Western Iowa and Eastern Nebraska's QDMA Branch

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I am in no way compensated, sponsored, blah blah, whatever by Dave Smith or Dave Smith Decoys. Heck, I don’t even know the guy…although we did talk on the phone once a few years back when I was going to have him fix up a goose call for me, anyway…I just really like these decoys! With four bowhunters in the family, I have to have enough decoys so that all four of us can be set up at the same time when necessary, owning a flock or two of Dave Smith’s gets a bit pricey, but if you take care of them, they really should last a lifetime. We wacked a pile of turkeys over ours last year, all with archery equipment, all at less than 20 yards. If you’ve been having issues with pressured birds that get decoy shy later in the season, these fakes might be the trick you’ve been looking for.

If you’re looking for the state of the art in turkey decoys, click here:

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Well, I’ve written about these two guys before, so if you’re reading this, you’re probably familiar with Brennan and Cory. I’ll say it again here; You can’t find two nicer, more humble, harder working guys than these two…and you’d have to look even harder to find a couple guys with as consistent success on big whitetails. I’m beginning to worry about wall space for these two, because they’ve gotta be running short.

This post is more of a pictorial of Brennan’s and Cory’s 2010/2011 season than it is a story. It should be noted that none of these deer were “outfitted hunts” these were all killed during the 2010/2011 season on privately owned ground, some leased ground, and some “permission” ground. Three different states are represented by these deer, Nebraska, Kansas, and Iowa. The other thing that these animals represent is an unwaivering commitment to passing young bucks, hours upon hours of freezing temperatures on stand, often without so much as a doe sighting, and drive that never fizzles or fades from the first day of the season to the last. Food plots and effectively hunting them is another common denominator for these two, as well as various other habitat projects…stuff that hits right smack in the sweet spot of what QDM and the QDMA is all about. Yep, Brennan and Cory each got lucky…again…multiple times this season…just like last year..and so on…But like I’ve said before, they work harder than most at creating their own luck.

Look back through the older posts from this season to read more about early season success that Brennan and Cory had on two different mega-bucks. If you look close at the trail camera pics from the “Brennan’s Booner” story earlier this yr, you will see the double forked G2 buck that he’s pictured with above.

…Now…I’m off to find a rabbit’s foot…

PS…Take a moment to check out some of the links which appear across the top of our blog page. There’s some really informative stuff, and great get-away ideas. If you’ve ever dreamed of chasing bugling bull elk in the Rockies, or mega-mulies in Colorado then check out the Atkinson Expeditions link. Or, if owning your own little piece of Heaven on earth is something you’ve always dreamed of, then click on the Dream Dirt blog, it’s the official blog page of Whitetail Properties, tons of fun & informative reads there!

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I’m supposed to be at the properties this weekend getting more TSI chores done, organizing the shop, burning some old wood piles, etc. Instead, the latest batch of snow and freezing drizzle changed my mind on driving the 5 hour round trip. Next weekend is the Nebraska Bowhunters Association banquet so I’ll miss out on chores that weekend too.

So, today I stayed home a sifted through a few trail cam pics. Several of these bucks I had encounters with throughout this past season. I have hundreds more pics from last yr. on a different computer with a totally different assortment of good bucks. As you can tell, the food plot program continues to ramp up at our place, as does a host of other habitat improvement projects. Especially with small properties, as is the case with mine, it’s imperative to create the best “bed & breakfast” around if you want to hold mature bucks on your place instead of the neighbors place. Better yet, get your neighbors on board with the QDMA philosophy, work towards building a QDM cooperative effort, protect your young bucks and reap the rewards.

MARK YOUR CALENDAR! The 3rd annual Big Buck Classic comes Back to the Qwest Center in Omaha March 25-27, 2011. CLICK HERE for more information on the event.

