Posts Tagged → PA
Happy USA 250th at National Mall big success
Spending two days in the DC-area 102 degree summer heat is not usually something I choose to do, but I gladly did it this week. And I am here to report back two facts: 1) The USA 250th Birthday National State Fair Semiquincentennial Celebration on the National Mall was a big success, and 2) Everyone I met there at the National Mall, and then yesterday at Mount Vernon, was a conservative patriot. This I consider to be not a success, but a failure by the political Left in America. More on this in a moment.
First, let me report on the USA 250th Birthday National State Fair Semiquincentennial Celebration on the National Mall. It was a lot of fun and I am glad I went. They had an active rodeo ring and horse riding competition, with hundreds of active fans cheering from around the fence at any given time. They had a huge Ferris wheel, which we rode in, and got a unique view from and of the DC skyline. There was a long line to get onto this ride at all times, and the two young ladies we rode up with said it was their second or third trip on it.
The FIFA or Fifi or FAFO whatever whatever huge screen soccer watching area was jam packed with thousands of fans, most of whom wore American flag shirts, pants, hats, or draped a flag over their shoulders. America was playing Bosnia when I was there, and the fans were cheering lustily. The line to get in went around the block.
The empty part of the National Mall that people try to show as evidence that this event is not popular is empty because there is nothing happening there. The state booths and the activities are almost all down-the-way, or back the other way. Everywhere else I went there were lots of Americans showing lots of interest in the events and music and exhibits etc etc. The live music was constant, fascinating, and performed by really talented people. No matter where we went, live music was being played.
The Princess of Patience was able to find one frozen ice cream treat out of all the food being marketed. And as far as I could see, the food vendors were struggling to keep up with the constant demand. A lot of food booths had staff promising that the next food delivery was due at any moment, and the hot, sweaty visitors were lined up and waiting. Gotta say, “artichoke dip-stuffed jumbo pretzel” and “bacon-and-cheese stuffed jumbo pretzel” sounds like a lot of work to make, cook, and then deliver ready to serve.
How about selling just ye olde regular big salty soft pretzel, with lots of yellow mustard? Strangely, I looked and never saw just regular old burgers and hotdogs being offered. The food was all creative and fancy, semi-gourmet. That would put a kink in your cowgirl rope, if you were trying to serve up fresh food to a constant stream of hungry fair-goers.
The state booths were fascinating and informative. I stopped in at Guam and had a long, fascinating talk with the friendly reps there, both of them Native, one of whom helped the Princess of Patience charge her phone. I learned about the 80-year American military presence on Guam (still a necessity, due to Chinese imperialism in the Pacific Ocean), and how the Natives are developing their own identity and tourist trade. Similar to Hawaii.
Pennsylvania’s booth seems clouded in controversy, but you would not know that when visiting it. PA’s booth was the best of all that I visited, because it had so much interesting information, and because the fascinating exhibits linked our glorious history to our excellent present. Lots of framed historic American and Pennsylvania flags, antiques, a life-size copy of the Liberty Bell… who the heck scrambled hard at the last second to put all of that together into a coherent exhibit? Thank you very much to US senators John Fetterman (D) and Dave McCormick (R), and to the many corporate sponsors who under-wrote the costs.
It is disappointing that my own governor, Josh Shapiro, did not participate. This big event, our nation’s 250th, should be a bi-partisan celebration. A person’s hate for someone in politics should not outweigh your patriotism for America or your pride in the state you represent. It is tough not to see this as a childish tantrum, but then again, I have yet to have any Democrat friend or family member explain this phenomenon to me without them going immediately from zero to a hundred on the Angry Meter. And it is hard not to see that as a childish tantrum.
Support for America should not be partisan, or even politically questionable. Especially on our 250th birthday.
Which brings us back to the attendees. What on earth is happening in America that people’s personal hatred of a president is so corrosive that they will vandalize national monuments that he has had cleaned up, and that they will boycott a fun, informative, unifying “national state fair” on the National Mall, on America’s 250th birthday?
Every single person I met and chatted with (dozens) there at the National Mall was a conservative patriot. The attendees had a great pride in celebrating America’s 250th Birthday, and made real showings of that pride in their choice of clothing, hats, and words of happy encouragement with one another. That there was no one Leftist (who I saw) just there out of love for America or pride in America says a lot of bad stuff about the political Left in America.
Ditto for yesterday’s day spent at Mount Vernon, the home of George Washington. The place was LOADED with American tourists, Boy Scout groups, all wearing patriotic colors and clothing. We all stood in lines to see just about anything, and despite the 102* blazing heat, everyone was just as friendly, happy, and good natured as the audience had been the day before at the National Mall. How refreshing.
Mount Vernon has incredible updated displays and exhibits, with a significant emphasis on the roles and daily lives of African slaves there, and presumably also across the South, until 1866, when the Republicans took away the Democrats’ slaves.
The George Washington Grist Mill and Distillery was closed, I guess due to the high heat, but come on, people. On July 4th week? On the week of America’s 250th birthday? Something there stank of sabotage….NPS staff who cannot bring themselves to work for a president they disagree with. That was not professional behavior or being devoted to America, if not to the man who temporarily runs it.
