Season Reports by Blood Brothers Outdoors

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2010-04-27T10:03:00.001-05:00

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Missouri Fly Fishing Trip

2010-04-26T09:49:00.001-05:00

I had a blast last week fly fishing with my dad and his good friend,
Jim Lund. Jim lives in Arkansas now since retiring from the police
department in Cadillac, Michigan, 10 years ago. He's a trout fanatic
if there ever was one. Jim was voted Orvis' #2 guide in the country
last year, a testament of his incredible knowledge and experience on
the river. My dad and Jim have fished together since I was a little
kid, and my dad has made an annual trip down to visit Jim and fish
each of the last 6 years. I went in 2005 and was finally able to get
back there this year. We fished a few different places in southern
Missouri, including the Roaring River and the tailwaters of the White
River. I landed a lot of fish over several days, my best being an 18"
4 pound rainbow. Happy spring everyone and thanks for the great trip,
dad!

Spring Is Upon Us

2010-03-24T23:24:00.001-05:00

I'm envious of a friend who went steelhead fishing today, while I
work away at the computer. But I guess I'll have my fun in another
month when I head to Arkansas with my dad for a week of flyfishing
with a good friend of ours.

I saw a big tom and three jakes out back yesterday morning, which is
a great sign since it's been a couple years since I've had turkeys
around my place. My four year old son, Jacob, will be tagging along
with me this spring as he hopefully gets to watch "daddy pow a turkey!"

Am heading to the woods this weekend to scout a couple whitetail spots here in
Michigan. One is a private piece that should be pretty good, and
another is a public chunk I've been wanting to get a good look at for
a while. It's nice to have daylight to play around outside now after
a long day at the computer. Hope ya'll can get outdoors and enjoy
what spring provides us!

Deer & Turkey Multi-tasking

2010-03-24T17:45:00.002-05:00

I've drawn the first week in May for my turkey tag. The landscape is turning green as I look over my choice of camo clothes to select something to match. Rummaging through my "hunting" closet I pull out stuff I'll need while chasing turkeys, and it seems strange to leave my portable treestand behind. The treestand was a fixture of the gear I carried with me from September to January last bow season while deer hunting. It'll feel weird to be wearing the camo and toting a weapon without that stand on my back, I thought.

It's time to get into a turkey hunting mindset of "runnin and gunnin gobblers", at least for the next five days. Bow season for deer is four months away, surely I can put that out of my mind to concentrate on gobblers for now. I finish gathering up the remainder of my turkey hunting gear so I'll be ready to go for opening day. Shortly after sundown I slip out to locate a gobbler on the roost, and get multiple responses to my owl call. Opening morning finds me set up within 125 yards of the gobblers I roosted nine hours ago. I make a little hen talk in the pre-dawn darkness and get gobbled at by three different toms. Oh boy, game on! The toms kept talking without me having to call anymore so I kept quiet and waited for daylight, expecting them to fly down into my lap. About 20 minutes after first light the toms all flew down into my neighbors field and taunted me by gobbling every couple minutes. My calling to them was ignored and after a while they walked further away in the direction of a real hen.

I didn't have permission to hunt there, and by now my neighbor, Ed would be on his way to work. I backed out of my position and drove to where Ed works to ask him if I could go after the toms on his place. After catching up with Ed I tell him the situation and ask if I can go after them on his property, he laughs and says, "sure, go get em, but why come all this way to ask? You don't think I'd ask you permission if I saw a big buck on your place and you weren't around, do you"? I tried not to look shocked by his statement, after all, he did just give me the OK to turkey hunt his land. I bit my tongue, and managed to thank him, while thinking, Ed and I are going to have to have a talk, later.

