Deer Season

It is the opening of the Wisconsin rifle Whitetail deer hunting season tomorrow morning. What that means is...no more daytime bicycling for over two weeks. It is sad that a person cannot be outdoors safely unless dressed in orange...and even then it's questionable. I would like to think that a person should be able to wear any color you want this time of the year even in the woods. It seems every year horses get shot, cows get shot and PEOPLE get shot. We do not look like deer. What is the problem? We do need to realize that accidents happen such as loading and unloading and falling out of stands, but purposely shooting at something that is not a deer I cannot understand. I could go on about deer drives and the mentality that they breed...such as brown is down???... and how some are just plain unsafe...but enough of that. I do hunt, although almost exclusively on our own land. If there is any week of the year that would be my least favorite...it is this one. Muzzle loader season is the week following and is getting just about as bad. Just one of the prices we pay to live in the country.

Now some Whitetail facts that I stole from our future daughter-in law Bobbi Jo. She knows a lot about outdoorsy nature stuff

Based on hunter reports, about one deer in 30,000 is an albino.-Melanistic deer are very dark sometimes even black and results from overproduction of pigment and is less common than albinism.-Albinism is a recessive trait and both parents must carry the gene before it can occur in their offspring.-The speed at which antlers grow, also makes them the fastest growing structures in the animal kingdom.-Largest body weight on record of a Whitetail deer is 511 pounds.-Recent Estimates put the Deer Population in the United States at around 30 million animals.-Deer do not have a gall bladder on their livers. This allows them to eat vegetation that would kill domestic animals.-A Whitetail has a top speed between 35 to 40 miles per hour.-Deer need 10 to 12 pounds of food per day to satisfy their needs.-In the early days of the American Frontier the skin of a male deer was worth a dollar--which is how we got the term "buck" for a $1 bill. -Saskatchewan, Canada has the largest White Tail Deer.-More than 1.4 million deer are believed to roam the state of Pennsylvania.-Tame deer will lick your hand, not only to get to know you, but to show affection.