Big Woods Bucks:

The Magic Of November
After the leaves have fallen

By Hal Blood

The leaves have fallen leaving the trees standing like gray silhouettes. They will now lies dormant until spring will once again renew the forest. There is no sweeter smell to a deer hunter than that of those damp, rotting leaves. The smell comes to the woods only once a year and it coincides with the deer season. Stepping into the woods on the first day of deer season to that smell still gets my blood running as if it were my first time hunting. To me the stark gray of the hardwood trees against the brown leaves on the forest floor is even more picturesque than all the splendid colors of the fall foliage. 

With any luck the temperature will drop enough for that first snow to start covering the leaves and painting a whole new picture on the landscape. It is now primarily a black and white world with a splash of green from the conifer trees. It is a lonely place and almost a surreal world, but to a deer hunter it is home. It is a place where the hunter can escape from every care in the world and take comfort in the fact that he is once more able to pursue the majestic whitetail buck. The true deer hunter lives day-to-day all year waiting for fall to come so he can be in those woods. It does not matter whether it’s a damp, rainy day or a cold and snowy day, for the deer hunter is content just being part of the magic.

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