Saturday marked the opening of Wisconsin’s nine-day gun season for deer hunting, and despite serious concern from hunters over last year’s poor numbers, business is a little better this time around. Hunters killed 106,404 deer over the weekend, marking an increase of 6 percent from 2009’s piss poor body count of only 100,330 deer. Get your sh*t together, Wisconsin deer!

But the big winner of Saturday’s opening was 16-year old Corissa Wege, who bagged herself three deer, including 13-, 10- and 8-pointers. According to Wisconsin Outdoor Fun (what, you don’t subscribe?), Wege called the experience “really cool” to which her boyfriend added, “Yes… cool… very cool. I can’t wait to be faithful for the rest of my life. I LOVE YOU, HONEY!”

Hey Wisconsin, only 100,000 deer? That seems pretty weak, ya sissies…

The DNR went into the 2010 hunt under intense pressure from hunters and state lawmakers to deliver a better hunt than last year. Hunters in 2009 killed only 241,862 deer, down about 30 percent from the year before and down 54 percent from 2000.

Hunters complained loudly last winter that the DNR has grossly overestimated the size of the herd for years. (Via Wisconsin Outdoor Fun)

It’s fun to imagine a large group of hunters screaming outside of the Department of Natural Resources office that they don’t have enough animals to kill. Mainly because they should be home preparing breakfast, brunch, lunch, linner, dinner, dinsnack, snack, and second dinner for their Wisconsin wives, lest they suffer the rage. By the way, I’m no hunting expert – I’m also no opponent of killing an animal for sport, I just prefer to kill them with a fork and eat them on the spot – but it just seems like killing hundreds of thousands of deer annually and then complaining that there are fewer the next year is just a little… odd. But don’t shoot the messenger. Especially you, Corissa.

And now for a story from the wild world of outdoors living: a former Marine camping in Wyoming defended his wife and two young children from a mountain lion attack… WITH A CHAINSAW!  Read this passage while I play air guitar:

Dustin Britton, a 32-year-old mechanic and ex-Marine [Ed Note: we prefer the term "former Marine"] from Windsor, Colo., said he was alone cutting firewood about 100 feet from his campsite in the Shoshone National Forest when he saw the lion staring at him from some bushes.

Britton revved his 18-inch chain saw and tried to back away. But the 100-pound lion followed. As the animal pounced, the 6-foot-tall, 170-pound Britton raised his saw and met it head-on – a collision he said felt like a grown man running right into him. “It batted me three or four times with its front paws and as quick as I hit it with that saw it just turned away,” he said.

Britton later discovered he’d inflicted a six- to eight-inch gash on the lion’s shoulder. He said he was surprised the damage wasn’t worse. “You would think if you hit an animal with a chain saw it would dig right in. I might as well have hit it with a hockey stick,” he said.

The starving lion was shot and killed after it killed a dog that was tracking it.  Authorities are making it clear that this is an exceptionally rare instance of a cougar attacking a man in the wild — they’re much more prevalent in night clubs after young men have been drinking — but you should still take your chainsaw with you wherever you go.  Ya know, just in case.

(thanks to Albert for the tip)

This is the newly-wed Rene Thompson of Louisville, Kentucky. She and her husband, Bruce, were married in Jamaica, and then the romance really started…with the first day of turkey season in East Tennessee.

After getting off the plane from Jamaica in Atlanta the couple didn’t even take the time to knock the sand from their shoes. They got in their car – where they had stashed guns, calls and camo – and drove to AEDC Wildlife Management Area. They slept in the car, then at daylight started hunting.

It wasn’t long before Bruce got a turkey to gobble. They put a decoy out and about 10 minutes after that Rene had a 17-pound jake with a 4-inch beard on the ground.

“Bruce would call and it would gobble and to be able to experience that was great,” she said.

What is it about women with guns that makes me want to run for my life? It’s bad enough that we let them drive and vote, amirite? I wonder what Bruce does to get himself a little personal guy time. Maybe goes to the mall with all his girlfriends and complain about how all his wife does is hunt. Guys don’t realize how good they have it sometimes. Especially when firearms are involved.

|Knoxville News Sentinel|

A Montana Missouri man who thought he had killed a deer while hunting was surprised to learn otherwise when the injured buck regained consciousness and attacked him.

Randy Goodman, 49, said he thought two well-placed shots with his .270-caliber rifle had killed the buck on Nov. 19. Goodman said the deer looked dead to him, but seconds later the nine-point, 240-pound animal came to life. The buck rose up, knocked Goodman down and attacked him with his antlers in what the veteran hunter called “15 seconds of hell.” The deer ran a short distance and went down, and died after Goodman fired two more shots.

Soon Goodman started feeling dizzy and noticed his vest was soaked in blood. So he reached his truck and drove to a hospital, where he received seven staples in his scalp and was treated for a slight concussion and bruises.

In a related story, “15 seconds of hell” is what my girlfriend calls sex with me.  It also explains the seven staples in my head.