Mr. Burns Joins the Merry Widows Club!

[Monty]

Since Monty has been away hunting he has not got his prospecting fix and is grumpy!? Things improved this morning and now Monty is OK again.? I have seen dozens of examples posted on the forum but this morning I found my first cap from a tin of Merry Widows!? Yes Sir, 3 Merry Widows, selected and tested, price $1.00!? I guess those things really use to be popular and I see them posted as found all over the U.S. of A.!? Amazing, but not really excellent.? Also found nineteen clad pennies, and 3 clad dimes, a dozen or so pull tabs, some lawnmower slaw and one golf cleat.? But I have a short story to tell of what else happened this morning.
? ?I arrived at my "hunted out" park just after daylight, wanting to work some paths that meander through the park.? I had been working these paths all last week and finding quite a bit of clad, a few wheats and a class ring.? I continued where I left off and noticed a large shadow come between me and the sun.? I glanced up and just saw the outline of a huge bird swooping down among the trees.? ? I thought, " Well, I wonder what kind of bird that was"?? (We have an eagles sanctuary not far away along the Arkansas River).? Thinking it might be an eagle gone astray, I tried to keep track of it out of my peripheral vision.? I didn't see it again for several minutes and soon paid it no mind as I continued detecting along one of the paths.? After about twenty minuets I heard this God awful screeching and chattering from a bunch of the local resident squirrels which caused me to look up.? I looked up just in time to see a huge white or light gray owl swoop down out of a tree and nab a full grown red squirrel off the? ground not 20 yds away!? Without so much as beating its wings the owl with the squirrel grasped in its talons swooped back up into the trees and on off to distant places!? The rest of the squirrels continued screaming and chattering for ten minutes after it had grabbed its prey and gone! Quite a sight!? All the time I have spent in the woods hunting and exploring I have never seen that!? ? I don't know what kind of an owl it was but it had a wing span of at least 5 feet and was a huge bird.? ? It wasn't an eagle and certainly not your garden variety old hoot owl we have around here.? Later I am? going to run a google search and see if I can identify it.? The first thing I thought of was a Great Northern Owl but we are not supposed to have any of those in this area.? Perhaps they migrate?? Beats me but excellent!? Monty

 

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[Ilovetodig]

Mr. Burns,

Could it have been a Great Horned Owl? I know that they are grey in color and grow to some very large sizes.

 

[vic910]

Glad to see you back at it Monty! Congrats on the finds! It's kinda awesome when you get to see nature at work. I saw the same thing last year in my backyard, only it was a big ole hawk that got the squirrel.

vicki

 

[kermit]

Nice, He have G-HO's in Kentucky from time to time. I spooked one off the ground one day while on my way to a treestand. The owl flew off with a snake in one of it's feet. The snake looked to be 4 or 5 foot long. It took it a minute to get off the ground. The snake was still moving.

 

[hollowpointred]

thats an AWESOME thing to see! experiences like that are a gift. you just don't get to see things like that very often.

 

[TXKajun]

WOW!!! What a great welcome back to THing!

BTW, did ya manage to bag anything while hunting

 

[lonewolfe]

LOL

cool find/s & story Jim!
HH

Loewolfe

 

[mchamby]

Nice nature walk for you Jim and a little change on the side, not a bad day. We have bard owls around here they are large but are tan to cream colored. I have run into them several times in the woods they just sit and look at you. I got a start from a partridge today while I was out detecting, he flew 10 foot infront of me but even with my head phones on the noise startled me. HH today was a good day to get out.
Mchamby

 

[Monty]

Great Horned Owl is what I was thinking but my fingers won't cooperate! Yes, I got a deer, posted under everything else. Got it the last morning of the last day! It was a gift from the hunting gods as two walked right up on me as I was building a shelter from the rain. (Forgot to take my rain gear as usual). I took the biggest one, a yearling doe who will be tasty in the cold months ahead. The other one was probably her twin sib, probably a button buck. It was real early and I couldn't tell for sure in the dim light. Monty

 

[bmanofnbc]

That must have been neat to see!
I was detecting at a school a while back and there was a huge hawk sitting on the monkey-bars until I got too close (maybe 25ft away) and it flew off. Very cool to see it that close though.