There are volumes and volumes of information to be gleaned in the woods right now. Scrapes, trails, and next years potential stand sites may never be more visible than they are right now! MRI from trail cameras and other enthusiastic whitetail nuts say that at least 50% of the buck population has shed last years headgear and that number will be near 99 percent in the next couple of weeks. So far my efforts have been focused on reading all I can about establishing switch grass (specifically Cave in Rock variety) and other NWSG’s. The free time I’ve had since wrestling season has wrapped up has been spent running the chainsaw; double girdling LOTS of honey locusts, hinge cutting, other basic TSI chores, and clearing some trails through impenetrable lower cedar branches in some of my thickest, rankest cedar stands. Turkey season will be here in the blink of an eye and then there will be the distraction of those gaudy birds making all that racket in the woods. I suppose I’ll be forced to nock an arrow or three and thin the herd a bit…tedious work, but I’ll go ahead and suffer through it. I was even able to find time to get a little diesel therapy in at the farm last weekend when I hooked up the box blade and straightened out the driveway a bit. Nothin’ like the smell of diesel in the morning on a spring-like day in February…like a little bit of paradise!

I’ve got my Eagle Soybeans and Real World Soybeans on order thanks to good friend Brent Jungman of Jungman Wildlife Supply Brent also fabricated a brand new combo 3 point/pull type cultipacker for me which I can’t wait to put to good use at the farms. I tell you, if you want a quality product, built the way they did it in the old-days, so it would last for generations, talk to Brent. He does it right!

Hope you managed to keep enough logs on the fire this winter. Hang in there…cedar pollen will be wafting in the air before you know it!

Life as we know it is changing around us every day, same for the fall/winter food-plot we installed in Papillion, Ne not to long ago.  This project is one that holds more personal pride for our group than anything.  You see, we simply planted this plot for animals that will never be hunted in this area unless they travel a good distance onto a neighboring property.  This plot is out of passion for the betterment of our natural environment as well as for visitors to the Chalco Recreation area to be able to observe animals in their natural environment.  Through the years we have planted many plots collectively as a group with one goal in mind, harvesting the animals that frequent them, ensuring they will be healthier and hopefully stay on our property long enough to be a recipient of one of our arrows or bullets, but not this time.  This time we are giving back to what makes us hunters, we are giving back to those who may not enjoy what we do, but yet enjoy seeing some of Gods greatest creations in all their glory.  This will be an ongoing project for our group and we plan on expanding this project over the years to come.  This project is yet another reason why to join the QDMA and especially the Heartland Chapter here in Nebraska/Iowa.  A special thanks goes out to Members of the Papio Chalco NRD, Whitetail Properties and Big & J Industries, LLC for their involvement in this project.  If you or someone you know is interested in joining our group please contact us!  Please contiue to check back for more progress as the year goes on with this project!

“BIG”

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September 22nd, 2010 will be a day that good friend Brennan Klassen will never forget. A big whitetail fanatic to the core, let me offer a little background on Brennan to set the stage;

Brennan is one of those guys that, no matter what activity he’s currently involved in, big whitetails are occupyiung a significant portion of his gray matter. He is a professional salesperson/bidder/crew chief for a large well-known fencing company in the midwest. Brennan works two and sometimes three jobs (freelance work) during the off season, all with the goal of putting his rear end in a tree for as many hours as it takes to kill a giant whitetail come deer season. Many guys would tend to use the word “lucky” when describing the kind of success he’s had at piling up big deer. Most of us would say he’s “luckier”, to have nearly the entire fall off from work to pursue gagger bucks. But, hold on just a moment, this is a guy I’ve known for a handful of years now and I can tell you this, he seems to get lucky on a big buck… or two… or three, every single year! To me, it’s beginning to look like he has a plan. A plan that involves working his tail off at his job(s) during the off season, procuring highly productive hunting ground in several different states, scouting, practicing with the weapons he hunts with, playing the wind, hanging dozens and dozens of stands, thousands of dollars spent on trail cameras and batteries, and the list goes on. If all that wasn’t enough, this past summer Brennan spent thousands more dollars purchasing equipment and became a real-world QDM’er, spending countless hours spraying, discing, and planting food plots in an effort to make his properties just that much more appealing to Mr. Big. In addition, he put in a few small watering holes on some of the Kansas property he hunts since water was the missing element on that particular piece…the point I’m trying to make here is that I believe luck has everything to do with Brennan’s consistent success…and he works HARD at making his own luck. With a few does already in the freezer this fall and having passed multiple 3.5 yr old and younger bucks, Clearly Mr. Klassen is practicing QDM principles year round, and the proof is in the pudding.

