The feeling I get when heading out into the woods before the sun has risen is unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. I feel a combination of anticipation, nervousness, hope, and usually a little bit of fatigue, since it’s right around 5:30 in the morning when I’m heading out to my stand.

For a hunter going out in the morning or evening, anything can happen. It could be the hunt you’ve been waiting your whole life for, or you could fall out of a tree (or some other unfortunate accident could befall you) and wreck your whole hunting career.

What shouldn’t change, though, is that you spend every minute out in the wilderness observing. One of my favorite things to do when I’m not seeing deer and allowing my mind to wander is to watch the squirrels, a habit I began because they trigger noise all through the forest, noise that can initially be mistaken for animals of prey.

While sitting out there, I try to be still enough that either a squirrel or bird perches on some part of my body. It hasn’t happened yet, but I’ve always thought that if that happens I’m doing everything correctly as far as my tactics, behavior and movement in the tree, or rather the lack thereof.

Anyway, I saw a blog this morning about the natural occurrence of frost flowers during this time of year. I’d always seen frost flowers and wondered how they are created.

As Patsy Bell Hobson explains, frost flowers only occur when temperatures fall to freezing before the ground has become frozen for the winter. The whole occurrence depends on water still moving up through the plant while sap freezes and makes a crack in the stem, allowing the water moving through the stem to slowly seep out of the crack (capillary action) and form very thin, petal-looking ice formations. She has several beautiful photos in that blog entry, and it was cool to read about what I’ve seen so many times, and why it was happening.

But this got me thinking. What else do I see out there while I’m sitting alone that I would miss if I couldn’t hunt?

One thing, for sure, is the attainable proximity with squirrels and birds that I can’t get in any other way. I seem to see the same squirrels each time out, each recognizable by size and distinguishing marks. Subconsciously even, I look for the squirrels to be in their respective trees and wonder about them when they’re not in the neighborhood.

Subtle changes in behavior of the squirrels also can make you privy to something approaching from the rear, although I’d rather see an approaching deer before any of my squirrel pals do the same – that way I’m in position to draw a bow and send an arrow if a shooter shows.

Icicles are another natural beauty in the wilderness--although they can be dangerous and looking directly up in search of them is not something you want to do, ever.

Watching animals behave is something I love doing anytime, but the occurrence of frost flowers is another cool phenomenon not all that many people get to witness. Yet another reason I’m thankful for being able to sit in a tree in the cold, watching and anticipating …

Good things come to those who wait.

At least that’s been my experience in most of my hunting and fishing pursuits, and I’m banking on that same notion proving true this deer season.

Since opening day, I’ve been out in the woods a total of about 25 hours sitting in the woods. That doesn’t include work put in ahead of season in preparation for the season: scouting, hanging stands, making sure my bow was zeroed in and, honestly, just driving around with binoculars dreaming.

So far, it’s been an abnormally warm early bow season, and hopefully the warm weather won’t last much longer. Either way, people all over are taking huge deer, and each email that I get from my brother and friends just makes me that much more anxious for the weekends.

What I do feel good about is I’ve seen the buck I’m hunting. About three weeks back, walking into the woods, I saw both a scrape on the edge of a soybean field I’m hunting on, about 70 yards from my stand, and a bedding area just in the woods about 20 yards from the scrape – very encouraging. Weekend before last, I saw an old-looking, 8-point typical come out and check the scrape before going out on the beans.

With a rifle this deer is hanging on my wall right now. But, that’s why bow hunting is so much better. Before I have a shot at this buck, I’ll know if he has any stubs on his rack and I’ll know exactly how many years old he is. And hopefully he won’t know what I smell like.

Maybe the allure of the sport can best be described by a story involving three brothers unrelated to myself.

Three or four weeks ago, my brother emailed me this story. Here’s the picture of that buck.

