By: Bears Butt

MuzzyGun

15 days till we head for the hills!

So, what has gone on in the last 5 days?  HMMMMMM……well we had a meeting about the hunt and drank some adult beverages.  I finished the batch of sweetbreads that I plan on taking to the hunt for all to enjoy.  And Weasel and I are working on some modifications to “The Rack”.  My list of things to take is growing almost hourly and this year will be a very different one for me, as my hunting trailer is staying home and I have been invited to sleep in “The Dog House”.

When a change like that comes along it really makes you think about what you need to be bringing on the hunt.  You see, all my things are loaded in that camping trailer and I have been adding things for this hunt ever since we got back from Conner’s bow hunt.  If I forget something for this hunt I will be kicking myself in the rear end the whole time.  But then, someone said once (or twice):  Gun, powder, ball, cap, license…..everything else is a luxury.

Well for old people that list has to be expanded some.  Add to it, insulated underwear, pants, shirt, coat, toilet paper, glasses, hat, radio, phone, cash, beer, food, binoculars, game bag, liver bucket, rope, knife, camera, beaver sharn, kill jug, boobin baby board, measuring tape, marking pen, “Luci” lanterns, gambrel, chain saw, gas, oil, tool box, capot, Kipper snacks, crackers, jerky, hydration pack, extra change of clothes, special surprise gifts, atv, extra gas, tie down straps, shooting cross sticks (what have I forgotten?)…..and then everything else is a luxury.

Whatever happened to the day you just put the rifle over your shoulder and headed out to hunt?  Was there ever such a day?  Maybe back before guns, when the man of the cave just walked out the opening of the cave with nothing but his bare hands to go and get some food.  Suddenly someone invented a spear!  And “Luxury” began.

Look how far we have come, from walking out the cave opening with only our bare hands at a cost of nothing, to absolutely needing all the things I have mentioned including about $1,000 for fuel, because I’ll be danged if I’m walking far.  And with anticipation of bagging a 65 pound deer.  Times have changed alot since Nanook….his anticipation included huge beasts in excess of a ton.  Maybe I should set my sights a bit higher.

AllTheMeatANDTheHead

Bears Butt

September 8, 2014

 

Written on September 8th, 2014 , Hunting Stories
By: Bears Butt

SO……..

I was at the movies and bought a popcorn that cost $3.50
I remarked that the last time I bought popcorn it was a dime.
The attendant smartly replied, “Boy you are really going to enjoy this,because now we have sound”.

Written on September 5th, 2014 , Jokes I like!
By: Bears Butt

Soldier-With-Rifle-in-War

Back in the early 1950’s, the United States got involved with a crisis between North and South Korea.  We sent thousands of soldiers there to protect the South Koreans from their nemesis the North Koreans.  During that conflict, hundreds of our men were wounded or worse and one of them wounded was 4 Hooves (Roy Torgeson).  Roy spent weeks in the hospital recovering from his wounds and then was sent home, a hero in every respect.  Usually, when a soldier gets wounded in battle, the records are clear and orders are cut recognizing the fact and a Purple Heart is awarded.  Along with the Purple Heart award comes a token amount of monthly compensation.

In Roy’s case, there was no such award nor compensation.

Roy spent years and years sending letters and trying his best to make the Commanders realize this error, but to no avail.  And then the warehouse that held all the military records in Kansas City burnt to the ground, taking with it all the records that were stored there….Roy’s was among the ashes.  He continued to send letters and make phone calls but nobody would listen.

When our friend Dan “Muskrat” Gyllenskog heard about Roy’s wounds, he began to ask questions and get more people involved through the Veterans of Foreign Wars ranks.  Years went by with Muskrat pursuing the award.  It looked like it would never come to be as he continued to hit road block after road block.  Even the Utah State Commander of the VFW got involved and he too hit road blocks everywhere he turned.

Finally, after years of “this battle”, someone in a high position in the Army, listened.  He reviewed the letters and the documentation submitted by doctors and others, clearly seeing the scars of the wounds in X-rays and reading the doctors statements about these scars .  That they could only have come from bullets or fragments of bullets.  And the age of the scars were from that time frame.