I fear for an America that is once again divided into halves. One half, my half, is proud of America, happy to be an American, will work with anyone to advance our great nation forward. The other half (or third) is angry about America, at war with America as we were founded, constantly faulting America, trying to set us back, trying to subvert us, and is actively boycotting our great nation’s 250th birthday celebration.
One guy I spoke with on a train was headed out of DC for the weekend. He is a Democrat lobbyist, an attorney, wearing a fabulous Swiss watch, and more or less said that DC was being inundated with knuckle dragging backwoods types, people like me, I guess, for the 250th celebration, and he had to get out of Dodge in order to enjoy the holiday weekend.
It is curious to me that the political left cannot enjoy sharing America with others. Either the political Left has absolute and totalitarian control of America, or they are miserable boycotters.
Kind of like 1860, a LOT like 1860….which America lived through, and came through stronger, after everything got sorted out.
On the other hand, I and the millions of Americans like me wish you a Happy Independence Day and a Happy 250th Birthday, America!
I took all of the photos below. Any reproduction requires attribution, please.
President George Washington’s face, made from a clay mask while he was alive. In 1776 he lead America to freedom
George Washington’s grist mill and distillery, which made him more money than anything else he did. Washington made rye whisky, which is now coming back into vogue, and which I can occasionally enjoy
General George Washington crossing the Delaware River imposed on the Washington Monument on the National Mall
The Washington Monument, the National State Fair Ferris wheel, and the “Arc d’Trump”
The Arc d’Trump, the big Ferris wheel, and the Washington Monument at dusk, a once-in-several lifetimes view. Smithsonian Institution on the left
Washington Monument lit up in celebration of America’s 250th birthday, with a temporary “national state fair” building in front
American soccer player Malik on the JumboTron on the National Mall, with the US Capitol in the background. Pretty unique view
Earliest known depiction of Uncle Sam, on an 1876 Centennial celebration flag, welcoming “all nations.” Legally, not as an invasion force
My view from the Ferris wheel, looking at the so-named “Arc d’Trump” and the US Capitol in the distance. The soccer game JumboTron is visible in the distance.
People from around America inscribed their best wishes for America’s 250th Birthday
Your faithful author and the Princess of Patience
Two friendly all-American federal police provided me with a grand entrance onto the National Mall
Yours truly, visiting the Truth booth. Truth Social is the official voice of President Trump, because former Twitter couldn’t stand the truth
So-called “Arc d’Trump” has great symbolism, especially with the Ferris wheel and the Washington Monument in the background
Pennsylvania’s booth had the most amazing exhibits, including this old flag from my home turf
Copy of the Liberty Bell at the PA booth
Why isn’t PA in the National Fair in DC?
Came as news to me that there even was a national state fair. Being held on the National Mall, in Washington, DC. Cotton candy, rides, Ferris Wheels, fried foods guaranteed to jump start your heart and then clog it, stuffed teddy bear prizes for your sweetheart, strong man competitions, rope-pulling contests, the usual fun stuff seen at most county and state fairs around America for the past 100 years or more.
Either I do not spend much time online, or the marketers for this big event were not aggressive about it. I just knew nothing about it, read nothing about it, heard nothing about it, had seen nothing about it until a week ago, when it was a couple days away from opening.
Turns out that this “National State Fair” is really big time. Almost a World’s Fair in some ways, with new technology and products being debuted. Pretty darned cool. It runs for a month, and covers America’s 250th birthday celebration on July 4th Independence Day. We are told the fireworks “will be like nothing you have ever seen, that Washington has ever seen.”
Yeah, OK, but is there a place and a role for one of my black powder cannons? Those things really go BOOM.
And so it came as a shock to see recent follow-up articles about how my home state of Pennsylvania is not (or was not) participating in this National State Fair on the National Mall in DC. Pennsylvania, the Keystone State, not participating in America’s 250th birthday celebration in Washington? Really?
Pennsylvania is called the Keystone State for some good reasons, some historic reasons. We were the keystone colony and then state that held together the northeastern and southern colonies and then states. Home of the Declaration of Independence. Pennsylvania’s natural resources literally built the America you experience today. Our own coal fueled the mills in Steelton and Pittsburgh that smelted our own iron ore into steel, that in turn became the railroad tracks laid on Pennsylvania oak railroad ties (of which I have sawed up many on my own sawmill).
The state of Wyoming is not some western name. It is an eastern name, from the Delaware Indian word for “great grassy plains.” The state of Wyoming is named after the Wyoming Valley in northeastern Pennsylvania, because it was the eastern railroads built entirely of Pennsylvania materials that deposited European settlers out on the Wyoming plains (after the Indians had been forced onto reservations). I do not know what the various Indian tribes called what is today Wyoming. But I do know that Pennsylvania had a big hand in making it so.
Pennsylvania coal, iron, and old growth hardwood timber drove the Industrial Revolution in America. Forty minutes due east of Harrisburg is the village of Cornwall, in Lebanon County. An enormous pit there is now filled with water, but it used to be filled with men mining heavy iron ore from the ground. In 1776, those pits were opened to produce the iron to make the cannons that Revolutionary War general George Washington needed to face off against the most hardcore British military, with much of the subsequent cannon blasting and men bleeding happening on Pennsylvania soil (and again at Gettysburg in the Civil War…hmmmmm… this Keystone State thing just keeps raising its head).