So it's back to the chase at Eds' place and I'm trying to close the distance on the toms who are now in the woods, gobbling occasionally. Cautiously advancing, I carefully examine the woods ahead of me for a red, white or blue gobbler head. I don't see any gobblers but I do get distracted by a buck rub on a ten inch diameter white pine. A short distance along my path another half dozen rubs appear on similar sized pines and by now I've forgotten about turkeys. Continuing on I discover large buck tracks, scrapes, and more rubs, it was all too much to ignore. Out of habit, I began looking for spots where I would have set up a tree stand but didn't notice any sign of Ed having done so. Since this was hilly country I suspected the buck would be bedding higher in elevation so I started climbing uphill to see if I could locate his bedding area. Half way up the hill a gobble rang out, not far away, it reminded me of why I was in these woods and I quickly sat down at the base of a large ash tree. I made some hen talk on my box call and set it down. Resting my shotgun on my knees, I waited for a tom to show himself. After fifteen minutes I called again but got no gobbler to answer. I remained still and pondered the recent events, big buck sign found and turkeys still active had me thoroughly enjoying my morning hunt. I decided to wait another fifteen minutes before moving on. Sitting there I thought about how turkey hunting and deer scouting is the only multi-tasking I've ever been able to do. The combination has revealed some good deer hunting spots for me in the past, it's no wonder why the more I turkey hunt the more I like it. Suddenly one thing became very clear, Ed and I would definitely have to have a talk. As I pondered how the talk might unfold, a blue head appeared from behind a deadfall, a minute later I was wrapping my tag around that gobblers' leg.

ATA Show 2010

2010-01-18T08:31:00.001-06:00

I just returned from a week at the ATA show in Columbus, Ohio. I was
there with Mountain Mike's Reproductions, a client of mine with my
business, Erdody Studios. I recently finished some cool new packaging
for Mike's new line of elk skulls. All his products received much
praise and you'll be seeing them in about every major retailer this
coming year.

I also walked around the show and met some great new people and saw
some really cool products. I couldn't resist picking up a new bow by
Nxt Generation for my little guy, Jacob as he turns 4 this month!
He'll be tagging along with me on hunts real soon.

I shot new bows by Fred Bear, Darton, and Ben Pearson. I was most
impressed with the new Fred Bear model, but they were all good and
I'll admit I didn't have time to check out all the new ones from the
other companies.

Some other great products I saw were the new 10-foot Hooyman saw
(love these!), Blind Ambitions Bale Blinds (hi to the Noll's!), a new
camera built into eyeglasses (can't recall the name), and Buck Bomb's
new Scrape Tape (Joe Gizdic helped them with this). Also some great
stuff for the kids from Hunter Dan and also from Nxt Generation
(already mentioned).

Iowa Late Season - Hot Action in COLD Temps!

2010-01-07T18:48:00.003-06:00

I certainly took it down to the wire this year, but gladly put my tag
on this buck in Iowa on Sunday evening. I honestly thought he was
larger than he is....it's the smallest bodied buck I've ever shot.
Nice head on him, but extremely rutted out. A 4 year old. Live weight
was 170 was all! He's got very short beams....17" and 19.5". But his
tines make up for it. He still goes 155.25".

(click on the pictures to see them larger)

Here's a video clip of the buck from earlier this fall before
he had broke off his split G3 on his left and a couple inches off his
left main beam. Probably would've hit 160 un-broken.

Brother John Scores Again - UP Swamp Buck Down!

2009-11-19T11:05:00.000-06:00

My brother John killed an old UP (Upper Peninsula of Michigan) buck on Opening Day (November 15th) on his own 40 acres. This was John's first buck off his own property, a cool, proud moment. As you can see, antler genetics are very poor around there, but the buck obviously has a few years on him at least. Great job again John, keep em fallin'!!

Hill Country and Marsh Bucks in One Season

2009-11-09T23:11:00.005-06:00

It's almost as if my 2009 archery season was scripted by the Blood Brothers DVD series this year, and it certainly played out that way.

Minnesota Public Land Marsh Buck

It was an odd whitetail season to start for me when for the first time I found myself in a tree stand on opening day in Minnesota rather than Wisconsin. Typically Minnesota and Wisconsin have the same opening day for archery season and I normally head for Wisconsin private hunting grounds but this year the Minnesota season opened a week later and I was going to give it a try.