Nearly one year ago, Roy received a letter of recognition and his first compensatory check from the US Army command and has since received a check from them every month.  But still no Purple Heart.  Yesterday, September 4, 2014, Roy got a call from the Ogden Standard Examiner’s military correspondent who wanted to come and talk to him.  Of course Roy allowed the visit and this man (Mitch Shaw) talked to him about writing his story in the paper and coming to his presentation.  Yesterday Roy also recieved a letter from the US Army headquarters stating that they recognized their error and that he will be presented with his long over due Purple Heart.  The presentation will be conducted by Senator Rob Bishop at 10 a.m., on October 18th, at the George E. Wahlen building 1102 N. 1200 W., Ogden Utah.

Roy called me this morning with the good news!  Congratulations Roy!  Persistence paid off, finally!  I for one will be at the presentation and I hope everyone reading this will be as well.

I am so happy to be writing this and my thoughts turn immediately to our buddy Muskrat.  He wanted Roy to receive this award so badly.  He and I talked many hours about it and the stumbling blocks he kept encountering in his pursuit.  How can something so plain be such a problem for the one in command not to see?  Finally with all the evidence they woke up and signed the declaration and cut the final orders for Roy to receive this award.

Congratulations again Roy!  And a hearty THANK YOU to Muskrat and everyone else that helped in this cause!

Bears Butt

September 5, 2014

Written on September 5th, 2014 , Uncategorized
By: Bears Butt

Bull elk buglingFor whatever reason, it seems like just after September begins I get this rush and can’t help but feel the need to go “kill” something.  Doves, grouse, whatever.  The weather begins to change and the early mornings get crisper and crisper.  I can already see a change in how the foliage looks up in the back of the canyon.  Fall is upon us and like it or not, winter will be right behind it.  But, while Fall is here, I love it.

The paper has already had articles from people complaining about the elk bugling out in the South of town in that high fence area elk herd.  So that means the wild elk in the mountains are no doubt bugling as well.  Maybe it’s time to take Weasel and his cow elk tag out for a one day trip?  Listen for the bugling and then move in to take one of that big boys cows home.

There was a post the other day on Facebook from one of my friends.  She is bow hunting in the mountains and she was telling her daughter to get her rear end up in the mountains.  She said the weather had been cold enough to “frost” the ground!  Her daughter has a limited entry bull elk tag and when they are bugling it is easier to know where they are and sneak in for a possible shot.  Frost on the ground is a great sign that Fall is on us.  And with that comes the elk breeding season.  I love the Fall!

And more than Fall, I love the muzzleloader deer hunting season.  I have said it a million times…”The muzz deer season begins and ends my year”.  I begin counting down from the last day of the season until it begins again the following year.  From now until it actually comes will be a long set of days.  20 days, but who is counting?  This Saturday at 5 p.m. we will be gathering for our annual muzz deer season planning meeting.  In reality, we don’t need to meet to decide who is going to go up on the Tuesday before the opening day, who is staying in who’s camp trailer, who will be pulling the trailers with the atv’s, who will be leaving camp early or coming up later, what meals we will having on what night.  We have already decided on all of this for years and years in the past.  But it gives us a great excuse to get together, have a few brews and talk about past hunts.  It gets all of us focused on one subject….”The Hunt”!  Winemaker rolls her eyes every year when I tell her the planning meeting is on “X” day, “Y”‘s house and “Z” time.

So, for the next 20 days, I will be thinking, planning and gathering all my stuff and it will no doubt end up all packed and ready to the point that I will start to doubt myself as to whether I have put it in the camp trailer or not.  Up at camp I will find I have packed WAY TOO MUCH STUFF, stuff I really don’t need, but felt I had to have it “just in case”.  I think of all the hunts of my past, there has only been one or two times that the “just in case” stuff ever got used.  Sometime in the next 20 days I will thaw out the sweetbreads and get them ready to cook.  Sweetbreads are always a good snack item on one of the days of the hunt.  This year I have something very special to give each of the participants of the sweetbread eating time.  If you have any doubt that you won’t make it to camp for that eating extravaganza, well, all I can say is, “you won’t have one” of the special things and for sure you will miss out on some very good eating.