I could go on and on about Pennsylvania history in the founding and development of America, but you should get the point here. Pennsylvania got the nickname “Keystone State” for a lot of good reasons, worthy reasons, hard-won reasons.
So, Pennsylvania, having played such a huge role in the founding and early development of America, should naturally be well represented in America’s 250th birthday celebration in Washington, DC, right? Right? RIGHT?
Ummmm, nope. PA governor Josh Shapiro very recently stated to the press that his administration was unable to locate any PA businesses who wanted to participate in the National State Fair, or who could afford to participate in it.
Apparently, I was not alone in learning this new information, as both of our US senators, John Fetterman and Dave McCormick, have in the past 72 hours leapt to action, together, to find both interested businesses and the private funding to get them situated at the National State Fair.
Their bi-partisan action to save the day for Pennsylvania on the national stage is news in and of itself, because just finding a Democrat who wants to be caught dead anywhere near a Republican, much less work with one towards some common shared goal, like, say, a National State Fair in Washington, DC, is harder than raising Lazarus from the grave.
So bravo! to senators McCormick and Fetterman, who say that they have received an outpouring of interest from all of the associated and related and even distantly related associations, groups, and individuals and businesses. PA -based manufacturers and inventors are especially keen to showcase their wares at the event, and have now publicly said so.
Which brings me back to the lurking elephant in the room (it is more of a big donkey than an elephant): Why is Governor Shapiro not out in front of this, leading the charge down to the National Mall? Why did he just kind of low-T diss this event and downplay it, as if it is no big deal for PA to be AWOL on something so important as the national celebration of America’s 250th birthday?
Does Governor Shapiro really, truly, sadly suffer from an affliction of TDS so terribly fatal that he became grossly partisan and petty about something so important?
What a big missed opportunity this is for a man who has represented himself as a political centrist, a uniter and not a divider. Governor Shapiro has aspirations of being re-elected this Fall, and of possibly running for President of America in 2028. As a former Democrat myself, I find myself shaking meself’s old head, once again, at the sad turn the Democrat Party has not just taken once or twice, but which now continues to take even farther off and over a steep cliff.
That someone of Governor Shapiro’s caliber is sulking and boycotting America’s national 250th birthday celebration is a baaaaaad sign. Bad for our body politic and bad for Governor Shapiro’s larger political aspirations.
Past PA governor Ed Rendell was as partisan a politician as you could find anywhere. Rendell was a huge and tireless champion for the Democrat Party. And yet, Rendell also took every opportunity to work cooperatively with his political opponents when those opportunities were given. Rendell understood that it is better to bask in the spotlight of national appreciation with political opponents, than it is to sulk alone in some partisan silo, holding one’s ball close to the body and vowing to never play with those kids ever again. That behavior is bad for everyone.
Pennsylvania’s Governor Shapiro likely has better things to do than read this blog, but if he does, I would (and do) ask that he hightail it down to the National Mall, and share the spotlight with the two US senators from Pennsylvania, McCormick (R) and Fetterman (D).
Promoting Pennsylvania is Job #1 for elected officials from Pennsylvania, and doing that with a smile on one’s face makes everyone involved look like emotionally healthy adults. And it makes all Americans feel like there are still some sane, normal people involved in retail politics. People we can look to for leadership. People who care about all of America, and not just about their own little slice of the electorate, off in some corner, away from everyone else American.
Now, please excuse me while I go hang my Happy 250th America flag on my front porch.
Musical “1776” Two Thumbs Up
Please do not tell anyone, but I saw a musical play the other day, and I liked it. Humiliating to admit, yes, but our three readers come here for honesty, if nothing else. Today you get five doses of honesty: The musical “1776” was excellent, timely, accurate, entertaining, and all the other positive stuff that my movie and theater critic mentors Siskel & Ebert would say about it.
We saw it at the historic Walnut Street Theater in Philadelphia, America’s oldest longest-continuously running theater. Because the venue has a sane policy on weapons (have your carry permit available if anyone asks to see it), I was strapped. I was strapped because it is downtown Philly, where the Wild West can descend upon one in the blink of an eye.
The docents, volunteers, and paid staff were all nice and helpful. Before the show started, we could have raised Lazarus more readily than actually reaching a human being during operating hours. Weak spot, but probably a weak spot in all theaters. No one there answers the phones or the emails until after you have come and gone.
Look here, theater is not for me. Watching adults play dress-up and make-believe is usually overwhelmingly annoying for me. These are not mature people, and many of them have gratingly annoying personalities. It is impossible to take actors seriously, on stage or off. Now that TDS is ravaging Hollywood, I am reminded daily about how much I dislike actors. It seems that the kind of people drawn to acting all fall into the “Big Jerk” category of life.
One exception in my world exists for those live stage performances that are about meaningful, inspirational, true stories. Biblical stuff ranks “acceptable.” Political theater is almost always heavily slopped to the falling overboard-left, preachy, inaccurate, dumb, communist, and, thus, annoying. Best bets are on movies, where the nonsense and forgotten lines moments have been left on the editing room floor.
“1776” is about the writing of the Declaration of Independence over a one month period, however, and is, therefore, a ten out of ten in my book, any day. It involves the story of the delegates from 13 colonies, debating the break-up with Britain, in Independence Hall, in Philadelphia, in June and early July, 1776. The widely documented personal performances of Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and our own (local to PA) John Dickinson are performed admirably by the capable actors. Thank you!