Do you make any deer jerky? Awesome stuff!

 

[SaintSea]

That's pretty special, Monty! I live/detect in Florida, so I'm often lucky enough to catch the sight of some pretty spectacular natural phenomena. I often remind myself to stop staring at the ground and pause to take in the beach, the birds, the sunset, the trees... There's all kinds of treasure around - you just have to keep looking!
Ruth

 

[stoney56]

Monty, don't always believe in what the Dept. of Wildlife says. They also way that there are no cottonmouths in the state. Ran across a 3 footer at the lake a couple of summers ago but decided not to try and capture it and take it to OKC as proof.

 

[Noodle]

Monty,
Glad to see another deer hunter on the forum! I've been trying to figure out how to take my MD to the field with me and not have the deer see me detecting. Our season opens Saturday. In the stand 6:30-9:30. Detect til 3:00. Eat. Back in the stand at 4:30. Down at dusk. What a great way to observe nature, read, and soak up some real peaceful environment. And Congrats on your "find"! Nothing better than them backstraps!

NOODLE

 

[AzSports]

Those Horned Owls don't migrate much at all, but why wouldn't they live in area?
Sounds more like a Snowy Owl, they do migrate (dont know about all the way to OK!) and the few I've seen seem to never be moving their wings. Neither one of those get much over 3 foot tip to tip.
Biggest ones are the Greys, could be over five feet, but I've only seen them in Northern MN and Canada!

Of course, you are near Texas, and those TEXAS owls.....

BTW, I always take my detector and pick hunting the Coues deer here in AZ. This year I'm hunting a Ridge along the Coronado trail, dreaming of Spanish Armour, but so far scouting has only found copper ore.

 

[Bavaria Mike]

Awesome experience! HH, Mike

 

[comfyinvermont]

Hey Monty, congrats on the tin. I have found at least two different types of the Merry Widows tins. The first is like yours, Price $1.00, but the second one actually names the three widows. Agnes, Mabel and Beckie. Now you know who they are. Lance

 

[rabajohn]

I had an owl go by in front of my deerstand one morning, being chased by a bluejay. The owl was awesome in that he never flapped his wings but sort of silently glided by in a straight line, eight or so feet off the ground and disappeared, with the bluejay still on his flank, into the woods. Another time, I was sitting in a three sided box stand which had no roof, just two side walls and a back wall. The side walls were at my chin level where I could slowly scan around for deer. I was doing so when a red hawk suddenly flew up and landed on the righthand sidewall next to my head. I stayed perfectly still and could watch him out of the corner of my eye. He was about 10-12 inches from my ear. I was surprised he did'nt hear my breathing or hear my heart pounding. He must have stayed their a full minute before he took off again. Afterward, I felt so blessed to have been that close to a hawk. Hope I did'nt bore you but I wanted to share it with you all. By thy way, I have never heard of those Merry Widows thingys. What are they?

 

[AzSports]

" By thy way, I have never heard of those Merry Widows thingys. What are they?"



You wearing a raincoat when in the bush? Fire your gun? Got kids?

 

[rabajohn]

Yo, Jonster!
Right after I posted my question, it struck me what they might be. Don't it always seem to work that way?

 

[trk5capt]

Monty, about 34yrs ago I too found a merry widows tin at the site of a German POW camp here at Charleston S.C. Being a Vietnam vet. myself, I had a good idea of what I had found, but just to check I asked my father a WW2 vet. but he was reluctant to spill the beans. I guess his generation was reluctant to speak of such things even with an adult son. In any event it is a part of our history that is seldom is discussed. Good hunting... trk5capt...