Sometime in the next 20 days I will take my rifle to the range in Perry and see how well it digests and shoots 90 grains of blackpowder behind a patched roundball……Yes….this year I am joining the ranks of the “ball babies”.  For the past two years I have tried and tried to get a recipe that my rifle liked shooting the Hornady Great Plains conicals and in those two years I have missed two deer and one very big bull elk.  Good by my “conical head” friends.

Sometime in the next 20 days, I will take the old cardboard off the “Boobin Baby Board” and put on a fresh cardboard, clean of any marks….this in preparation for a fun filled hunting event where there will be a lot of shots taken at deer and those deer not being brought back to camp.  I love it!  BOOM!!!!  “If Idda, Yabutt”.  Another dollar in the biggest buck contest bag and another name on the board!

07BoobinBaby(This was from the hunt in 2007)

Another fun hunting season is in store for us all and maybe, just maybe we will bring home some venison….I hope!

Sometime in the next 20 days………………..

Bears Butt

September 3, 2014

Written on September 3rd, 2014 , Hunting Stories
By: Bears Butt

27AnnualRendezvousNumber31It’s hard to believe that we have been gathering now for 31 years and we must be having a good time or we would never had made it this long.  Switchback and Natalie did a stupendous job at pulling off this rendezvous!  We thank you dearly for everything you did.  Of course it doesn’t all fall on a couple of people, Bones did an excellent job with the range masters, targets, packets etc.  And of course the range masters who volunteered were excellent at keeping things safe and orderly.  Anchor with the hawk throws did an outstanding job as usual and the entire Gyllenskog family needs praising for the kids lympics, bb gun shooting and the adult lympics.  Fat Duck pulled off an almost impossible shotgun shoot, with some crazy “in the shooters face” bird throwing.  And last but not least were the volunteers who kept the kids occupied with face painting, games, an obstacle course and making sure they were tired by days end.

It’s really hard to say who had the most fun at the event.  I know I was dead beat by the time I went to bed every night.  And by looking into the eyes of many the next morning it was very obvious they had a very fun evening as well (some evenings longer than others).

Our weather was nearly perfect with just one day being what I call, very hot.  I loved the overcast days and the light rain during the sleeping hours was a nice refreshing breath of fresh air.

In order to have a fun and enjoyable rendezvous there is always a TON of hard work that goes into setting everything up.  We all know that shooting our rifles and pistols is a must at our rendezvous.  Years ago, that was all we did during the day, but because of the younger people in camp, our activities have spread to other fun things.  Setting up the shooting range doesn’t take a lot of work, but it sure takes some time and man/woman power.

1SettingUpRangeThe “A” frame and cross member range is made of angle iron and the cardboard is attached using wire ties at the top and then again onto a cable run along the bottom.  If we could find another medium to attach out targets to it sure would be a nice improvement, as when the wind blows it doesn’t take a lot of wind to knock the stand down.  We make do with what we have.  The range was set up on Wednesday afternoon and the cardboard was attached early on Thursday, just in time for the first day of shooting to take place.  Some folks have other obligations and must complete their shooting before the Saturday Noon deadline.  So basically we have 2 and 1/2 days of shooting.  The range must be manned/womanned with range masters covering both ends of the shooting line.  For future events, two range master should be employed, one on either end of the shooting line for improved safety.  Not that we had any real issues this year, just because we could use the extra safety.

5RangeIsReadyToGo

The Firing line is back 20 yards from the target stand and there is plenty of visibility to see incoming and exiting participants in order to shut down the shooting and allowing the travelers to continue through to and away from the camping area.

With the range all set to go, the shooters began showing up to shoot the targets found in their packets.