Here is the voice mail I received from Brennan on the morning of September 22nd at 7:15 am. I’m gonna save that voice mail forever if possible. The excitement in Brennan’s voice is a great reminder of why we chase these critters. Great stuff!

“Hey Marty, …(out of breath)…it’s Brennan…it’s about 7:15 Thursday morning…(out of breath)…I just shot a monster dude…(inaudible)…it was that big one…(breathing)…that Booner…I just drilled him! …(inaudible)…he’s down like 30 yards from my stand…(inadible)…I’m all tore up buddy…(breathing)…I’ll try to shoot you a picture when I calm down…later”

Everytime I re-listen to that voice mail I want to go get in a tree!

Congratulations Brennan! Thanks for sharing your first B&C whitetail with us here at The Heartland Branch!

I was fortunate to get my hands…and a tape measure on Brennan’s deer shortly after he got back to town with him. Since I don’t personally care much for net scores I didn’t bother subtracting anything that could be considered a deduction. Brennan’s deer stretched the tape to nearly 178″ green/gross. Truly the deer of an archery hunter’s lifetime…but then again…there’s a lot of season left and Brennan’s been sharing a few trail camera pictures with me of some more bucks he’s got semi-figured out…he’s so lucky!

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Below, Cory Wiedel tells the story, in his own words, of how he settled the crosshairs on the buck of a hundred lifetimes. Cory’s buck falls just short of 200 typical inches, with G2s exceeding 15″, Cory’s grandchildren’s grandchildren may never kill one bigger. If you ask Cory Wiedel, the good old days are right now!

Very LUCKY way to start off the 2010 season!

This Kansas Muzzleloader buck was shot on the second day of the early muzzleloader season, September 21st.

Here’s the story:
On the first night of the hunt, there were two 140 class bucks about 500 yards away from my stand that were looking at an inside corner on my property that was out of sight from my stand. Just the way these bucks postured and acted intimidated, I knew there was something big coming out of that corner.

The challenge was that I needed a NE wind to hunt that inside corner and they were calling for S winds for the next few days. Plus I didn’t have a stand over there.

At noon the next day I decided to check the weather even though I thought it would be out of the S. I couldn’t believe it, a front was moving in and from 5pm to 9 pm the wind was going to blow out of the NE.

Well, I didn’t have a stand over there so I decided to take a 5 gallon bucket and sit on it on the ground next to some thick hedge trees. The hedge trees covered me up very well, I had deer as close as 3 yards away.

At 5:00 a coyote was headed for the inside corner, he stopped and was looking over in my direction. No deer were on the field so I stood up and whistled at him to get him from going where the deer were going to be coming out at. He saw me and headed back where he came from.

Deer started to pour into the soybean field about 5:30. The farmer got these beans in late and they were still green. At 7:15, there were about 25 deer in the field. The two 140 class bucks were on the field and they eventually looked to the inside corner and sure as heck, here he came. I could see this bucks rack clear as day at 450 yards. I knew he was a shooter and I’ve learned that once my mind says it’s a shooter I don’t focus on the rack anymore, I focus on getting him harvested.

He started heading my way and slowly got within 200 yards. He was starting to head away from me at this point so I took the 200 yard shot. He immediately hit the ground, but then got back up and slowly walked a couple hundred yards to the inside corner and vanished.

I decided to give him some time and we came back at midnight. I would have left him all night but there are a ton of coyotes in this area and I didn’t want them bumping him.

As we approached my deer, I couldn’t believe my eyes. I knew he was big, but not this big. I haven’t officially scored him, but he’s got 15+ inch G2′s, over 12+inch G3′s and his main beams are 29 inches long.

