Most memorable hunt

One of my most memorable hunts occurred in mid-november during peak breeding. It's not too often that a hunter actually gets to witness what is commonly known as the "lock down" phase of the rut. During the lock down phase, bucks have stopped chasing the does because the does in that particular area have come into estrous. During this portion of the rut, once a buck has found a receptive doe, he will continually corral her in a thick area in hopes that other bucks won't find her while he waits to breed. During this hunt, I was fortunate enough to be sitting in my stand over looking a thick marsh when I noticed movement off to my left. I looked over and noticed a doe about 20 yards away acting strange. I assumed there was a buck tailing her, but I couldn't see anything in the distance. With every step, she stopped and looked over her shoulder. Finally, I caught a glimpse of a very nice buck tailing her. He walked up behind her and nudged her. She took a few more steps and stopped. This continued for nearly an hour until the doe was directly underneath me. I could tell that the buck was getting weary because the doe was nearly out of the marsh and could be seen from a great distance. Instead of tailing her right out of the marsh, the buck decided to back track and circle around into the thick underbrush, making sure to keep an eye on her, but also not allowing himself to be exposed. The doe sat motionless under my stand for what seemed like an eternity, but was actually only a few minutes. She then stood up and wandered back into the marsh, only to be harassed some more, until she was ready to breed.  Just as the duo began to wander off, I was able to take a shot at the buck with my bow. Unfortunately, it was an extremely cold morning and I was forced to sit absolutely motionless for over an hour, so needless to say, my body, especially my fingers were like icicles and I wasn't able to connect on the buck which would have scored in the 130's. I felt disgusted after replaying the show in my head, however, I was thankful that I was able to witness what is commonly known as the "lock down," something that most hunters despise of.

12 Days of Christmas | Day 12

On our last day of Christmas, Day 12,

OUR FAVORITE PRODUCT!!!!

Brings to us...

Why is this our favorite product? It's simple, Easy-Eye is near and dear to our hearts! Not only that, Easy-Eye is the ORIGINAL Arrow wrap, located right here in Michigan! They offer a huge variety of designs for every hunters need. They make arrow retrieval easy! They also offer a way for hunters to stand out, mix and match with any fletchings to create a custom design thats all you! Eze-crest wraps don't affect the weight of your arrow, providing you with a straight shot every time! These products are quality and are backed by amazing people! 

Their mission:

“To make archery easier for everyone, Shoot Straight & Don’t Lose You Shaft!"

Don't be caught wrapping your shaft with anything else!

Check them out at www.eze-eye.com

12 Days of Christmas | Day 11

On the 11th day of Christmashas brought us...


The EagleView. These binoculars feature high-powered, precision-detailed resolution throughout the versatile 8-24x zoom range. Turn-and-slide rubber eyecups enable optimum viewing with or without eyeglasses. Environment-friendly materials are used for the parts. And the compact, lightweight body is easy to handle.


Features

• 8-24x zoom
• Unique zoom lever designed for extra-smooth zooming
• Turn-and-slide rubber eyecups for easy positioning of eyes at the correct eyepoint
• Multilayer-coated lenses for bright images
• Close focusing distance: 4m
• Carbon fiber material in parts of the grip enhance durability
• Designed for comfortable fit and easy handling
• Compact and lightweight
• Parts contain eco-friendly materials

I have used these particular binoculars for several years and have nothing negative to say about them at all. They're extremely easy to use, and their zooming capabilities allow you zoom in very close to your target to judge the animal with extreme accuracy. These are a great pair of binoculars for the beginner on up to advanced hunters. They're compact enough to fit in any zipper pocket, but yet, powerful enough to judge animals at far distances. These are an all around excellent pair of optics and I would recommend them to anyone. Check out www.Nikon.com to get a pair today.


Happy Holidays, 
The Valentine's

12 Days of Christmas | Day 10

On the 10th day of Christmas,  brings to us...


The Yellow Jacket line from Morrell offers various targets for all shooting needs, from field tips, to broadheads. These targets are durable, offering over a thousand shots of resistance, so you can shoot over and over for your best practice before heading into the woods. Arrows are easily removed. And targets are easily moveable as well, which is great for moving them back and forth to camp. The Yellow Jacket line happens to be our favorite, however, Morrell offers several items for every hunters needs. Just check out what their pro-staff is saying about them at, www.morrelltargets.com!


Happy Holidays,
The Valentines

12 Days of Christmas | Day 9

On the 9th day of Christmas Under Armour brings to us....