2WinemakerShooting

12Shooting13EdjukateerChecksSights

Seeing Edjukateer sitting at a shooting table does not mean we allow a rest to be used during the competition.  All competition shots must be done standing off hand.  Here he is making sure his rifle can “digest” the 20 grain limit of powder we have imposed upon ourselves for safety.  We are blessed to have a police force that allows us to shoot withing the city limits and don’t want anyone hurt in the event of a “flier” shot that doesn’t hit the backdrop to our range.

7DirectHitHow is that for a Perfect center of the target shot?  Good shooting Winemaker!!!!

8DryDogShootsPistolPistols and rifles are all shot from the 20 yard line.

11SwitchBackReadsRulesOf course you can’t have a bunch of different targets to shoot at with out having some “stinking rules”, here Switchback is reading up on what is do be done with each target.  Some are only one shot targets, while others may have as many as 5 to be shot.  Scoring of each target varies as well, some full ball rules, some half ball rules and others a line break will score big points.  Remember the one with the highest score gets first pick of a prize off the donated prize blanket!  The one with the lowest score gets whatever is left on the blanket!  Everyone wins!

14BonesShootsThose aren’t very big targets from 20 yards back are they?  Gittem Bones!

15FiringLine

17HunterExplainsSightsToExplorer

18WapitisTarget

19NiceShooting

26EmilyShoots

Young and old alike, women and men, all compete on an equal basis.  We don’t discriminate and when it comes to handing out some heckling and harassment, if you give it out, expect to get some back!  If you can’t take it, keep your mouth shut!

3DryDogSaysHappyTimes

When we get together it is always meant to be a fun time and we have yet to fail in that regard.  By the time the end of the rendezvous comes around, I usually have a very sore throat from yelling and laughing and of course my trade mark side ache from all the hard laughing that has gone on for 3 or 4 days and nights.

16DaveHooperShootsBowThis year brought in a new twist as we allowed bowmen to shoot in the competition as well and their scoring was right with the rifle and pistol shooters.  They shot the same targets with the same scoring and with some targets they took their chances on ruining some very expensive arrows.

23HoopersAfter1

25HoopersAfter2

6WeaselRuins3ArrowsOUCH!  Arrows hitting 1/4 inch thick steel don’t have much of a chance to survive.

28LightedCandleShootHEY!  What am I seeing down range?  It looks like a candle in a can and it appears to be lit.

29CandleOutYO!  What happened to the flame?

30CandleOutWOW!  Good shooting!  That is a solid 10 point target right there!  Shoot at the flame, put a hole in the can and puff out the flame without hitting the wax of the candle!  Shooting like this will get you some good prizes for sure!  And if you only think something like this can only happen once in a great while, think again.  We had more puffed out candles at this rendezvous than not and that is saying something with 49 shooters competing against each other.  Check out this husband and wife team!

67BullsEyeAndTommyBoyPerfectShootingGreat shooting Bullseye and Tommy boy!

54SigningUpJust to clarify some things.  Here we have three guys signing up to compete in the shooting.  Not only do they sign up, they also sign a waiver of liability and they present to the Range Master their blanket prize.  Remember I said “everyone wins”, well every shooter brings to the table a gift, either hand crafted or purchased, that is worth around $20 and it must be in good “mixed company and mixed age” taste.  No competitive shooting without the prize.  This keeps everything above board and everyone is happy in the end.

53ShyMouseSignsUp

As the days of shooting go on, there is more and more happy times being had by all.  If you aren’t having any fun, it’s your own fault.

51SlickerMissesSilentThunderCheckTargets

57PuttingUpTargets

58GoodMornin

53FlyingFeathersShoots

It’s all about having fun!

55CheckingTargets

59TheFireingLine

At any shooting event like this someone is likely to have issues with their weapons.  Sometimes (and more often than you would think), you get to “BS’n” and forget to load powder into your rifle  and then you push down a patched round ball and have to go through some hoops to get the ball and patch out.  Well it can happen with pistols too.