As I normally do in August I spent many of my evenings driving near a large tract of public land and glassing bucks crossing into bean fields at dusk. By late August I had a young buck I estimated would score 110" patterned and was torn on whether I should hunt him on opening day or push further into the marsh into a proven spot and hope a mature buck would be bedding there. I had been seeing a few bigger deer but had nothing located on such a consistent pattern. I knew that the young buck would not hold his pattern longer than a day or two as he was in an easy to access spot and hunting pressure would quickly change his routine. I decided I would be holding out for a bigger buck this year and on opening day pushed into the big marsh for a long afternoon sit. The spot I was setup in is a very tricky spot to access without kicking deer out and requires a slow entry and the final approach is on your hands and knees so that bedded bucks in the grass cannot see me. I setup in a small cluster of oak trees that conceals my setup and offers good shooting opportunities.

The sit began with a doe busting me as she walked right up to my tree and smelled my climbing sticks. I quickly began to wonder if I had made a mistake and should have setup on the younger buck which I felt was the sure hunt. A couple hours later and I couldn't believe my eyes as I saw what looked to be a wide set of antlers in the grassy bedding area. I started rolling on my camera and capturing some video of the buck. I knew he looked good at a distance but could not immediately determine if he was a shooter or not.

Video still of the buck standing in his bed

After a long stretch and many directional wind checks by the buck he finally walked out of his bed and started making his way towards my stand to feed on some acorns. I lost sight of him for what seemed like 5 minutes in the tall grass. I gave out a few small grunts and soon heard his antlers coming through the grass. Once I saw his body I knew he was a 3 and 1/2 year old buck and was going to take him. He stopped and gave me plenty of time to range him at 23 yards and anchor my pin behind his shoulder. My arrow found it's mark and the buck took a couple bounds then stood looking around and quickly tipped right over only 15 yards from where I had shot him. I had just killed my best Minnesota buck on highly pressured public ground on opening day. The bucks dressed weight was 180 lbs on the button and his antlers have an inside spread of 17 3/4" and 4" bases. I can attribute my hunting tactics to taking this buck to my friend Dan Infalt who has shared so many strategies for killing these mature marsh bucks.

Opening Day Minnesota Harvest

A Wisconsin Hill Country Slob

A week after my Minnesota hunt I spent some time with a new bowhunter and friend getting him started on a new property we had gained access to in South Eastern Minnesota. I spent the weekend filming but my mind was already drifting to the hills of Western Wisconsin and what the season had in store for me there. The private property I am hunting this year in Wisconsin is a brand new property for me and I had gained access late in the summer so I was not able to do any scouting prior to the season. I had however spent many hours dissecting topography maps and aerial photos to determine likely spots for a successful hunt in hill country.

On October 24 I setup on a finger into a coulee with trails crossing 3/4 of the way up on either side of me and a logging road cutting across the finger below me. I felt good about the wind direction and spot I had chosen but the evening hunt produced no deer sightings. I left my stand set for the night and snuck back in again in the morning. At about 8:00am I grunted in a 2 and 1/2 year old 10 point buck that was extremely difficult to pass up. He had fair mass, good spread, but he wasn't what I was waiting for. At noon I called my wife to discuss the great encounter I had that morning and she gave me a little grief for passing a "10 point buck".

It was my last hunt for the weekend on the evening of October 25 and I decided to freelance another new spot further west on our property. To my dismay I entered an open hardwoods where I could see hundreds of yards both east and west. I walked down a finger to a shelf where the landscape dove off sharply below. This shelf had many deer trails cutting across it but the most intriguing aspect was the dozens of fresh rubs on nearly all of the trees and good diameter trees to boot. I picked a leaning tree above the trails on the shelf and setup for the evening. I felt that if I wanted to see bucks in this open mature woods I would need to do some calling this evening. I had never had any great luck rattling before other than a few small bucks and even a doe, but I always try it on ground where pressure is lighter. About an hour and a half before quitting time I grabbed my antlers and simulated an engaged buck fight for 30 seconds or more. It wasn't 3 minutes after I hung up the antlers and I spotted a large buck making his way towards me with an intent pace. When he got below my stand I knew quickly that he was an older mature buck and came to full draw. At 11 yards I let my arrow fly and made a perfect double lung shot. The buck ran about 100 yards and expired. The bucks dressed weight was 204 lbs and his antlers have an inside spread of 18 7/8".