Real focus is put onto the debate about slavery, which did occur in the actual Continental Congress, and how that hot issue was taken out of Jefferson’s first version of the Declaration of Independence. Depicting this on stage is especially important these days, as it is bizarrely considered “cool” by some to incorrectly badmouth America about slavery.
Fact: In 1794 America just about had a civil war over slavery. We also almost had a full civil war over whisky and taxes, then, too. But abolishing slavery was an early goal in our nation’s founding, and white people were ready to fight and die to end it, even as slavery was a full blown enterprise in the rest of the world. Eventually American whites got around to that fighting and dying thing, in 1861, when the insurrectionist Democrat Party declared separation from the rest of America, over keeping their slaves.
By 1865, the Republicans took away the Democrats’ slaves, and as we see even today, the Democrats never forgave them for it.
I digress.
That this was a musical without much singing was God’s way of showing me that beauty can occasionally exist in the darnedest places, including on a stage full of … feh… actors. That most of the singing that did occur was bawdy or silly really took the sting out of the musical part.
The actors said their lines well, performed very well, and entertained us audience people well, about an important subject. The Walnut Street Theater was clean, had no stray odors, and was a pleasure to visit. All the audience members upon whom I threw myself were friendly and gracious.
In another couple of months America, us, our nation, will celebrate its 250th anniversary since our founding. It is a really big deal. This play was timed to synch with our national celebration, and it fits well. If you find yourself going anywhere near Philly in the coming weeks or months, go see “1776.”
And go strapped, because the venue has a Constitutionally-minded policy on 2A concealed carry. God bless ’em. That was the only reason I set foot inside the theater…they actually believe in FREEDOM.
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Feeling antique? See you at the 18th Century Artisans Faire
Every February, a bunch of fascinating people gather round to share in their enjoyment of living history here in Central PA. At my age, and at their age, at our collective antique age, it sounds like a big ol’ birthday party social, but in fact there is a lot of cool stuff at the 18th Century Artisans Faire.
Now in its third or fourth year at the Carlisle Expo Center (in Carlisle, PA), all kinds of talented blacksmiths, funnily dressed people, gunmakers, historians, antique tool and furniture makers, jewelers etc will gather tomorrow Friday and Saturday. I will be visiting gunmaker Mark Wheland, who has a 62 caliber percussion rifle project under way for me. Modeled on the 1850s British Sporting Rifle design, with a custom Rice barrel using Forsyth rifling, a beautiful Rod England lock, and stocked in a museum display grade piece of highly figured Turkish walnut, it will be my go-to percussion hunting arm for Pennsylvania’s October antlerless and bear hunting seasons. More on this rifle later, as an article about it is forthcoming when Mark is done.
Simeon England, one of the talented blacksmiths at the show
Hope to see you there tomorrow. And don’t forget that the Great American Outdoor Show at the PA Farm Show complex starts on Saturday. Lot of cool stuff going on here in a very cold time of year.
Andy Curtis
Sunday hunting in January, 2026?
Last summer, Pennsylvania was approved for as much Sunday hunting as the PA Game Commission would care to implement. After decades of wrangling, a simple law allowing the agency to set all hunting days was passed, and in fact, PA hunters got a whole bunch of Sundays to hunt on. It was glorious.
Nothing was simple about getting the simple law passed. It required the departure from the PA Farm Bureau board a whole host of people who for decades had publicly said “Sunday is for church, and if you don’t go to church on Sunday, you should go, even if your religion has you going on Friday or Saturday or not at all.”
They were that un-American, these supposedly all-American arbiters of all things religion on the Farm Bureau board. For decades the PA Farm Bureau had held up Sunday hunting in PA, even as Sunday hunting freedom was implemented across the USA. Out West, Sunday hunting was never in question. A citizen’s right to choose when to hunt was respected. But back East, the home territory of the Puritans and the Quakers…nope, Blue Laws all week long, for hundreds of years.
So now that we have Sunday hunting freedom on the books here, what will PGC do with it? We saw this past season greatly improved with something like ten or eleven additional days to be afield (legitimately). But now, as we enter into a very complicated extended rifle season for antlerless deer, mostly starting December 26th and ending January 24th, it appears that we don’t have any Sundays to hunt in January, 2026.
Tell me this is not the strangest thing…
This could well be an easy oversight by the PGC staff, who were probably giddy and overwhelmed with logistical considerations last summer, as they worked on implementing PA’s first-ever real Sunday hunting. Or it could have been a carefully considered gentle tap on the brake pedal, a desire to measure success or failure first, before going full bore ahead in Fall 2026.
It is easy to understand how policy officials can think that way. But now here we are. And now that we all saw how easy it was to implement Sunday hunting this past Fall, I have a request of the PGC staff: Quit being all responsible and anxious about Sunday hunting! Go full bore, baby!
See, PGC was not all anxious about another very complicated policy it is now implementing for the first time ever, this year into next: Extended rifle season for antlerless deer.
The purpose of extending rifle season for antlerless deer state-wide on some properties, and region-wide on others, is to allow the alpha hunters among us more time to help bring down the deer population. So that the kindly drivers on our highways and byways do not hit overpopulated deer with their cars.
