Fawn-Killer Down!

TheGDog

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D14, went-in on some roads that went way in there, but at the beginning, at like 5:30a or so, a couple JackRabbit came running into the dirt road because of my headlights, so I said to myself, when I come back, I'm gonna try calling, cause figure if they are in there, then the yotes can't be far behind.

I'd guesstimate like around 5-7 minute mark. The terrain in that spot worked Primo for calling too because there were a few length-wise washes running thru it. So I caught a good glimpse of her as she bounded across one of those washes. So then I just put the Pocket Prey caller on my lap and brought up the rifle just as she's behind one of those pines. Was a great hit, but STILL the damn thing ran about 35yds or so. But that's Ok cause that lil 35gr Hornady NTX projectile made it easy to follow all the blood. And you know like when you see multiple good large bits of blood, all the anxiety goes away in regards to "Will I Find It?" The kind of blood where you straight up know they ain't gettin' far.

Aw dang it, it's saying the pics file size is too large. I 'll have to LoRes 'em some of em first or something, dang it.
20221002_133214.jpg
 
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TheGDog

TheGDog

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Gary, pics, or it never happened!
You KNOW I know that's the rule! Posting the pics via cellphone was being problematic. So I instead opted to post just one pic per post as a work around. Seems to do OK that way.
 
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TheGDog

TheGDog

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Hmmph... Oddly I can't get it to post up the pic of where I found it expired at. Pic taken by the SAME phone, so who knows what the dealio is.
 
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TheGDog

TheGDog

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That lil 35gr NTX whopped him but good! She bit at the wound and did a twirlie for like one turn... then behind her was a fallen burnt tree with like... I'd say 2.5ft pieces of limb still attached and sticking straight up. Damn thing LEAPED over those branches... then the run instinct kicked in. She ran like 10yds to this tall spindly bush and busted thru it, then hooked a left and then followed the lil wash. Was NOT hard blood-trailing her.

I'm shocked! that lil 35gr NTX took out a hole like silver-dollar size, thru the opposite side shoulder!
 
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TheGDog

TheGDog

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BTW... can somebody tell me what's "The Trick" to using a Tail-puller on a yote? MAN!!! I damn near hurt my shoulder from pulling soo freaking hard on that tool. It's ever so slowly making progress, but I ran out of light in the front yard, so put her back on ice til tomorrow.

The other yote I got before this one, the skin at the base of the tail was coming down decent from just pulling on the whole hide itself, but then as the vertebrae came to the smaller ones... the skin just ripped out and the bushy tail got left on the tip of the tail.

So I'm trying to make sure I'm being careful this time. And I'm trying to do it in such a way that I don't mess-up the tail like before. But DANG that tail is barely budging! Are they all always this hard to pull them off? Or is it just because of the healthier good size she was that it's being stubborn? Cause like as I was pulling on the thing, I was expecting any second the vertebrae themselves would rip apart! That's how hard I'm having to pull this dang thing!
 
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TheGDog

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Resized_20221002_132536.jpeg

it complained the orig fil was too large to upload, so I TXT'd it to myself since I knew it'd shrink it down a few.
 
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TheGDog

TheGDog

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Damn... was hoping you waxed em in 11 or 13. Good job.
Thanks Man!

No matter what I'm definitely gonna try going back out to this place after the deer season is over and do some more calling. It's frustrating as hell to go to new places and spend the whole day trying and absolutely nothing comes in. So this was a nice, much-needed success. And heck, if out there grows them all nice and big like this one, sign me up!
 
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BTW... can somebody tell me what's "The Trick" to using a Tail-puller on a yote? MAN!!! I damn near hurt my shoulder from pulling soo freaking hard on that tool. It's ever so slowly making progress, but I ran out of light in the front yard, so put her back on ice til tomorrow.

The other yote I got before this one, the skin at the base of the tail was coming down decent from just pulling on the whole hide itself, but then as the vertebrae came to the smaller ones... the skin just ripped out and the bushy tail got left on the tip of the tail.

