Bambi's mom isn't dead...yet

Before anyone starts thinking I am a horrible person, let me explain my stance on hunting. I do not support "trophy hunting." Killing an animal just so you can mount it's head on the wall is not ok. Hunting exotic and endangered animals for their fur is not ok. But, hunting deer or other game animals with the intention of using the animal for food is totally acceptable. It is much more humane than most of the cattle and chicken farming that supplies grocery stores and that we walk in a buy with no thought as to how inhumanely the animals are treated. Deer meat is natural, no hormones or antibiotics, it is also healthy because it is so lean. That being said, we hunt (or at least my fiance does). His family has land in Mason, Texas which is one of the most highly populated deer counties in Texas. They have deer feeders set up in the fields and even have game cameras that take still photos all day of the deer at the feeders. They are very conscious of the population in the area, how many does and bucks there are, how many new fawn there are, etc. They are already concerned about the implications that this year's drought will have and decided to limit the number of deer that the family could shoot. It's quite refreshing to see that kind of concern considering that most people could really care less. All of the guys hunt, but they rarely actually shot anything. And most of them do not eat deer so they are unfortunately just hunting for horns. But, we take the meat for ourselves so it all works out. Our goal last week was to bring home three deer to stock the freezer, but it didn't happen. Brian missed once and then hit one on the last day, but wounded it and it got away. Wounding a deer is very upsetting to everyone, they do not want to see any animal suffer, so the whole group went out to try to track the deer down, no luck. If we can somehow find time to make it back down there before the hunting season ends (Dec. 30th) we will. But it looks like our freezer might stay empty until next fall. On another note, our "vacation" sucked. I was really sick for 2 days, our nice dinner out with no kids resulted in the owner of the restaurant (a woman) practically assaulting Brian (don't ask!) and I had no internet, even on my iPhone, for a week!!!! We did bring home BBQ from the best place in the world though and now I am going to go eat some!