Which begs the question: Why have an extended deer season if we don’t also have Sunday hunting during it?
For those readers who are hearing this extended deer season business for the first time, or even for the second or third time, yes, it is real and it is really complicated.
First, ALL DMAP properties state-wide are open to antlerless deer hunting with a rifle, from December 26th to January 24th, 2026. All private and public DMAP properties, including private properties that are not yet a designated DMAP property but which fall within one of the Chronic Wasting Disease DMAP areas. You do need to have a DMAP tag to hunt with a rifle in or on one of these DMAP areas.
I think CWD DMAP area #6396 here in southcentral PA still has DMAP tags available.
Second, extended rifle season in some WMUs, like 4C, runs January 2nd to January 19th.
This is all in addition to the regular flintlock and archery season that begins December 26th and runs through January 24th. If you want to hunt buck, you can only have a flintlock or archery tackle with you; no rifle.
So clearly the PGC thinks PA has too many deer, and the agency wants us hunters to remove more does from the landscape, so they are giving us more time afield with the most effective hunting tool, the rifle. It then logically follows that the agency should want us hunters to have more time afield in pursuit of implementing their policy, too.
If you want Sunday hunting this coming January, which I do, then contact the PGC and let them know.
And while we are discussing hunting here, may we suggest that all archery and flintlock hunters wear an orange hat? Why not? With all the rifle hunters out with us in the late season, our camo-only ways are likely not as safe as they were when it was just us flintlock and archery hunters afield.
Happy hunting!
We want Sunday hunting in January!
Pennsylvania seasons…the one that really matters
The longstanding quip that Pennsylvania has two seasons, road construction season and hunting season, still stands.
Anyone living in PA can attest to the seemingly endless roadwork everywhere here that begins in May and ends in November. At one time, Pennsylvania had the greatest miles of roads to square miles of area of any state; but, according to a random 2018 chart on the Internet, eight years ago PA ranked #7 and was pretty much tied with Indiana, Maryland, and Delaware in this regard.
New Jersey now holds this dubious record of most linear road miles to square miles of area, which surprises no one, given how urbanized NJ is. But it seems that no state makes so many crappy roads and bridges quite like PA, and so we do have the endless road construction to fix them, and thus, the adorable quip.
It does seem that our highways and bridges are always failing, or about to fail. Whether this is because of bad contracting, corrupt payoffs like with the recent PA Turnpike scandal, or the high number of freeze-thaw cycles our roads go through, it is tough to know. But whateva… the quip strikes home, every time.
Our other season is worth about $1.5 Billion annually. Call it Elmer Fudd Season, Deer Season, or Red-Check-Plaid Pennsylvania Tuxedo Season, hunting season is still a huge part of Pennsylvania’s culture and economy. Thank God above. This is the Pennsylvania season that really matters, though it has been changing in the past twenty years and ten years, respectively, as more doe permits have been issued and as bear and deer season openers have moved from Mondays to Saturdays.
Despite all the seasonal scheduling changes, which have resulted in northern hunting camps losing their traditional gatherings for big bear and deer drives, the easily renewable economy of hunting chugs along. No broken bridges or defunct roads here; the money just happily flows and flows and flows.
Outdoors people, of which Pennsylvania has a lot, really like to have nice outdoors lifestyle stuff. Things like camouflage flatware, camouflage lingerie, camouflage radios (conveniently made to look exactly like forest floor leaf litter, so that when you inevitably drop your radio, it becomes invisible and forever at one with said forest floor, and you have to go buy a new one), camouflage tee shirts, ammunition, guns (no one ever has enough guns), boots (no one ever has enough hunting boots), fishing rods, fishing lures and hooks, ATVs, etc.
And so here we are, four days into the 2025 PA deer rifle season, and EVERYTHING SUCKS. As in, I have heard nothing but nonstop bitching from friends, acquaintances, and even people I do not know who I bump into at the gas pump, about the lack of deer. And for once, I have to agree with these grouchy complainers. Count me in as one of you guys this year.
Normally, I would scoff and deride these complainers as bad hunters, or unappreciative hunters, but the truth is, I am also having a Bad Hunter kind of rifle season myself. And this is on top of last week’s bear season, where my wonderful flatlander friends, whom I love and whose company I enjoy very much, continued to yet again miss gimme shots on huge trophy bears on tough bear drives, just so they can promise to come back and “git ’em next year.”
Trying to not disappoint me, they say.
Whether there is some kind of invisible solar flare activity that we humans are not privy to, but which is very important to the life of deer, or an alien space ship picked up and removed all the deer in PA, our deer hunting season is off to a weird start. Everywhere, as far as I can discern. It is certainly true without any doubt that most of the deer are having teenage human type life cycle inversion, where 2:00 AM is the time of most activity, and 2:00 PM is for sleeping. Exactly where all the deer are sleeping is a great mystery that a lot of us have sweated off a lot of calories trying to determine the past 72 hours.
Trail cameras report back legal bucks and bands of does traveling past places we normally guard with a rifle, but in the middle of the night, when we are sleeping off that 1,500 foot elevation climb to the mountain top that has zero acorns and zero deer sign. And then there is the descent at dark, the harder part.
So I am going to nominate a third season of sorts, maybe temporary, maybe only for the beginning of the 2025 deer rifle season here in PA: Bitching, Moaning, and Grumbling Season.