2009 Hill Country Wisconsin Buck

Brother John Scores in Colorado

2009-11-09T18:19:00.001-06:00

My brother John recently shot this nice mule deer buck in Colorado.
This was a do it yourself, public land hunt. Congrats John on a great
buck!!!

My Dad Scores in Iowa

2009-11-09T10:38:00.004-06:00

What a thrill to watch my dad kill his best buck of his life (by
far!) ...the video footage turned out awesome too! :o) 145.5" as a
9pt. 185 lbs dressed. 4.5 year old. 13 yard double lung shot.

It was the third morning of our hunt. Despite the 70+ degree weather,
we stuck it out and this guy responded to my rattling and my dad's
grunt calling at about 8am. We saw some super bucks and had a great
time.

(click the pictures to view larger)

South Dakota Mulies

2009-10-15T11:11:00.001-05:00

Chad Schilling fishes the pro walleye circuits with my son Tom, and the two of them have become good friends. I pre-fish those tournaments with my son and sometimes go out in Chads' boat also. Chad is from South Dakota and runs a guiding service for walleye fishermen and pheasant, antelope, and deer hunters. When I'm in Chads' boat the conversation always gravitates to hunting stories. This past summer Chad invited me to come out bowhunting for whitetails or mulies. Chad said he would point the way to some good public ground and cut me loose to do some spot and stalk hunting on good bucks he had been seeing. He also offered to film me when he had some free time.
My heart was set on a decent mule deer so I jumped in to the spots Chad recommended and did the glassing routine until I spotted a good mulie buck. Once a buck was spotted I'd start a stalk that may cover a mile or better to close the distance. There are no trees and very little ground cover so stalking by staying low and using the topography to keep out of the bucks line of sight by walking in valleys or the back side of ridges was a must.
My first stalk resulting in a shot had me on the top of a rise with two mulies in the valley below, feeding. My rangefinder said 55 yards but I thought it was a little farther so I aimed just over the bucks back and that's where my arrow went. I should have believed the rangefinder. It was disappointing to make a good stalk and then blow the shot, but I was hooked on this type of hunting regardless. It's a blast to be slipping in on a buck instead of waiting for one to come to you.
After screwing up on a few other chances, due to being smelled and heard before I could draw the bow, I got another chance. Chad was with me to film and glass, and spotted a good buck about a mile away. It was 8 AM and we started off after the heavy racked 3 X 3. There was a smaller 4 X 4 with him when we slipped to within 150 yards. The rest of the stalk would be on our bellies to get within 60 yards. A deep cut valley seperated us from the ridge the bucks were on. At 75 yards Chad began filming while I crawled closer, to get behind a rock that could provide a little cover. When I got to the rock I peeked over it and ranged the distance to the bucks, 60 yards. I sat up and drew as the bucks stared in my direction. My shot was low and the bucks took off. Another blown opportunity but the thrill of the stalk outweighed any disappointment.
Chad and I did get up close to a band of mulies the next day but the only shot I had was a 20 yarder as the buck faced me, not an acceptable angle. I stood there at full draw as he whirled and split at high speed.
This spot and stalk hunting on the wide open prairie is in my blood now, I will be back.

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Minnesota Bear Hunt 2009

2009-09-08T20:58:00.001-05:00

Here are some pictures from Dan's and my recent bear hunt to northern
Minnesota. This is an incredible wilderness experience, do-it-
yourself all the way. Dan and I each killed smaller bears than we'd
hoped to, but we had a great time. Look for a detailed video in the
future about how we go about planning and executing a do it yourself bear hunt such as this.

