I won a Kentucky deer hunt through Grizzly Tobacco last year and the place put 10 hunters on their properties to hunt, middle of November. They surveyed us the night we got there, I was late because of major flight delays and missed some stuff, but I ended up with a videographer and had to hunt with 1/2 the guys on a farm a little over an hour from the main property where we were staying. Got up at 4 am to get dressed and drive to the lodge to load up lunch and grab some breakfast, drove a little over an hour to get to the farm we were hunting on with one of the other winners that drove to the hunt. Each hunter was ferried to his stand or blind individually by guides, there were at least 10 other hunters, it was a lengthy process. I got some plastic elevated 2 man stand that had a couple crappy chairs in it, I grabbed the swivel office chair as the shooter, right plastic armrest was broken and made a lovely clunking noise if you leaned on it just right. Camera dude was an excellent person and had some very cool cameras, a Sony digital "camcorder" with night vision, and a bunch of GoPros, poor guy has a lot of pictures of me peeing, I offered to pitch in for some counseling, he graciously declined. We had to stay in the stand all day, no walking allowed, safety reasons, but, no explanation of terrain or deer routes either, OnX saved the day. We were not allowed to look for deer we shot, nor gut them. If they had to track a deer you shot, there would be additional fees. I was told before the hunt that my longest shot would be 200yds so that's where I was sighted in for with a 300 Win Mag, my stand was in the middle of a large corn stubble field and my longest shot was lasered at 485 yds, I have never shot that far in my life, phone service was good so I looked some stuff up for my loads and had a hail mary plan just in case. At some point the stand we were in must have blown over, the widows were filthy and had not been cleaned, it was snowing, windy and damp cold that first day, had to leave some of the windows shut, no heater in the stand. Videographer has never deer hunted before, all of his cases had velcro on them so we had that conversation, he was not dressed appropriately, I was pretty good, they loaded us up on a bunch of midweight Sitka gear as part of the prize and I was layered up appropriately, coffee and irish cream in my thermos stayed hot most of the day. They had the smallest percolator you could buy in the main kitchen and we had Keurigs in the cabins we stayed in, for some reason coffee was hard to come by, there had to be 25 trucks at the main lodge in the AM, a commercial coffee maker would have been nice.
Now, there were rules, minimum buck deer had to be 130"'s, I have no clue how to estimate inches on the hoof, anything less and there would be a fee, I assumed I would have to pay the fee, apparently this was not the case I learned on the last day. I saw at least 30-40 deer that first day, mostly does and fawns, one nice 6 pointer, videographer thought I should shoot it, I googled a 130" 6 pointer for him
Sun went down, got ferried back to the trucks, drove back to the lodge and got back at 8pm, grabbed dinner and went back to cabin, ate, showered, and hit the rack, same pattern for 4 days.
Next day, same stand, same deer, much warmer day though. We as a group had, and still have, a group text going and a couple deer were taken, 8 pointers, lots of bitching about nothing but squirrels, so I was glad to be seeing deer, good humor with the group overall though. A couple of the southern boys froze in their ladder stands that first day AND saw very little deer activity and shared their displeasure with management, that got us labeled the first day as "those Grizzly guys", my "guide" was a former cheesehead, he was a pretty good guy and appreciated my hunting since he knew what it was like "up North", I think he got an earful though. The main marketing guy for Grizzly was hunting with us also, awesome guy, he was feeling some frustration too and was trying to make the hunt good for all of us, we were getting the feeling we were getting the short end of the stick and the outfit was catering to their regulars. We had also seen some of the deer that got harvested at the main lodge and where we hunted, most of us had not even glimpsed a shooter buck per the outfit standards, I had not seen anything over 6 pts in 2 days. We got the stand shuffle after the weekend and the regulars went home, I think 1/2 the hunters were gone Monday AM, I got set up in a ground blind on a smaller stubble field, max 100 yd shots, and saw some good activity, again, no consultation about terrain or deer paths. I finally had a nice 8 pointer pop out onto the field I was on hard to my left, he walked away from me with his head down and I only glimpsed his rack, he was heading towards some corn on the ground and would have to turn to the right to feed, deer was walking the edge of the field and went left just as he passed a large tree, I had a shot but the 130" minimum was singing in my ear and I hesitated thinking he might come back for a bite, never saw him again. Videographer got some good footage thinking I was going to take a shot, turns out that was probably the biggest deer the group would see a 4 days, I still never got a good look, only had A Texas heart shot and I was not going to do that.
