Ben Rising - What a Year!

Last year Rising/Woods team had an awesome deer hunting season. This year it seems like if there wasn't for bad luck, I wouldn't have any luck at all this season. In order to fully explain all of our bad luck, I need to rewind a few months back to July. My wife Melody was going through a rough time with her back. After finally convincing her to go to the Dr., once she could barely walk, she had Xrays done. Here her left leg is slightly longer than her right which has made her lower spine twisted, vertebra are unaligned vertically and suffering from 2 herniated disks. So she started a long treatment to try and get better. She was desperate to get better not only just to be able to live a normal life again but also to be able to get into a tree by the end of Sept.

Shortly after starting her healing process, our oldest son Zach had an accident. Trying to help me at the mill, he took it upon himself to try and dislodge a piece of wood that was stuck in a conveyor belt. Needless to say, the belt caught his glove and pulled his arm in. He was stuck in the machine for 20 minutes while Jarod Hawkins, his family and my fellow coworkers desperately tried to get him dislodged from the machine. Once we finally got him out I was afraid of what would happen. Surprisingly, while stuck there was little blood, so I was afraid that it would start flowing uncontrollably once we was free. BUT it didn't even though he had a gash about 8" long all the way done to the bone and open about 4" across. After getting him to the hospital he ended up going into surgery for 2hrs to repair his arm. The Dr was completely amazed!! He had just missed his main nerve and artery and could not figure our how he managed to not severe either one. A week after surgery there was signs of infection starting. It was a long recovery for him also, but recover he did and soon started physical therapy to regain strength in his arm. His biggest concern at that point was whether or not he would be able to pull a bow back by the end of Sept.

So basically that is how our summer went. All vacations were canceled and we spent the rest of the summer focusing on getting Melody and Zach healed. Finally by the end of Sept Melody was feeling A LOT better and only needs to go in every so often for adjustments (though her spine is still twisted and unaligned and prob will forever be so) her herniated disks are healed and therefor the pain is gone as long as she stays on top of it. Zach finally ended therapy and has regained strength back from 10lbs to 43lbs of strength in his arm (FYI-he has 96lbs of strength in good arm). Needless to say he will NOT be pulling a bow back this year. But we are just grateful that he will be able to go at all and have use of his arm.

So with all that said and done, it is time for bow hunting season to start. As most know by now, I am partners in an outfitting business with Jarod Hawkins. We start full camp by mid October so that gives me until then to hunt and film on my own personal properties. I have had my sights on a certain buck but he has been completely unpredictable and nocturnal. I was hoping by 1st or 2nd week of Oct he would be showing up more in the daylight. But NO, we hit that Oct lull that everyone's been talking about. The days got shorter, but a whole lot warmer!! Now it seems he has completely disappeared. I haven't gotten a picture of him in over 2wks.

We have had several other nice bucks that we have been keeping an eye on, hoping that they would make it through the season and become some serious studs next year. Unfortunately, we have had calls saying that the bucks we've been watching were harvested by neighbors. One has been hit but not recovered yet. Hope he made it!! I have included a trail photo of one that was harvested that we really hoped would make it. These are deer that have traveled off of our properties and been harvested on by neighbors. One deer in particular that Jarod had been keeping an eye on, was hit on the road. What's a guy to do??

Now it's work time and our hunters started showing up. And let me tell you, it was rough for them too. We were still in that Oct lull when our outfitting started. I don't think Ive ever seen it this bad before. By our second week of outfitting, the bucks were finally on their feet. We had several guys have opportunity, but just didn't make it happen with one wounding a nice one but unable to recover it due to a bad hit. We are now in our 3rd week of outfitting and things are really picking up with several nice harvests. Two of my best buds Kenney Bevans and James Mugrave help us out along throughout the summer hanging stands and such, so they get to come out and hunt our outfitting properties. Kenney was able to harvest a really nice buck on Sunday. I have included a Kodak video of him with his buck.

So now we are keeping our fingers crossed and hustling like crazy to get our hunters deer. In the mean time, I will be guiding and hopefully getting a little free time to get out myself and Melody out and on film. Soon I am scheduled to head out to Iowa and Illinois, so maybe then my luck will change.

Until then I'm hoping the RISING lull will end soon and you will all hear from me soon!!

Ben Rising