In day before yesterday, it was quite late again when I finally took my hunting gears and headed to north. Our hunting club has two distinct hunting areas, and I have almost always used the southern one. The norther one is more remote and includes many interesting fields for hunting wood pigeons. I haven’t realized how good hunting possibilities our hunting club offers for pigeon hunt, I really need to explore those areas also next year! For now, the grouse season is so close that I think I need concentrate on those birds 🙂 During the whole trip I walked 10 km altogether, wandered from field to field, through many forests. I tried to goggle pigeons, landed on ground to eat, but didn’t see anything. Instead, I managed to find spruces where the pigeons were sleeping. By sneaking I got many birds in the range of my shotgun, but because of the thickets it was impossible to spot them before they woke up and escaped. For many years, I haven’t practiced for shooting aerial or running targets with my shotgun, why I don’t want to take the risk of wounding animals. Although, I have shot many escaping animals, but it was long time ago when I practiced a lot. Thus, I didn’t catch anything during this trip, but it was really encouraging how close I got those pigeons, and now I know many new spots for pigeon hunting! Furthermore, and once again, even without any catch the trip was priceless. I joyed the loneliness by spending days and nights in nature, whistled with pygmy owls and heard how moose were rumbling around. I walked a lot with my home in my back, saw new places, and from time to time enjoyed fresh water during these late hot days. And as I got home, I took the hare ribs I’ve been marinating, and cook some delicious dinner 🙂 See the recipe in the end. Here are some photos from the weekend, enjoy!
The haunting moon arises in the sky.
A lot of fields, I need to benefit these better during next year.
Early marks of a wood pigeon.
During the night I whistled with a couple of pygmy owls, and one of them seemed to freak out 😀 Still, I didn’t got any photo, only saw this little bat(man) enough close.
Time to go to sleep.
Early morning in the darkness. Collecting some high resin wood.
A portable stove 😀 Let’s go!
More signs about wood pigeons. During nights and middle days they sleep in spruces and go to eat in fields.
This is what they are looking for.
This is one of the spruces in which the pigeons were sleeping. I managed to sneak under it and I knew there was pigeons, but didn’t see the hiding birds from this angle 😛 Then, they woke up and flew away.
This place is getting too urban.
Ahead to new adventures!
Phew, too hot to climb on this hill.
What is behind the corner?? Well, no pigeons at least 😛
Someone has dug a small ditch and exposed some interesting bones. I wonder, should I call to some archaeologist about these 😀
Wow, a lot of rowan berries! It looks like there isn’t going to be a white winter 😛
The end of the trip. This is an earlier photo about how much I got meat from the hare I shot.
After tenderizing the hare for a couple days in a freezer, I put the ribs in marinade for a couple of extra days. The marinade consist of soy sauce, beer, salt, red, white and black pepper, and rosemary. Then I melted some butter and quickly fried the ribs in a hot pan. After moving the meat in an oven pan, I sauteed some red onion and boiled cooking cream. Finally, I poured everything on the ribs, including chopped rutabaga, and put the lid on. I kept the ribs in the oven for two hours in 150 Celsius approximately (I needed to play with the temperature for getting the sauce to boil), and made the potato wedges simultaneously.