31FatDuckShootsEMPTYPistolFat Duck was not very happy when I took this picture of him trying to shoot his pistol.  The caps are going off just fine, but the powder charge just won’t ignite and send the ball down range.  He is cussing something awful as 5 of the 6 cylinders have not fired.  He is ready to do with this pistol what he threatened to do on a limited entry buck deer hunt in the Crawfords several years back “IF I HAD A CRICK, I’D CHUCK THIS S.O.B. OF A GUN RIGHT IN IT”!  Well , he knows very well there is a crick right behind him at this range and he can make the toss from where he is right now.  But, let’s take the gun back to the loading area and check to see what the problem might be.

32EmptyCylendarYEP!  Just what I figured…it wasn’t loaded!  That is funny right there Fat Duck!

Let’s tally the scores judges!

72ScoringPackets

But you know, it isn’t all about the shooting anymore!

I’ve already told you about signing in for the shooting.  Well the Booshway (person in charge) and the Segundo (second in command) have been working very hard to get this rendezvous ready for this year.  Among the things needed and to provide everyone with a Memoir, a receipt for you is made and handed to you when you arrive, whether a visitor or a participant.

49PatMakesReciepts

If you attended this event and didn’t get a receipt for some reason, let me know and I’ll see if I can round you one up.  A lot of hard work and expense goes into making receipts and every year they are different!  Thanks for all the work on these Pat and the Gyllenskog family!  Nice job!

So, let’s think for a minute.  Shooting, kids activities, adult activities…let’s see some of those events!

Kids flint and steel starting event.  The winner of this will compete with the adult winner on Sunday night for a great prize.

37KidsFlintAndSteel

The adults usually have to help the kids get ready and encourage them to do their best.  But it is up to the kids to start the fire.

38Kids

40TryingToLightIt

41Determined

42TryingHard

43GavinWins

And once Gavin gets a good spark to land on his char, he produces a very nice counsel fire for the nights activities!

44NiceFire

During the day and as the shooters are down at the range, a bunch of things are going on back in the camp area.  However, I was down at the range and didn’t get to see the kids activities.  But I know there was face painting and bingo along with some other activities to keep them entertained, but once the “organized” kids things were done, the kids themselves were quick to find entertainment.

47CodyWithGavinsBeard

88KidsHavingFun

109KidsCatchingCrawfish

110KidsCheeringSection

111KidsTreeTrail

108TinyCrawfishThey caught some big crawfish as well, but I wasn’t quick enough to get pictures of them before they were turned loose.  One thing is for sure, kids can entertain themselves better than adults can for them.

Well, we did have an organized event for the kids all lined up…the “Young Peoples Lympics”!  These kids were broken up into teams of 4 to 5 and each team had to toss a frying pan for accuracy, start a fire and burn a string, drink up some root beer and a few other things.  The team with the fasted time to do all these things won a great prize for each team member.  Yours truly, Bears Butt, was set up to be the bar tender and dish out the root beer.

82BearsButtGivesInsturctions

82ChugChug

83StartingFire

84ReadySetGo

85MeasurePanToss

Again, it’s all about having fun!

During all of this, we constantly have visitors coming and going from the camp.  Some have been here as participants in the past and are now coming to visit with old friends because of other obligations that have kept them from coming to “play”, but they are all welcome.

73WannaPee3ForksWanna Pee and 3 Forks.

74HaagarrBrokenHaWKHagaarr and Broken Hawk.

75TwisterTwister.

77DancingRamrodDancing Ramrod (hurt his back while cleaning up for the rendezvous…some things are just not fair).

And as for some of the folks who may not have ever attending an event like this, our friends Bob Cat and Rose!  Welcome!

102BobCatAndRoseComeToVisitIt’s always nice to see new faces and hope those people return in the future to enjoy more of the activities.

Speaking of which, I was involved in the adult “Mountain Man Lympics” and so I did not get any pictures of that event, but as things have a way of happening, Bob Cat was on the winning team and won himself a nice gift certificate of $25!  I’m certain his involvement on his team will have him talking about it for years and years to come!  Good going!

