Man" moment at my place. We live in the country on a small acreage and so we occassionally get possums or racoons in our garage (we leave the garage door open enough for the cats to come and go as they please for rodent control purposes). Over the previous week, we had been noticing what we initially thought were droppings in our garage around the sack of sunflower seeds my wife feeds the birds with. With a little research and some continued looking at these things I adopted a theory that one of our two cats were eating the seeds and spitting out the chewed up hulls. Regardless of what it was, it was leaving a mess.
Thursday at about 11 PM or so I went into the garage and Mr. Possum was munching away. He tried to make a break for the garage door and I cut him off at the pass. He then went to the southwest corner of the garage. I walked up to him and stepped on him in order to be able to pick him up by the tail which I then did ambivalent to his growls. Every few seconds I would shake him down to keep him from biting me.
With 1 hand I was able to open my truck door and retrieve my Browning .22 pistol. I used my armpit to remove the gun from the holster continuing to shake down the possum. I put the gun in my armpit to open the door from the garage out to the back yard. I then placed the possum in the grass and dispatched him cleanly. Man I'd give $100 to have had that whole scene recorded!
One of the many results of all the "Big Tobacco" litigation was that the government forced the tobacco companies to print larger warning labels, run ads regarding the negative impact of tobacco use, etc. However, at or around the same time frame the companies start producing grape, peach, cherry, etc, flavored cigars. Check out the friggin selection the next time you go in a convenience store. Now who the heck do you think the companies are targeting with such products??!! I'm relatively certain it ain't 60+ year old men.
Well I'm about 40 days into having this blog and, I'm said to say, I'm not famous yet! All kidding aside I've enjoyed doing it but I'm wondering how you're liking it? For some reason I'm not able to see any "Comments" though I've had a reader or two say they've made 1 or more comments. Let me know whatcha think at thecritr@gmail.com. Thanks in advance.
He ain’t “Survivorman”; he ain’t the “Turtle Man” and he is certainly not “The Skunk Whisperer”. He is a man from southern Oklahoma with a passion for the outdoors and hunting and fishing. Stay tuned in the following weeks for his new BLOG “Life & Times of CRITR” where he will share stories of his many outdoor adventures sprinkled with some other life stories, wild game recipes, and occasional legal opinions.