Right now and for the next ten days, it is the only season that matters. Good luck, fellow deer hunters!
How many Central PA deer hunters spend our time for two weeks, overlooking a deep wash or draw and picking out shooting lanes. Snow makes it perfect, But we still need deer to show up…
Who us? Yes, it is 11:24 PM in a location with little hunting pressure or human activity, and the deer have gone totally nocturnal.
Maybe not an impressive rub, but the scrawny six point caught on camera that we derided two weeks ago would be most welcome right about now, as the monster 150 inch twelve point has not been seen for two weeks…
Back hair, chest hair, belly hair…baby, I got it all and more
Confession time: I have a hell of a collection of back hair, belly hair, chest hair, even butt hair and ear hair. Fo’ real.
I know, I know, a man of my age does not age well, as “things” begin to grow from every orifice and heretofore unknown location, but so why then do we have to write about it…sorry, my apologies. There is an honest purpose here.
You, the lone, long-suffering sole reader of this blog, are probably already thinking to yourself “Good Lord, this guy has finally gone off the deep end with this TMI shock jock shtick. ” And were we actually talking about real body hair from my own voluptuous, idyllic form, you would be correct. However, as racy or as disgusting as this may sound, the fact is that I do have a pretty cool record-setting collection of all the aforementioned clumps of hair, but they are not from my own body.
Again and now even more so, whoever is left reading here at this point is gagging, and wondering what happened to the erudite intellectual who used to occupy this lonely outpost of fascination. Well, the bad news is I yet remain under the mal-influence of one Bill Heavey, the also-lonely humor writer of the once-wonderful magazine known as Field & Stream, now digitally un-dead and unknown to Americans under the age of sixty.
The good news is that I am not talking about human hair here, but rather the hair, or fur, of the many deer I have shot arrows at over the past five decades. This is true. I am not lying.
See, I fancied myself an archer at a young age, and so I got somewhere (probably at the kind of now-gone country auction that elderly collectors dream about and salivate over) a cheap recurve bow and a motley assortment of mis-matched arrows and dull broadheads, and set out to bag a deer.
Yes, I practiced, for years, as only the uninitiated and un-groomed and un-mentored can practice. Which meant that on Tuesdays and Fridays my archery “form” aligned well enough that I could hit the broad side of a barn, which were plenty, large, bright red, and quite broad where I grew up. And on all other days of the week my arrows sailed off into the wild blue yonder, to sit hidden in the fallow weeds and maybe puncture a neighbor’s tractor tire the following spring. Or maybe eventually catch my eye and be re-purposed as an arrow, more defunct stick than game-getter at that late point, but available and at-hand, and so useful nonetheless.
As a young man, I shot at deer from the ground and from neighbor’s hillbilly blinds, AKA rickety wooden death traps in today’s more refined hunting circles. My woodcraft was then and remains now unbeatable, and I am not lying or exaggerating when I tell you that I could stalk within feet of a dumbfounded deer, and let fly. Only to watch my arrow clip hair from the aforementioned areas and parts of the deer’s external anatomy, time and time again.
Bill Heavey would tell you, had he been as cool as me as a kid himself, that the deer died of laughter from the ridiculousness of the experience. But no, my deer did not die of anything. Not from shock, not from surprise, not from overwhelming mockery of the incompetent human mere feet away, and not an arrow in the heart. No, my deer stood stock still, with grass or acorns or corn hanging out of their slack jaw, staring at me in disbelief. Some even provided me with two shots.
I could have died from the shame of it all.
This routine of Bad-Indian-Sucky-Bow went on for decades, even as I graduated to used but working Fred Bear Kodiak recurves and then to custom “stick” bows. My prize and pride is a beautiful reflex-deflex longbow made by none other than Mike Fedora, the dean of modern traditional archery in America. Back in 2000, Jack Keith and I traveled from Harrisburg to the Eastern Traditional Archery Rendezvous, then at Denton Hill in Potter County (home of many more bears than people), where we connected with Jack’s dear friend John Harding, and where I was introduced to Mike Fedora.
At ETAR, Fedora traced my bow-holding hand, did some phrenology-like measurements of my various body parts, and pronounced that the bow of my dreams would be ready within a few months. And no sh*t, Mike Fedora did produce a beautiful bow that was like an extension of my soul. I could then and still can shoot that thing into bullseyes all day long. At archery targets, me and that custom bow are deadly.
At deer, I still drop the ball. No can hit. Must be nerves, which are steely when I am hunting with a rifle. And so my arrows continue to clip bits of hair from all over deer bodies all over Upstate New York and Upstate Pennsylvania.
I am telling you, my collection of these bits and clumps of hair is large and legendary. If nothing else, no human being alive has missed so many deer at so short a distance for so long as I have. A living, walking, malfunctioning Guiness Book of World Records I may be in this regard, around these parts it is nothing to brag about. Rather, I inspire pity from even little kids dressed in camo who have already arrowed several Pope & Young bucks by the age of seven.
In the not too distant past, someone with my pathetic archery hunting skill would have perished from starvation long before amassing even the beginning of such a fine and rare collection.
