This is a view of what we call the #1 field (in order that we started them), on the far side is a oat/chickory mix (new this fall) and the nearer/larger field is clover that we have been maintaining for 4 years, this is the clover in the first post.

The next is a little oat plot that gets a lot of action, it's only about 15 x 30 yds. We planted few apple trees in this same little area, they are about 6-8 ft tall and we only lost one to the locusts last year.

I've been trying to document some life stories and such for my kids and this gave me prod in the pants to get some more of it together. Plus not being able to hunt because Karissa is due next Friday, I've been spending the evenings "wish-I-was-hunting" on the internet.

Hope I don't embarrass myself too much (this is long):

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I owe it all to my Dad, he's the reason I grew up to love the outdoors and I am forever thankful to him. He had the vision, the motivation, and the means to put our place together.

He started hunting this area with a few buddies around the time I was born (1969), one of which bought some land from an ageing farmer. They built a little three story A-frame. We called it “Lee’s”.

All the materials were dragged in and built without the aid of electricity, not even a generator. You had to park nearly a mile from the cabin in the beginning. Later, the trail was improved and you could get to within a half mile without four wheel drive, and with it you could get all the way there, but it was one rough ride.

They all had those little CT-70 Honda motorcycles that they would ride to the cabin from the parking spot and they also used them to get to their tree stands. They would let me ride them around the trails during the daytime when no one was hunting. They built permanent tree stands, and named them things like “Tim’s Stand” (Dad’s), “Louie’s High Tree stand”, and “Brad’s Stand”. We still use those names for those general areas even though most of the tree stand structures are pretty much gone.

The best we can remember I started bow hunting about 1979. I'll never forget when the time came to build “Dan’s Stand”. Dad and I packed up all the boards in one of those army issue duffle bags with back pack straps and marched the half mile from the parking spot. I was an adult before I realized how close my stand was to “Tim’s Stand”. I still like to circle out to my old stand site; the nails are the only thing left now along with a few sawed off branches that were used for steps. A few years ago, I cut down the pull rope and put it away for a keepsake.

I’ll also always remember sitting up in the loft of that A-frame listening to those men's stories. By that time, everyone had converted to compound bows, there were a few recurves hanging around in the cabin, but they were never used. Dad and I always bowhunted, I have no memories of gun hunting deer from that camp. At some point, Lee banned all the original members from hunting on his place and Dad kind of drifted away from deer hunting.

I continued to hunt with Dad until my cousin turned driving age, he and I began going to other places to hunt and left Dad to fend for himself. I hunted a few other places with high school friends and eventually found myself with no place to hunt deer. Dad and I continued to hunt waterfowl together and sometimes when the blind was going to be too full I would head up into the woods to deer hunt while Dad and his friends would stay at the lakeside.

About the time I turned twenty, one of the original “Lee’s Place” hunting buddies, Louie, bought some land that joined Lee’s place. Dad and I began to deer hunt together again at Louie’s place. Louie was almost never there except for opening weekend of gun season, he had a forty foot trailer that was jam packed with junk. We had to stack stuff up against the walls to make room for sleeping bags on the floor. Dad suggested to Louie that we clean the place up, and he and I did just that. We spent a summer remodeling the trailer and put the place in pretty good shape. Louie had contracted a fellow to clear a couple of one acre spots that he said were going to be “food plots”. I had never heard the term before. Like I said, Louie was almost never there, but he parked his old broken down Ford 8N tractor in the front yard along with a bush hog and discs. Dad and I got the thing running and we began to put this food plot thing into action. We maintained clover plots and the rest of the place for the next six years. I was seeing more deer and better deer than ever before, plus I was into it big time with log books, aerial photos, and I mapped deer movements on topo’s. I didn’t kill any big bucks but I saw enough to really keep me pumped. 

Then Louie informed us that he was putting the place up for sale, I have always wondered if Louie felt that we took his place over. If that was indeed his perception, I am sorry, we always looked at it like we were caretakers of the property and we always kept him informed of our plans and also always gave him “right of way”. He would say “I’ve been thinking about doing this or that” and Dad and I would make it happen.

I have a lot of fond memories of Louie’s place, foremost is that Dad killed his first and only deer to date during that time, a nice eight point buck. It’s kind of funny that with all those years of hunting, he only has this one deer to his credit. The only other confirmed harvest I witnessed is a pheasant on a put and take hunt just four years ago. I do remember Dad and his friends cleaning small game, quail, rabbit and others, in our back yard when I was kid, but I have no idea who did the shooting. I figure that he always put my hunt first, that he was not going to do anything that would jeopardize my chance at having success even if it meant passing up every shot opportunity he had. Dad and I, as adults, really bonded at Louie’s place.

My brother Neil had started hunting with us again near the end of the “Louie’s Place” era; he had been in the army for most of that time. I really enjoyed the three of us bumming around together. After the sale, Neil and I approached Lee for permission to hunt from his cabin and Lee agreed. I think Dad was still put out over the whole deal with Lee and he would always pass on joining us unless there was no chance that Lee would be there.

In the summer of 1998, Dad suggested that we buy a little piece of land on the West side of Lee’s place and build a cabin to hunt from. Lee didn’t even know this little pocket of private property existed and put up a little fight before backing down. Dad had been talking to a guy who owned some property adjoining Lee and mentioned wanting to sell a piece of it.

Dad said we had always been using other folk’s places and it was time to have a place of our own. We spent some time on the decision and a ton of time on the plans for what type of structure we would build. In August of 1999, we broke ground for our log cabin, our estimates showed we could do it for the price of a conventional stick framed building; logs were by far the most popular choice out of the two. In early November we had it under roof and weather proof. Dad had been diagnosed with prostate cancer in October, but he told the doc that he couldn’t have surgery until the cabin was finished. We busted our rear ends to get it closed up and Dad had his procedure and recovered slowly, but surely.

In 2000, we finished the rest of the cabin, started some new food plots with borrowed equipment and just last year bought an old 1952 Ferguson TO-30 tractor with implements. Having our own equipment has the food plot thing going really well.

My growing family limits my time afield, but I’m still able to help keep the place up and we are hoping to add some acreage in the near future. With thousands of acres of Hoosier National Forest adjoining us we can live without it, but as they say “Buy land, God ain’t making no more of it”.

Most of all, I’m just trying to be the father my Dad was and is to me.

To my knowledge, they have never sprayed.

The power line cut was mowed this July and whoever did it made a concerted effort to minimize the damage, the guy actually drove his equipment around the perimeter. I have trail cam pictures of him.

The way I figure it, we are helping out by keeping some pieces of the right of way maintained. If theres no reason for them to mow it or spray it then why waste the time, fuel, and chemicals.

We haven't coordinated anything with the power company, if they have a problem with it I'm sure they would have let us know by now.

I dug up a pic of the old A-frame cabin