So I'm trying to make sure I'm being careful this time. And I'm trying to do it in such a way that I don't mess-up the tail like before. But DANG that tail is barely budging! Are they all always this hard to pull them off? Or is it just because of the healthier good size she was that it's being stubborn? Cause like as I was pulling on the thing, I was expecting any second the vertebrae themselves would rip apart! That's how hard I'm having to pull this dang thing!
Skin it down a bit further with your knife, before you start pulling vs. just cutting around the base and starting too pull. Make sure you don't get hair stuck down in there or it can hold you up as well!
 
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TheGDog

TheGDog

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Skin it down a bit further with your knife, before you start pulling vs. just cutting around the base and starting too pull. Make sure you don't get hair stuck down in there or it can hold you up as well!
Thanks man. No, being careful to stop often and pull/peel the tube of the tail skin downward after some head way gets made. Trying to be real cautious to, at all costs, NOT rip that tail! I already caped the head skin off and everything. That daylight was gone and my shoulders and trapezius were sore, so I put her back in the YETI and have been swapping a 1 Gallon Grystal Geyser container with another from my freezer to keep it cool til I can get back to it again to work it even more to get the last half of the darn tail free and clear.

I was just so upset with myself the last time when I screwed up and didn't use a tail stripper and part of that tail got left behind. So really really trying to be patient with this one. But like, I gave myself a helluva neck-ache from all the extreme pulling and twisting I was trying to perform to make some headway on the damn thing.

The rule I've learned from working on Motos/Mechanical things is, if you're needing to use a lot of force, chances are you're doing it wrong or not using the right tool for the job, and will likely break something and cause yourself ten-fold more grief. As a young adult sat there and watched my idiot older brother time and time again snap the heads of bolts or strip out the heads on screws, etc. Always made note of that.. you know... what NOT to do! Hehe.
 

mcr-85

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BTW... can somebody tell me what's "The Trick" to using a Tail-puller on a yote? MAN!!! I damn near hurt my shoulder from pulling soo freaking hard on that tool. It's ever so slowly making progress, but I ran out of light in the front yard, so put her back on ice til tomorrow.

The other yote I got before this one, the skin at the base of the tail was coming down decent from just pulling on the whole hide itself, but then as the vertebrae came to the smaller ones... the skin just ripped out and the bushy tail got left on the tip of the tail.

So I'm trying to make sure I'm being careful this time. And I'm trying to do it in such a way that I don't mess-up the tail like before. But DANG that tail is barely budging! Are they all always this hard to pull them off? Or is it just because of the healthier good size she was that it's being stubborn? Cause like as I was pulling on the thing, I was expecting any second the vertebrae themselves would rip apart! That's how hard I'm having to pull this dang thing!
Skin them down a bit below the tail before you pull it. I have a clamp on tail puller that works ok but most the time I pinch the tail between two 60d nails and pull it down with those on coyotes. Works pretty slick for me. Don't forget to split the tail after you pull it.
 
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TheGDog

TheGDog

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Yeah, after like this first week of deer season, I'll unfreeze it, remove the last bit of tail and split.

Last year I bought a fleshing blade. Still need to re-purpose some wood from homemade bistro tables to make a fleshing board, so I'm not killing my back all leaned over doing it with the hide clipped to some Hardi-backer board, like I did before with my deer. All that hunched over makes ya sore, especially when you don't have an actual fleshing blade to easily scrap off the flesh of a large area at a time. Without the purpose built blade it takes quite a bit longer. More if when you skinned it you were n00b so you didn't know you should also be preoccupying yourself with trying not to leave muscle tissue behind on the hide. Because you didn't know how much extra work that'd take to scrape off later if you've already salted the hide because you feared hair slippage occurring soon because you harvested this animal in 90 F weather. And had to hike him 6 miles back out.
 

packer58

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Take a look at the PVC fleshing beams, I built one a few years back and love it. If I recall it’s 8”.
 
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TheGDog

TheGDog

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Take a look at the PVC fleshing beams, I built one a few years back and love it. If I recall it’s 8”.
BTW Thanks! I looked into those easy fleshing beams where like you said they just cutout a rounded-tipped section of a cut-in-half-lengthwise section of ABS or PVC. I agree it looks like the 8" tubing would work best. Then just attach to a 2x4 or 2x6 piece just long enough that you can lean it into your gut at a comfortable height to stand at while performing the fleshing.


I really like how that simple design makes it slim to store, so want need lotta space and can probably just keep it up in the rafters in the garage for storage.
 
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