I didn’t have any trail cam pics of this buck this year, but I did see him during last year’s rifle season and I guessed him at 160 inches. I think he will score in the 195 inch range.

Again, I am very lucky/fortunate to have harvested this animal!

Good Luck to everyone this up and coming season!

Take Care,
Cory J. Wiedel

In the last 72 hours two good friends have harvested two GIGANTIC whitetails. I haven’t asked their permission yet to post any details or photographs of their successes. But trust me, Gigantic! I can tell you this, one is an archery kill, the other muzzleloader. Both animals are B&C megabucks. Stay tuned, if granted permission, I’ll share the details soon, hopefully with pictures. If I’m not granted permission the lesson I’ve taken from both hunters is this: Albeit somewhat cliche, you can’t kill ‘em sitting on the couch, early season feeding patterns can be just as effective as super late season. Also, both of these men are extremely humble about their success, yet both are incredibly proficient marksmen/archers…practice, practice, practice with your weapon of choice so when your dream buck appears you’re not on the “hope” program when it comes to placing that projectile in the vitals…I can’t wait to get in a tree tomorrow afternoon!

Well, I was wanting to wait an entire week until I updated this blog post, but seeing that there are already some early results, I wanted to get them out there as soon as I could.  Today is day five of our “Natures Elements” test that I started just to see how well some of the leading brand products held up to the elements that we subject them to.  In the past five days we have had climate changes here in Omaha that have be very unpredictable as you can see below in the results.  I will continue to perform this test for the full two weeks, but wanted to put out up to date information for your review.  Also note the photos at the bottom of the article for a visual reference when review the latest data.  Samples of the molded products will be sent to the lab for mold description as well as alfatoxin reports and that information will be posted here as well.

Check back in to find out the results!