The story of the brothers – from Marquette, Kansas – began in 2005, when they spotted him as a 2-year-old buck measuring around 120 inches. Since that time he grew to a 160-inch buck last year and this year he’s expected to be about a 185, after grossing at 200 7/8 before the mandatory 60-day antler drying period required by the bow hunting record club, Pope & Young.

Each year they scouted him with trail cams, never being able to get a good look at the monster since he was wise enough to avoid many of the game trails used by other deer and also because he was largely nocturnal. But hours spent in stands and blinds gave them glimpses, and sometime around October 29 of this year, Scott White rushed home from work, showered and went to his stand. That evening “Big Nine,” as they called him, came rustling through the branches and he got his shot, which he didn’t miss. Turns out he was “Big 11” by this date.

 My immediate reply to my brother expressed how awesome I thought it was that this set of brothers  hunted the same buck for about four years. They scouted it every year, watched it grow and knew every time they sat in the woods this deer was lingering. My brothers reply, parallel to mine, was something like, “Those are the kind of stories you like to hear about. They deserved it.”

Then, a couple of weeks later, an older brother of Scott’s shot another trophy. Simply put, time in the woods always pays off.

Or, something like my mom’s bad luck turning good last Thursday can get you there by way of accident. On her way to work, mom hit a doe, a common occurrence all over Kansas, given the deer population. Thank goodness she was alright first and foremost. Then in good, old-fashioned rural resourcefulness, the sheriff who showed up on the scene gave mom a tag, and she had the deer processed.

Her words to me? “Caleb, I got mine, where’s yours?!” I can’t wait to eat a portion of that 30 pounds of summer sausage, and maybe listen to how my hunting methods are flawed.

To any of you readers who may have already filled your tags, email me any pictures you have (cregan@ogdenpubs.com). It may make me long for the forest, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. And I’d love to see the fruits of your labor.

It is with the utmost joy that I deviate from the usual course of content for this blog, and focus on the complete happiness that my brother’s wedding brought our family this past weekend. Rest assured, hunting remains at the forefront of my mind, as I’ve missed several hours in the woods doing family stuff, but the peak of the rut remains, and I have all the free time in the world coming up.

I must admit, I wasn’t too thrilled when my brother messaged me last September with the news that he’d just proposed to his future bride and she’d said yes.

Selfishly, my thoughts were that Josh and I had sort of been cohorts for all of our college life, and that would now end. We’d lived together since the spring of 2004, three years spent hanging out together every single night and doing the typical things that college students do. We even vacationed together. It was a necessary bond between brothers who could be solid for one another when life became frustrating, and it was the best time of my life.

So when Josh got a girlfriend, and they moved in together, I looked at it as good for both of us. After all, he’d still be living near me, and we could still enjoy each other’s company, and he could enjoy the company of a female, something we never considered doing seriously when we lived together.

But the engagement was the one that stung my self-centered outlook the most. Now I knew Josh and my days of living close by were numbered. Now I knew I was losing my best friend. Now there was a finite number of days until the wedding which signaled the end.

But it’s not the end; far from it, in fact.

The wedding, to me, signaled a new beginning for my big brother, and it couldn’t have been more beautiful.

During the wedding, the priest talked of Josh and Nikki’s first date, a date that consisted of going fishing, and how awesome it was that Josh tested a girl from the get-go in order to see if she was the type of girl for him. What the priest didn’t know was that I went along on that date. Nikki, Josh and I took out our little 15-ft. bass boat, and I spent a good amount of the time un-snagging Nikki from the structure we were fishing around while Josh maneuvered the boat. I had to work in the early afternoon that day, around 5, and after I left Josh brought out his GPS system and his map of sunken brush piles, and they ended up limiting out on crappie.

I love this memory, because he saved the best for her.

After watching them exchange vows, I know they absolutely are in love, and I think that same feeling permeated throughout the church.

I know it was one of my grandmother’s and mother’s happiest moments in life.

And if something can bring them such genuine joy, it must be right.

Welcome to the family, Nikki, and congratulations to both of you. I’m so very proud of you both.