Sunday morning, bright and early, Fat Duck pulled off his shotgun shoot, one which he coined “Angry Birds”.  His event had himself in harms way down range and hiding behind our POS trailer in order not to get splattered with shot.  In the meantime, the shooter was standing “in harms way” as well, as the birds were fired to come directly at the shooter.  I liked to think that the shot was in direct correlation to “self protection”…..

100DangAMissMISS!!!

99BustedBirdNice shot!

101NowThereIsASolidHitSmoked it!

Now on to the men and womens hawk throw (remember, real mountain men throw knives….they don’t always stick the knife, but they throw it very well).

102LadiesHawkTime

103NiceThrow

104AThrowAndBonesHasAStick

Look closely, as Bullseye is throwing, Bones (in the background) has her hawk firmely planted in the log!

104GettingReady

106WhoNeedsAHandle

107GuysTurn

105JudgesAddingScoresAnd when it’s all over, the judges add up the scores!  In this event, the women and men’s divisions are separated and for a good reason too, the ladies almost always out do the guys!

Well, we need an adult flint and steel fire starting contest!

91AdultFireStartingNow these guys are serious!  And who will compete against Gavin in tomorrow nights contest?  As it turns out Wapiti Dung will try his best at beating Gavin.  As I was still trying to get a flame from my attempt at this contest, Wapiti had finished, made his celebration and disappeared before I could grab my camera.

Good times, stories, lots of heckling and of course some old pictures are generally brought out and shared around the camp:

76OldPicturesThat looks like a “pick on the Dry Dog” picture.

Well, as you can quickly see, there are a lot of fun things happening at the rendezvous, but along with that, it does not come free.  There has to be some fund raising going on as well.  Raffle tickets are sold and the prizes are great.  Prizes for kids are separated from adult type prizes and when their names are called they generally get to pick from the lot of prizes.  This goes on until they are all gone.

87SellingRaffleTickets(Opps…I don’t have any pictures of the prizes!  Dang it!)

96KidsGetToChoose

112AcceptingPrizeWon

90BlanketPrizesThese prizes on the blanket are the gifts the shooters put down.  There are some prizes there that I KNOW cost more than $20 and to be the first one to choose it is not an easy thing to decide what to pick up.  Everything there is good.  I had my eye on a prize and lucky for me, when it was time for me to go up and pick up my prize, it was still there!  That is not always the case.

Most rendezvous going folks have a name they have earned in some way or other, to name a few in our group are No Grimace, Wapiti Dung, Tracker, Bones, Edjukateer, Weasel, Fat Duck, Flying Feathers, Winemaker, Explorer, Hunter, Dew Drop and the list goes on and on.  And as things came to be during this years rendezvous there was a new name given to one of the young members.  Cody Zundel, please come forward!

116CodyNamedSquirell“AND FROM NOW ON, WHERE EVER MOUNTAIN MEN SHALL MEET, YOU SHALL BE KNOWN AS ‘SQUIRREL'”!!!!

Well, the rendezvous comes and goes very quickly.  Maybe not so quickly for the Booshway and Segundo, but certainly for the rest of us.  This time last week I was busily getting ready for it, and now it’s over and my mind is quickly turning to the Muzzleloader deer hunt.

39FlagAndSharnesOur American Flag stands tall, our list of Willow Creek Free Trappers who have gone on ahead of us, waves proudly in the breeze.  Our Beaver Sharn stand protects the camp from evil doings and bids us good luck on all the events of the camp.

But it does come to an end and for Switchback and Natalie, you two did a wonderful job!  Thank you very much!

115AsTheSunSets

35BooshwayChair

Next year will be the charge of “Slicker and The Misses”!  We are here to help you guys in any way we can!

Bears Butt

September 2, 2014

 

 

 

Written on September 2nd, 2014 , Uncategorized

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BearsButt.com | Stories, Ramblings & Random Stuff From an Old Mountain Man

Just some of my old stories, new stories, and in general what is going on in my life.