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Item	Date	Soil Site PH	Air Temp	Observation Time	Moisture	Notes
A	9/16/10	7	66 F	6:47 PM	N/A	Granular Product
B	9/16/10	7	66 F	6:47 PM	N/A	Pelletized Product
C	9/16/10	7	66 F	6:47 PM	N/A	Mineral type product
D	9/16/10	7	66 F	6:47 PM	N/A	Powderized Product
E	9/16/10	7	66 F	6:47 PM	N/A	Powderized Product with granulars
F	9/16/10	7	66 F	6:47 PM	N/A	Powderized product with granulars and forage items
G	9/16/10	7	66 F	6:48 PM	N/A	Powderized product with oats and granulars
H	9/16/10	7	66 F	6:48 PM	N/A	Powderized product with tiny granulars
I	9/16/10	7	66 F	6:48 PM	N/A	Powderized Product with granulars
J	9/16/10	7	66 F	6:48 PM	N/A	Grass Control Site
A	9/17/10	N/A	89 F	3:01 PM	N/A	No visible change in appearance or texture.
B	9/17/10	N/A	89 F	3:01 PM	N/A	No visible change in appearance or texture.
C	9/17/10	N/A	89 F	3:01 PM	N/A	Product has discolored from moisture in the air/dew
D	9/17/10	N/A	89 F	3:01 PM	N/A	No visible change in appearance or texture.
E	9/17/10	N/A	89 F	3:01 PM	N/A	No visible change in appearance or texture.
F	9/17/10	N/A	89 F	3:01 PM	N/A	No visible change in appearance or texture.
G	9/17/10	N/A	89 F	3:01 PM	N/A	No visible change in appearance or texture.
H	9/17/10	N/A	89 F	3:01 PM	N/A	No visible change in appearance or texture.
I	9/17/10	N/A	89 F	3:01 PM	N/A	No visible change in appearance or texture.
J	9/17/10	N/A	89 F	3:01 PM	N/A	N/A
A	9/18/10	N/A	59 F	5:13 PM	.75″	Product is moist to the touch, still appears to be in original form
B	9/18/10	N/A	59 F	5:13 PM	.75″	Pellets have swelled and are stuck together
C	9/18/10	N/A	59 F	5:13 PM	.75″	Pile is completely crusted over and discolored
D	9/18/10	N/A	59 F	5:13 PM	.75″	Pile is crusted over and soggy, consistancy like mashed potatoes
E	9/18/10	N/A	59 F	5:13 PM	.75″	Pile is crusted over, the larger granulars have made its way to the top
F	9/18/10	N/A	59 F	5:13 PM	.75″	The pile has crusted over, some of the larger particles are more visible
G	9/18/10	N/A	59 F	5:13 PM	.75″	Pile has become soggy, larger particles are visible
H	9/18/10	N/A	59 F	5:13 PM	.75″	Pile has become crusted over.
I	9/18/10	N/A	59 F	5:13 PM	.75″	Pile is soggy
J	9/18/10	N/A	59 F	5:13 PM	.75″	Ground is saturated
A	9/19/10	N/A	60 F	6:31 PM	.035″	Pile is moist to the touch, still in original form but wet
B	9/19/10	N/A	60 F	6:31 PM	.035″	Pellets are swollen and pile is now all connected
C	9/19/10	N/A	60 F	6:31 PM	.035″	Pile is still crusted over and wet
D	9/19/10	N/A	60 F	6:31 PM	.035″	Pile is soggy and portions are crusted over
E	9/19/10	N/A	60 F	6:31 PM	.035″	Pile is still crusted over
F	9/19/10	N/A	60 F	6:31 PM	.035″	Pile is still crusted over
G	9/19/10	N/A	60 F	6:31 PM	.035″	Pile is still soggy and discolored
H	9/19/10	N/A	60 F	6:31 PM	.035″	Ple is crusted over
I	9/19/10	N/A	60 F	6:31 PM	.035″	Pile is still soggy
J	9/19/10	N/A	60 F	6:31 PM	.035″	Ground is still saturated
A	9/20/10	N/A	90 F	3:35 PM	N/A	Pile is very dry on top, bottom portion is still damp, not crusted over or clumped together
B	9/20/10	N/A	90 F	3:35 PM	N/A	Pelets are now crusted over on top, still one large pile
C	9/20/10	N/A	90 F	3:35 PM	N/A	Pile is completely crusted over, moist underneath
D	9/20/10	N/A	90 F	3:35 PM	N/A	Top portion of the pile is crusted over while the middle is moist a dough consistancy
E	9/20/10	N/A	90 F	3:35 PM	N/A	Pile is crusted over but wet in the middle
F	9/20/10	N/A	90 F	3:35 PM	N/A	Pile is crusted over but wet in the middle
G	9/20/10	N/A	90 F	3:35 PM	N/A	Pile is spongy to the touch and wet in the middle
H	9/20/10	N/A	90 F	3:35 PM	N/A	Pile is crusted over and wet in the middle
I	9/20/10	N/A	90 F	3:35 PM	N/A	Pile is now crusted over and wet in the middle
J	9/20/10	N/A	90 F	3:35 PM	N/A	Ground is still moist but not saturated
A	9/21/10	N/A	72 F	11:00 AM	N/A	Pile is moist to the touch heavy fog this morning.
B	9/21/10	N/A	72 F	11:00 AM	N/A	Pile is crusted and saturated with white mold growing on it
C	9/21/10	N/A	72 F	11:00 AM	N/A	Pile is crusted over and soggy
D	9/21/10	N/A	72 F	11:00 AM	N/A	Pile is cracked open, soggy center crusted top
E	9/21/10	N/A	72 F	11:00 AM	N/A	Pile is cracked open, soggy center crusted top
F	9/21/10	N/A	72 F	11:00 AM	N/A	Pile is craked open, white mold growing out of it, crusted top soggy middle
G	9/21/10	N/A	72 F	11:00 AM	N/A	White mold is growing on the top of this pile, it is crusted over, middle is soggy
H	9/21/10	N/A	72 F	11:00 AM	N/A	Pile is all soggy, with a lite crust on top
I	9/21/10	N/A	72 F	11:00 AM	N/A	Pile is Cracking and growing white mold in the cracks
J	9/21/10	N/A	72 F	11:00 AM	N/A	Ground is moist