- C7EF0203-3C87-415F-BEF6-4C62423C5776.jpeg (5.73 MiB) Viewed 7164 times
A BIG problem the group had was the handling of the harvested deer. We saw deer getting hauled out at the farm we were on all weekend, none of the deer were gutted, when we got back to the trucks in the evening at the staging area, the deer were still not gutted. When we got back to the lodge, the deer shot around the lodge were also not gutted. The deer were piled on trailers or laying on the ground as a group but just randomly, no meat pole. To say that went over like a lead balloon was an understatement, to a tee we were all appalled by the poor handling of the meat and the poor respect for the bucks. One of the Georgia or Alabama boys shot one on the third day and got out of his stand and gutted the deer before the guide showed up, they started to give him a hard time and he informed them what we thought about their deer processing and they backed off, didn't hurt that he was about 6'2" and 250#, that further cemented our reputations as problem children with the employees.
- 5C8E4827-97C4-4797-ADE2-96D969470D79.jpeg (3.62 MiB) Viewed 7164 times
By the third day we were pretty disgruntled, this was rich horse guys operation with similar customers and we were hunt 10-20 days a year guys, we heard the third day they had laid out some of the bucks on the ground to spell out the initials of the place and took a picture with a drone, I did not see this myself. My videographer was exhausted by the 3rd day, he was uploading and editing until 1-2AM every day and wanted to sleep, he had more than enough video of me peeing apparently, I am sure there was some good footage of Mr. Happy peeing out of a ground blind window. I got moved to another farm on the last day that the Grizzly marketing guide harvested a nice buck on 120" on, we got to the staging area around noon and got on a side by side to go out to the stand, we were running trails on ridges, it was like a ride at Disney land, there were deer running to the right and left all of the way to the stands! I got settled in on a ladder stand on a hillside looking down the gulley at a creek bed, and it starts to rain. All you can hear is rain hitting the leaves on the ground, but the deer were chasing, and soon a 6 pt was chasing a doe past my left downhill, watched them for a bit and a couple of 8 pointers roll in along the creek bottom and also and a couple more does, very cool day watching them, no shooters though, and frankly, I was less than enthused about the staff processing my deer, part of the hunt was to get 50# of meat shipped back and any trophies. The guy I hunted with and drove with was from Georgia, by the evening of the last day he was feeling the pressure and kept seeing deer behind him but the would disappear in the terrain, he had to pee so he got out of the stand to do that and walked 20-30 yds behind his stand yo have a peak and a nice 8 pointer pops up, he took a standing shot and thinks he hit it, texts the guide and waits. They picked me up first at dusk and went to his stand, they asked where he was and where he shot the deer and proceeds to dress him down for getting out of the stand, a lot. That Georgia boy is as polite as they come and took it, the guide badgered him to the point that I was getting pissed off, I suggested we search for the deer and got him back on track. Long story short, nothing but a bit of belly hair, but it was raining off and on so hard to see blood or guts, but it was not everyones first rodeo, 5 guys looking and no deer was found, so no penalties assessed. Pretty sure none of the hunters than won the trip will ever darken their doorsteps again, even if they win the lottery.
- 967405B4-65AF-40D6-9755-E812A6A2B067.jpeg (3.11 MiB) Viewed 7164 times
I was appalled enough about the ungutted deer that I talked to my processor, he was pretty dumfounded. I spoke with my local Conservation Officer and he was helpful in that he had seen worse cases and we talked about wanton waste, he suggested I talk to his counterparts in Kentucky, which I did and they pretty much said oh well, if they eventually butchered them, they did not care.
So, as to the state of hunting, to each his own, it was a good hunt, but the lodge was really a non-factor in that I was barely there for the amenities, I never even saw the place in the daylight until the day I left, I wish I knew what the lay of the land was better and expectations, find out ahead of time what is going to happen to your deer after you shoot it, my first "guided' big game hunt, unless you count me trying to keep up with MHS and JBOhio in CO.