Pictured: Women's ColdGear Top | Mens ColdGear bottoms


Under Armour ColdGear is amazing! Growing up, nothing like this was available for the sportsman/woman, at least not this quality. We were restrained to the everyday long-underwear that could be purchased at the local drug store. Now, there is a line that is like no other. This base layer keeps us warm in even the coldest of conditions! It's been mentioned in Field and Stream Magazine as one of the best under garments for the hunter daring to go out in the rain, snow and windy conditions. We received ours a few years ago and would now, not be caught in the woods without it. It's incredibly comfortable, conforming to the skin and fitting under any top layers. It's also machine washable! And now, Under Armour is branching into other areas for the out-of-doors, providing gear for warm weather, gloves, fashion camouflage gear and many other hunting necessities. Check it out at www.underarmour.com!


Happy Holidays,
The Valentines

12 Days of Christmas | Day 8

On the 8th day of Christmas Buck Knives has brought us...

The Buck Zipper.  This gutting knife has a fixed 4.5 inch stainless steel blade with the revolutionary gutting hook on the end to aid in the "zippering" of the animal. The purpose of the gut hook is to allow quick and easy access to the animal without cutting the intestines and jeopardizing the integrity of the meat. The handle is made of Heritage Walnut which gives it the great natural wood appearance.

I have used this knife for many years on lots of animals and I've never had any issues with it. This knife is well worth the money and the blade holds its edge extremely well. I've only had to sharpen it once since I've had it and it still cuts just like the day I pulled it out of the package. Head the www.buckknives.com to pick up your Buck Zipper today.

Happy Holidays, 

The Valentine's

12 Days of Christmas | Day 7

On the seventh day of Christmas Michigan brings to us...

  Woods-n-Water News. We have found this to be one of the most useful hunting and fishing resources Michigan has to offer. It's complete with stories of monster bucks and amazing fish-tales. This magazine has contributions from Michigan's best outdoor writers and photographers. Over the years, Woods-n-Water has become an effective resource for all outdoorsmen and women. Great thing, it's affordable. At $3.00 an issue, it's filled with 160+ pages of the best Michigan outdoor's has to offer. Color photos and quality authors capture stories about anything from morel mushroom hunting and ice-fishing to big buck success stories. Get your copy today at any Gander Mtn. location or check it our online at www.woods-n-waternews.com!


Happy Holidays
The Valentines

12 Days of Christmas | Day 6

On the 6th day of Christmas, Kwikee Kwiver brings to us...

This is a shout out to all of our friends at Kwikee Kwiver. As we've mentioned before in our blog, Kwikee is a company right here in Michigan. This is the only Quiver we have ever used and for good reason. These are a durable and well designed products. They are easily attachable and detachable with their Ultra-lock function, which also helps to eliminate vibration. They are available in 9 different camouflage patterns, including our favorites, Lost Camo and Realtree. They are also available in black. AND, we heard rumor of them offering it in pink-camo for the ladies!

So, may we suggest, supporting a local company with some really amazing people? Go to www.KwikeeKwiver.com to find out more!


Happy Holidays
The Valentines

12 days of Christmas | Day 5

On the 5th day of Christmas, Black Gold Premium Sights (www.blackgoldsights.com) has brought to us...

The Ascent.  The Ascent is a multi pin adjustable sight that comes in either a 3 or 5 pin setup. The Ascent allows you to sight in your pins, just as you would with any other bow sight. However, the difference is that the last pin is a floater that allows you to adjust, through a dial, the exact range that you want to shoot beyond what your fixed pins are set at.

Through the Black Gold website, you're able to customize your sight as well. You can choose the size, color and number of pins, the color of your sight ring, and the length of your dovetail if you choose to do so. 

This sight is the first of its kind. Sure, there are a bunch of adjustable sights out there, but the difference is that they are all single pin adjustable sights. The downfall to these particular sights is that you range your animal, dial it into your sight and draw your bow. Unfortunately, if you get busted at full draw and the animal runs out an additional 20 yards, what do you do? You must let down your bow, range the animal again, set your dial and re-draw your bow. With the Ascent, if the animal runs out an additional 20 yards, you have the option of using your preset pins to make the adjustment rather than having to redial your sight. For a great product to increase your hunting accuracy, we recommend the Ascent from Black Gold Premium Sights!


Happy Holidays
The Valentines

12 Days of Christmas | Day 4

On the 4th day of Christmas, Jim Knapp and Hunter's Specialties brought to us....

The I-Kam Extreme. This pair of glasses comes with 3 interchangeable lenses (Amber, clear and brown.) It features a 4GB built in memory that can hold up to 3 hours of video. It also has a micro SD card slot that can accept up to an 8GB card, giving you hours of video storage. The camera is built into the center of the glasses and is nearly invisible. There is a slot to connect directly to your computer, no drivers needed. This camera is perfect for recording all of your outdoor hunting and fishing adventures. Not only that, it's perfect for recording sporting events, concerts and any other events where a video camera would come in handy. It also has a built in microphone to record all the sound as well.