View of one of the rivers we hunted near

Bear Camp, Sweet Bear Camp

Maybe this was or wasn't the bear I shot, but this was a pic from the day before I sat this spot:

My First Bear

Clip of a bear Dan passed the first evening

We nicknamed this one Bart the Bear from the movie The Great Outdoors....an absolute SLOB!

Here's a nice bear that was hitting in daylight about a week before the opener

Another nice one in daylight from that same spot

Whitetail Addictions Volumes 4 and 5 Available Now

2009-08-19T16:46:00.001-05:00

We now have in stock and are shipping Volumes 4 and 5 of Whitetail Addictions. These are the DVDs of the television episodes from 2008. Order yours today in our store

Baiting Run to Minnesota

2009-08-19T11:04:00.001-05:00

Dan and I met up in northeast Minnesota over the weekend to find a
few more spots and start baiting for our bear hunt which opens on the
first of September. It was a whirl-wind weekend of many miles and
plenty of rain, but the stage is set. Hopefully the bears find our
baits and the other hunters don't. We ought to have some cool trail
cam pictures and videos waiting if that happens. This is a do it
yourself hunt in some major wilderness....just like we like it!
Special thanks to Eddie for tagging along on the road trip and
helping me with the baits and driving...I owe ya man!

Big Buck Contest Sign-up!

2009-08-11T20:14:00.000-05:00

Don't forget to sign up for our big buck contest this year. Just make
a quick reply in our contest thread by September 12th:

http://www.bloodbro.com/messageboard/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=7524

We have some great prizes and more are being added. You could win a
Nova Scotia bear hunt, a trophy deer hunt in Illinois, and more!

Iowa Non-Resident Deer Drawing Results

2009-07-20T07:52:00.002-05:00

The results are in and my dad and I each drew our tag! My dad will be
bowhunting and I'll be filming for him. My tag is for late
muzzleloader season. We're looking forward to chasing some Iowa slobs
this fall. Check your Iowa non-resident deer tag lottery results.

Newest Blood "Sister" - Jordyn Erdody, Born July 8th!

2009-07-10T13:34:00.003-05:00

My wife gave birth to our new baby girl, Jordyn Alice Erdody, on Wednesday
late afternoon. Both are doing well now, though it was a rough day. We're
bringing her home Friday. She was 8 pounds, 11 ounces, 22-inches long.

Baby #3 Coming Soon!

2009-07-08T11:59:00.000-05:00

Just a quick update from here at the hospital. Jennie went into labor this
morning about 1am. It's been a long night and morning...we're hoping to
announce our new little one later today.

Summer Re-Roofing Project

2009-06-26T09:15:00.000-05:00

Summer is time for getting big projects done before you-know-what
arrives in the fall. I don't know how I suckered Lee into this, but I
got him to share his roofing expertise with me as we re-roofed my
house in June. We were stuck with the hottest week of the summer and
had to work through the night, but we got it done. We both agreed we
know what we WON'T be missing come November while we're sitting in a
cold treestand! Thanks again, Lee.

Planning a Father-Son Iowa Bowhunt

2009-06-13T09:33:00.001-05:00

It won't be long and I'll find out, hopefully just verify, that my
dad drew his Iowa bow tag this year. My brother and I have applied
for him the past couple years, knowing it wasn't something he'd do on
his own but if/when he drew a tag he'd "probably" find a way to get
excited and go. Well, I scouted a good spot this spring for him. I'll
be muzzleloader hunting it this winter, but I'm taking a week to
bring my dad out there this November for a week to get first crack
and bowhunt it. I'm really looking forward to this trip with my dad
and will hopefully film him taking his best buck ever. It's been
several years since my dad and I went on a hunting trip together and
I'm vowing to make more time for that despite my fanatical approach
to hunting (versus my dad's laid back approach).

