I've been AWOL

Sorry I disappeared on all of you. I'll try to keep up on posts now.

Thanksgiving was great. We went to Mom and Dad's and there were only half the number of people as usual but we had a good time, and lots of good food.

The Monday after Thanksgiving is the start of a two week deer hunting season here in Pennsylvania.

I can't believe it but I finally shot a buck with antlers (My very first set of antlers).
A seven point with a 15 1/2 inch spread. We didn't weigh him but we are guessing his dressed wieght was about 175 lbs.
*T* and I went out back behind the house and I was at "my post" by 6:40 a.m. Monday morning. I shot this buck at 7:18 a.m. I didn't even want to go out that morning, it was cold and supposed to rain... I only went because *T* was so excited about it and told me that he had a good spot for me to sit. (I had a good spot in mind too ... it was warm and dry.... My bed...LOL).
After I shot this deer *T* was more excited then I was... seriously... I really didn't care that it had antlers, I just kept looking at all that meat, a doe would have been just as good.. I don't eat the antlers anyhow :-P
I was back to the same spot Wednesday evening while driving deer for my brother, and paced off the distance the buck was from me when I shot him... he was 50 of my paces away.... roughly 113 feet from me. LOL...Troy is bragging to everyone that the deer dropped like a rock when I shot. I'm not surprised... the deer never knew I was there and he was so close the gunshot alone would have given me a heart attack. At that distance I'd have been ashamed if I hadn't killed him.

Now I've got all this meat to take care of ... it's great. I would like to make some jerky, summer sausage and country sausage too. I'm hoping that we get a couple more deer, between us we have four more doe tags and a buck tag left to fill... wish us luck.

The Turkeys Are Gone

I know ... it has been almost a week since I've posted anything, but I haven't had anything to talk about.

*T* and I butchered the two turkeys Sunday evening... that was interesting, seeing as *T* has never even witnessed poultry of any kind being butchered....lol... I shouldn't have laughed at him but it was funny. I started helping my parents with butchering since I was old enough to pluck feathers, so it is amusing to me to see some one's reaction who has never done this. LOL.... like I said, I should not have laughed at him, but he took it well :-)

We sent the turkeys to be smoked and will have one for Thanksgiving and the other for Christmas. I tried to weigh one of the turkeys on the bathroom scale but I'm not sure how accurate that was. The scale said it weighed 28 pounds, dressed, but I'll get the true weight from the slaughter house where we sent them to get smoked. A friend of mine, *R*, works at the slaughterhouse were the birds are being smoked so he took them with him to work last night, and I haven't talked to him to see what the total weights were.

Today I am going to pick up three female rabbits. I have been wanting to get rabbits to raise for meat for quite some time. Our last attempt failed when the female we got last year died from an unknown cause. I still have the male rabbit, so I'm going to try this again.... wish me luck.