I've used this camera many times to record hunting and fishing excursions. It records at a speed of 30fps with absolutely no lag. The play back is high quality resolution (736 x 480). It's extremely simply to plug into your computer and watch and edit your video as soon as you're home from your outdoor adventure! Check out Hunters Specialties to pick up your I-Kam Extreme and begin recording your adventure today.

Happy Holidays!

The Valentines

12 Days of Christmas | Day 3

On the third day of Christmas, we hunt | we fish brings to you...

The MarCum VX-1. This portable fish finder is perfect for the entry level ice fisherman. It offers an interference rejection option that helps to eliminate any interference from other sonar units, a zoom option that allows you to zoom in on the bottom 5 feet of the water column and it also features a 2.5 inch target separation that allows you to distinguish fish that may be in schools. This is an excellent unit for anyone looking to take the next step in their ice fishing adventures, but may not have the money to invest in other more expensive units. I have personally used this unit for several years now and see no reason to upgrade to a more expensive unit that does the same thing.

We can't begin to tell you how much time this item has saved us, We don't waste time at fishing holes that have no fish. With this MarCum we are able to find a good fishing spot a lot quicker. We drill our holes, place the transducer in the water and within seconds we know whether or not we have fish. It prevents us from having to drag the shanty around, now we don't even open it up until we know we're on fish. It's saved a lot of time and kept us a whole lot warmer out on the ice by getting us on a good spot the first time! This is a great gift for any ice-fisherman/woman! 

Happy Holidays!

The Valentines

12 Days of Christmas | Day 2

Day number 2 of our twelve days of Christmas takes us to the clothing realm of the hunting industry. We found this great little web-shop called, VintageWhitail.com (the site is under construction now, but you can find them on ebay at outdoorwearstor​e). They offer t-shirts, long sleeve shirts and hoodies with sweet designs that are really inexpensive. Shipping is also really affordable! They have both mens and women's styles and sizes. The shirts are quality screen print and seem to be pretty true to size. This is a great gift for any hunter on your list! Below are a couple of our favorite designs!

Happy Holidays!
The Valentines

12 Days of Christmas | Day 1

We wanted a way to share with other outdoor enthusiast our favorite hunting and fishing accessories, so we decided what better way than to count down the 12 days of Christmas with these items!?

Day 1 of this Christmas count down, we bring to you an item from one of our new favorite companies, Pine Ridge Archery, the Archers Allen Wrench Set.
(Pictured below and found at www.pineridgearchery.com)


We found this item at the Mathews Business Show in Wisconsin and we're so glad we did! I don't know how many of you have struggled with the same problem, but we have, so many times, caught ourselves losing allen wrenches or digging through the small bag they come in, dropping them to the ground and often times misplacing them all together. When we finally do find the right size, we place it in our bow case, hoping it will be there the next time we need it, however, it always seems to find its way to hide itself. This handy little set keeps all of your allen wrenches in an organized "swiss-army-knife"-like fashion, making the right size quick and easy to find. Sizes are in order and labeled clearly. Also, if you ever have any problems in the field and need to do some on-site adjusting, it's small and compact enough to do so! The best thing, you can buy it with a holster that clips into a pocket, belt or pretty much anywhere!

It's a great stocking stuffer idea for any archer and costs about $9.95.


Happy Holidays,
The Valentines

Mathews Business Show 2011

So we were lucky enough to go to the Mathews Business Show of 2011. It's a show where only licensed Mathews companies and retailers are invited. I have done some graphic design for the Eze-crest company, Easy Eye Archery, so they let us tag along. We met some of the most amazing people within the industry and the Mathews family. We felt so at home and have decided that we need to find a way to live our dream. Seeing all the new product and realizing how creative people are within the sport of hunting really inspired the two of us. The show was at the Chula Vista resort in Wisconsin Dells. When we walked through the doors and saw people waiting in line to check in with G5, Scent Blocker and Mathews logo's on their coats, we knew we were in for a treat! Setting up for the show and seeing all the big name companies that were there got us so excited for the next few days. The people we were going to be surrounded by are the people we have admired for a very long time.