This is a farm that's on the small side. It'll be a good one for our
upcoming Farm Country video that's in the works. Most of us don't
have the luxury of 600+ acre farms, but we all know the great
potential in Iowa. I don't plan on running my dad all over the
country, which is why a rut hunt where the bucks are on the move and
my dad can hunt fewer spots should be great. I'll post more in the
coming months as we find out if he draws and then go scout some
summer velvet bucks.

Fawns a Droppin'

2009-06-13T09:25:00.001-05:00

My brother John found these two little ones just off his yard the
other day.

Scott Scores on His 1st Turkey

2009-05-17T08:23:00.005-05:00

My hunting buddy Dave asked me to call and film for his Bro-in-law, Scott... Worked hard for almost 15 minutes today!

We were running and gunning and covered a 200 yard farm in 15 minutes trying to provoke a gobble. We stopped in a little clear area in the woods near a field where I have seen Toms the last couple evenings.... I called from a standing position with Dave and Scott standing behind me and plenty of trees if we got a gobble... I yelped loud with a box call several times to shock a gobble and got nothing... All the sudden Dave whispers "don't move he is coming right at us... I am like "where" he says 2:00 so I just move my eyes and the tom is walking fast right at us from 60 yards closing the gap in a wide open mature woods.
I whispered as soon as he gets behind the tree when I drop you guys drop... We all dropped as the bird went behind a tree at about 50 yards.

Scott is a 1st time turkey hunter and was really nervous. When we dropped we had a slight dip to hide in behind a small downed tree with no back drop.We just waited with no turkey showing after a minute or so... I slipped out a light yelp and got a gobble... I waited about 15 seconds and hit a yelp again and he hammered back from 40 yards and went into strut and now I could see him again. As soon as he fully came into view he spotted us trying to hide behind the "branch".

He putted and I told Scott to shoot. He said "I don't have a shot" and the bird turned and started to look flighty so I said just rise up and shoot him. Bam. Dropped him in his tracks. He was very excited and I was very happy to be there for his 1st bird, 1st hunt ever. He will never forget... Especially with footage to show off of his hunt.

Dome Scores a Tom on his Son's First Hunt

2009-04-21T14:10:00.001-05:00

Ya'll may recall my friend Dan Desrosiers (aka Dome) from his giant
208" booner he killed a couple years ago (highlighted in our Hill
Country Video too!). Well, Dan shared a cool story this morning of
his son Ben's first turkey hunt yesterday evening. Ben will be 4
years old this November and accompanied Dome to the woods on
Michigan's turkey opener. Thirty minutes into the hunt, Dome had
called two nice toms in but they hung up. An excited Ben kept
whispering, "Shoot em Dad!" but Dome knew they were just out of
range. He started getting aggressive with a diaphragm call and got a
gobbler in the woods behind him to respond. This brought the two toms
in on a string and Dome blasted the bigger of the two at 20 yards.
Ben urged his daddy to "shoot the other one!" but Dome held off. It
was a short but sweet turkey season for Dan and his son, one they'll
always remember. It will take many more hunts to convince Ben that
turkey hunting isn't always that easy.

Backyard Burn Almost Gets Away!

2009-03-31T08:39:00.000-05:00

This is usually the type of story I expect from Infalt.... I was
burning some garbage Saturday while doing some spring cleaning in the
yard and a gust of wind threw some flames into my switchgrass.
Fortunately, the east wind blew it towards my yard and woods instead
of out into the field so it died down at the transition and I got it
out with the water hose before the firemen had to lend a hand. It
doesn't look that bad in the picture but the flames were higher than
that small pine tree! I was very fortunate it didn't end up worse
than it did.

Morning Steelhead Fishing on the Grand River

2009-03-31T08:34:00.001-05:00

Well, no fish pictures to show, but here are a few scenic shots from
a morning fishing outing with my friend Eddie Stanton as we attempted
to catch some steelhead in the Grand River below the dam in downtown
Grand Rapids. All we caught was one 5 pound sucker each...makes me
want to go scout for deer.