And yet, I have discovered hope, salvation for my pathetic-ness and hopeless skill-less-ness. As much as I hate to admit it, I, a traditional archery snob who mocked bows with “training wheels” (compound bows) and belittled “bow-guns” (crossbows) as un-sporting arms that no worthy deer would allow itself to be taken by, I have finally fallen to the siren song of the modern crossbow. Or, to be honest, the cross-gun that shoots a short arrow like some kind of James Bond super-weapon.
Despairing of my ineffectiveness at archery hunting, and desiring to finally carve some notches in something to prove my prowess as a traditional hunter before I expire, I went and bought a Ravin R10X crossbow. It came highly recommended by contractor Ken Pick of Renovo, PA, whose son aced a very nice mountain ten point with one two weeks ago at the distance of 87 yards.
I can barely hit a deer with a modern centerfire rifle at 87 yards, so when I saw the photos of the young chap and his buck and his James Bond cross-bow-gun, I decided if I could not beat them, I had to join them. And join them I did, by buying said Ravin R10X at Baker’s Archery in Halifax, PA. Vindication and verification and all related cations came at me real fast as soon as I took that scary-ass contraption afield.
This is no lie and no exaggeration: Ten minutes after I took a little mosey to a spot where I had not hunted before, but where I thought deer had to be (this is the woodcrafty Josh), I had whacked an anterlessless deer. I had only put the scope reticle on the spot where I thought the arrow would hit the deer, and before I even pulled the trigger a loud THWACK resounded in the woods.
The deer ran twenty yards and died of fright, with a gigantic hole coursing through its body where I must have aimed but do not remember doing so, due to my own shock at having actually killed something with a stick and a string.
Life is full of surprises. Don’t deprive yourself of these dangerous-as-hell you’ll-shoot-yer-eye-out-kid bow-gun contraptions. Dude, they are cool and totally worth it.
Take my experienced word for it.
The trophy of my dreams: A yearling button buck taken with a James Bond super weapon on a ground stalk
A young man who was mentored in traditional archery, with good form, at ETAR 2020 at Ski Sawmill
People’s trail cameras are literally everywhere. This was sent to me as I was preparing to ask this kind young man to help me drag the deer fifty feet to the gravel road
No joke about it, my friend and archery and life mentor, Jack Keith, was the real deal in everything, and I miss him every day.
People who subsist on archery can’t afford to write silly essays about sucking at archery
Traditional archery legend Fred Asbell showing how to correctly hold the bow while hunting. Fred took all kinds of animals all around the world with traditional archery tackle
A young man with even better archery form at ETAR 2022
Why retain lousy judges?
Pennsylvania voters will have the rare opportunity to NOT RETAIN three lousy judges in a few weeks, and how can you vote to retain these people?
Don’t!
The “PA Dems” send me their daily emails, which I dutifully read. It is fascinating material, mostly because there is no substance to it. It relies on an “Us vs. Them” version of politics, which I think most Americans are tired of in so many ways. This same tribal hate-filled scapegoating is what got Charlie Kirk murdered, and which has boiled up from the far-far-Left gutter of the Democrat Party’s base.
Just like the phony “COEXIST” bumper sticker, the old “Hate is Not a Family Value” bumper sticker also was a bold lie. Americans who sported these on their cars were neither coexisters nor peace loving non-haters. The coexist people are the meanest, angriest, least capable of co-existing with different Americans, and hate is now an out-and-proud defining characteristic of the Democrat Party base.
It all flows from the 1960s Marxist academics, like Herbert Marcuse, who told their college students that it is OK to hate and hurt people who disagree with Marxists, because those people are automatically just bad, bad people, and they deserve to be hated, and hurt. And so hate has become a fundamental part of the Democrat Party messaging, including the emails that I get.
The PA Dems say that the court is their “firewall” on policy, but this is all wrong, that is not what courts are supposed to do. Congress and state legislatures are charged with writing laws and policy, and the courts are supposed to simply interpret it all as either consistent with the constitution, or not. Not act as another legislature of just a few people. And so it is this political activist judge thing that has got so many Pennsylvanians wound up tight about this upcoming retention vote.
Says one activist I admire, “Vote “NO” to retain the PA Supreme Court Justices. Below are the current salaries of those justices along with all tiers of the judicial system including our local Common Pleas Court Judges. By choosing to run for retention instead of re-election, these Justices, if retained, will be serving another 10-year term in which their salary for that time will total $2,619,760, and the Chief Justice will receive a total of $2,695,990. I don’t believe she can serve another full term due to mandatory retirement age in another two years or so. In addition to their generous salary, they also receive an annual cost of living raise and the best benefits as far as healthcare, prescription drugs and eye care. Regardless of the justices being on the wrong side of so many issues, there is no reason to hand them another term instead of making them stand for election.”
In other words, the judges chose a simple political dodge instead of running a real campaign, to stay in their cozy taxpayer funded jobs. Even one who should automatically age out in just a couple years!
We do not need more elected officials with this rotten, selfish mindset.
Additionally, the activist policies these judges pushed were destructive nonsense that served the political interests of just one political party, at the cost of tossing our rule of law right out the window along with believable election results:
- they approved a heavily gerrymandered electoral map, which a lot of Americans say they do not like,
- they allowed the use of highly corrupt vote “drop boxes” despite Act 77 not authorizing them,
- they extended the deadline for mail-in ballots by three days, in violation of the law, among other non-legal, anti-legal decisions that damaged Pennsylvania’s election integrity
Christine Donohue, David Wecht, and Kevin Dougherty do not deserve to serve as judges any longer. They have failed at this job, badly, and they should not be retained. Time for a change, time for people with integrity to sit in those seats.