The first person we had the honor of meeting was Bob Ohm, the number two guy at Mathews Inc. This fellow is one of the most honest, down-to-earth people we have ever met. He talked with us about how he and Matt McPherson met and let me tell you, it was a great story that went back to when they were both young boys at church camp. Bob went on to tell us that the next day, he was leading a tour of both the Mathews bow plant and the McPherson Guitar plant. Of course we were the first in line to sign up! As we headed to Sparta, WI I don't think that either of us stopped fidgeting for a minute! We were so excited to see the roots of a company we love and respect so much and if we would have had the chance, we would have went to each and every employee and shook their hand to say thank you. Walking around the bow plant, we were both in awe at how friendly of an environment it was. Shift managers talked to us about how each process was accomplished and then we got to see the employees in action. They also have this amazing thing called a Kaizen, it's a Japanese word for improvement. They encourage their employees to find better and more efficient ways of doing their jobs and they get rewards for doing so. We both thought that was such a great way to keep employee moral up as well as strive for ways to make the company smarter and more productive.


We also got to see the Zebra Bow Strings section of the plant, well inside the door at least. Apparently, the equipment used to make these things is very original and so they keep it under wraps for obvious reasons! Did you know that there are over 920 million combinations of Zebra Bow Strings? They have so many colors available that they are able to create pretty much any combination you can think of! It's pretty fantastic!


Next we were able to visit the McPherson Guitar shop. People like Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley play these incredible hand-crafted instruments. The process they use is kind of old fashioned, thus being the reason that these guitars are the best of the best, not to mention gorgeous! (Heres a cool little fact: Matt McPherson has a recording studio in the bow plant, so that if he is working on projects over there and happens to have a little ditty in his head, he can head right in and record it! How neat!) Only about 4 McPherson guitars are produced a week, thats how intense and beautifully crafted these things are. At the end of this tour, an employee actually played for us and it was awesome!


On the third day of the show we were able to meet Dave Watson from Mathews TV (and formally of the Oakridge Boys), small world being that his producer is originally from a town near ours. It was great to chat with both of them about their hunting adventures. We also got to watch them film some things for upcoming episodes from the show.


Then came the huge SURPRISE! Okay, not truly a surprise, because we had to assume he'd show up at some point... BUT, we got to meet the man himself, Matt McPherson! He was so gracious and fun to talk with. This is a man we have both idolized for a long time. He is not only a very successful business man, but he is also a christian. This is very admirable, because as big as his companies get, he stays true to his religion and for that we admire him ten-fold.


On the third night of the show at the fancy dinner, we ran into Lee and Tiffany Lakosky. These are two people we have wanted to meet for some time. Not only do they have one of our favorite television shows, The Crush, they also work very hard to nab those big boys in Iowa. Every time we watch the show, we try to pay very close attention to their management of food plots and of their herd. Lee is an amazing farmer and they both pay very close attention to what deer they have on their property. We admire that they are both extremely ethical hunters, taking only mature deer. They are also very careful about making ethical kill shots, but don't hide the fact that not every shot is perfect, even pro-staff can miss sometimes. 


We also had the honor of meeting Bob Fromme. He's the man who took the world record grizzly. Could you imagine having that massive animal within 15 yards of you? Well, he did. It was stunning to hear the story about the harvest of this giant animal and to hear him describe the size of the bear!


And my personal favorite, Nicole Jones, who took a minute to talk to us about her new line for Scent Blocker, she assured us that the new women's line would accommodate short ladies and her being the tiny one she is, I hope she is right! We also got to meet her husband Pat Reeve, who was hanging out behind the camera for the show. They both star on the show Driven. 


And we can't forget all the other amazing people we met, like Leo, Shirley and Ryan from Kwikee Kwiver (An amazing company right here in our home state!) Brian from Pine Ridge Archery (whose pink kisser button and allen wrench tool had us smiling ear to ear!) Ben from Black Gold Premium Bowsights! Angie and Scott from Table Mountain Outfitters and the television show Life at Table Mountain. Bryan from Mathews TV and so many more great people who made us feel so at home!


So thank you to all who made our trip to Wisconsin so exciting!


The Valentines

Welcome

For anyone who decides to follow this blog, please keep in mind that we are not pro-staff of any nature. We are simply a couple who loves the outdoors and strive to be the best sportsman/woman that we can. This blog is about our trials and tribulations in the woods and water. We are not beginners at our sport, but we have a lot to learn and even more to share about our adventures in the wild. We hope this blog will inspire other outdoor enthusiast to share their stories and tips. We also hope this blog helps ourselves and others become better and more ethical hunters and fishers. We appreciate everything that nature has to offer us. Both the hunting and fishing industry are very dear to out hearts and we have had some amazing opportunities to meet some amazing people that live the outdoors everyday. We thank God for the pleasure to hunt and fish in this amazing world he created. So please, enjoy the blog, post often!

The Valentines