Vote NO on November 4th to not retain them on the court.
You must flip over your ballot to check the NO box.
And you can also term-out Judge Dubow and Judge Wojcik, too.
Dogs vs. Drones in deer recovery Part 2
So you hit a deer, with an arrow or a bullet, and it ran, and now you want to find it. As is common, the critter crossed paths with you and your sporting weapon late in the day (deer especially move most at dawn and dusk), and now the sun is setting and daylight is fading. Finding the trail and following it is becoming less and less likely. After ten or fifteen minutes of looking for it, the sun is down and all you know is that you have some blood at the initial point of contact. Yes, the deer jumped high, mule kicked, and tucked its tail as it ran, all of which are good signs of a solid hit. But, you don’t have much of a blood trail and no light to follow one, even if you could find the spoor.
Archery hunters commonly back off at this point, and either wait an hour or two before resuming the search in earnest, using strong lights and extra eyes from friends, or they just leave the site altogether. Returning in the morning provides better light for trailing, and the good likelihood that the deer will have run only a short distance, bedded down because it is wounded and does not feel pressured, and then expired.
But what if you are worried about coyotes eating your prize overnight? And what if you think the hit was really good, and the ground cover is just so thick and difficult that there is a good chance the deer is lying dead just fifty yards away, and yet tough to see from where it was hit? Faced with these prospects, a lot of hunters will go after the deer, good blood trail or not, good visibility, or not.
Comes the question, what is the best way to find this wounded and probably dead deer: Should you stagger about in thick thorns in the dark, losing half your own blood and clothing in the process? Or should you call in the cavalry?
Today, calling in the cavalry means either getting a deer tracking dog (www.unitedbloodtrackers.org here in central PA), or getting a drone operator. Using either dogs or drones is not necessarily permitted in all states. After a ton of political wrangling over a twenty or thirty year period, Pennsylvania only got search dogs for finding wounded deer less than ten years ago, while for hundreds of years many southern states still use dogs to chase deer to hunters. So one state is worried about disturbing the hunting woods at all, while another state is OK with basically setting the woods on fire… for hunting.
Today, using drones to find wounded or expired deer in Pennsylvania is unsettled business. In fact, it is a mess. Here, too. Here is the final word from the drone operator, whose PGC charges were dismissed by the court.
That is because the PA Game Commission worries about the misuse of drones for unethically looking for wildlife to hunt (gaining an artificial advantage), for herding and moving wildlife, etc. Fair enough, but what about the states that do allow drone recovery? Are those states just made up of unethical slobs who could never do a good job hunting or managing wild game?
And what about all of the cool videos online that show guys using drones to successfully find expired deer in the most improbable places that would have never occurred to even the most experienced band of searchers, or that would not have been accessible to a dog and its handler?
No question about it, recovery drones are both cool new shiny technology, and largely successful. PGC’s past recent behavior about drone deer recovery has been lackluster (see links above), sadly, and even lawless. We hunters expect much better from our wildlife agency.
Deer dogs have their noses and the guidance of their experienced owners, while drones have infrared and thermal cameras that can go over a lot of territory quickly, at night, and often see a warm carcass through cover while the hunter simply stands and watches the video feed. Drones can often do the hours of work of a tracking dog in just a few minutes. On the other hand, dogs can pick up a two day old scent and follow it to the long-cold carcass, something a drone cannot do, unless the carcass is out in the open. In which case it will be but a pile of fresh bones.
But there are real concerns about drones, like spooking and pushing out an entire herd of deer, maybe by accident, maybe on purpose, or looking too soon and unnecessarily pushing off the wounded animal to even farther distances, maybe over property lines. Some drone operators mount big flat screen TVs in their vehicles, so the drone search becomes less about recovery and more about entertainment and snooping on trophy deer at night. Some states require that the hunter who wounded the animal not be able to see the drone search results, to eliminate a possible inducement to cheat (like going after another, bigger, animal in the dark).
Of course, in places with big swamps, pythons, and alligators, a drone might be preferred!
One suggestion that Central Pennsylvania tracking dog handler Vicky Church has: Get deer/ game animal recovery drone operators certified. Not just by the FAA, but also by the PGC. Make sure that drone recovery operators are behaving ethically and legally. It is hard to argue with some version of this, even though I am philosophically opposed to any more regulation on our already far overburdened society.
Vicky says the deer dog people had to do it, so the drone people should, too. Hard to argue with her.
Hunting is supposed to be fun, and no wounded wild game animal should be abandoned to the coyotes just because search options were artificially limited by over-anxious regulators. My opinion is drones should be allowed for finding wounded wild game. But let’s face it, it is a lot more fun to watch a dog work the scent and the field.
Nothing beats the happy look of a smiling dog, or the people with it.
Wild Game recovery dog handler, Vicky Church. Photo by Tom, a hunter who benefited from Vicky’s help
Vicky and her dog trailing a wounded buck. Photo by Tom
No way a human is going to do this easily or well. Oh, many of us have tried it, without success. A drone might achieve this, if the cover is not too thick