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 Please stop in at the forum and leave a message. I like to find out who's been by the camp and where they're from. At this forum you can discuss anything you want, reply to a message someone left, post a recipe, story, hunting/fishing tip, or boast about your hunting season. 

06/07/01 UPDATE: 
All the broken picture links on the West trial page have been fixed - enjoy!
I removed the mini-poll, it looks like the Martinsen Camp photo is authentic.
Fixed the broken links on the East, West, and North Trail pages. Should be able to navigate much better.
Don't forget to leave a message at the forum.

New Bois Brule Camp /  Hanson Buck / Rompola Buck / Beatty Buck
Double Beam Shed / Troubleshooting Beer Problems / Hunting Links / Hunting Stories

Welcome To The Bois Brule Deer Camp!

What a man does in camp is little different from what he did 100 years ago: hunt deer, swap lies, eat hearty food, play cards, smoke cheap cigars, enjoy the company of his friends, and bask in the romance of it all.

Camps come in all shapes and sizes. The building doesn't much matter; nor the hunting success. What counts are the company and the commitment to return - from year to year, from generation to generation.

The companionship, the food, the respite from day-to-day jobs, the cards games, the story telling, and a million other happenings in our camp are very important. There are rules concerning how the sleeping quarters are doled out, where everyone sits at the table, who washes the dishes, who hauls in the firewood, and who captains the hunt. In addition to our state laws, our camp has its own extremely rigid rules of etiquette, such as who shoots first when two hunters spot the same buck, and how the meat is shared if only a few hunters score. To violate any of the camp rules is unthinkable, and those who do so are quietly drummed out. A deer camp is a powerful common denominator.

Check out the links below for camp history, the Hanson buck, the Rompola buck, links to other hunting sites, new camp photos, old camp photos, past hunting seasons, sheds and more.

NOTE: There are over 70 pictures so some pages may be slow in loading. Also, alot of pictures are thumbnails, so click on the image for a larger version.

NEW BOIS BRULE CAMP

Summer 1999
It was time to build a new camp. Most of us have gotten a little fatter, our little kids are now young adults, some are married with future hunters, and some say they will never get married. Any how, it was time to replace the old camp.

HANSON BUCK

This buck was taken in 1993 by Milo Hanson in Saskatchewan Canada and is now the World Record. 

THE ROMPOLA BUCK

Detroit Free Press
January 13, 2000

CANADIAN farmer Milo Hanson tried to come up with a reasonable explanation as to why Traverse City hunter Mitch Rompola signed a legal agreement that he no longer would claim to have killed the world-record whitetail deer.

"I don't know why he would sign that agreement unless the deer is a fake," Hanson, the real record-holder, said Wednesday. "I know I would never have signed something like that. If it was me, I'd have just sent my $25 in to Boone & Crockett, had the deer entered in the books, and been done with it."

By signing the agreement, Rompola staved off a threatened lawsuit by Hanson and his partner, Arkansas businessman John Butler, who say their earnings from Hanson's record buck have been compromised by Rompola's unsubstantiated claims.

It was Nov. 13, 1998, when Rompola killed in Grand Traverse County what he later said was a deer that scored 216 5/8 on the Boone & Crockett scale, three inches bigger than the Boone & Crockett-record whitetail Hanson killed in Saskatchewan five years earlier.

A reporter for Rompola's hometown paper, the Traverse City Record Eagle, and I were the first to report it a few days later, and when hunters around the country learned of the claim through those newspapers' Internet web sites, the explosion of interest was incredible.

And therein lies the real root of Rompola's problem: He just never realized how big this thing was going to be.

Rompola dumbfounded the hunting world by announcing that he was angry at B&C and wasn't going to enter the deer in the books. During the ensuing months, he also claimed that four scorers flew into the state to measure the deer secretly, then dropped that claim and had it scored by three Michigan measurers, who said it indeed surpassed Hanson's record.

But they only saw the rack mounted, and Rompola refused to allow it to be X-rayed, although by then several experts were saying it was a fake, cobbled together from bits of other racks or plastic resins. And Rompola still didn't submit to Boone & Crockett.

He continued to make bizarre and contradictory statements and refused to talk to reporters. But while he suddenly announced that he never claimed it was a world record (a statement that wasn't true), he still said it outscored Hanson's deer by three inches, and the photo of "the Rompola Buck" was being used to sell everything from bows to deer scents.

Hanson wasn't going to do anything about Rompola's claims until the next B&C panel scoring in 2001, when the top deer from the previous three years will be measured and officially accepted as records.

"I thought he might be waiting until the panel score, and then was going to come forward and say, 'Here's the world record,' so I was going to kind of wait and see," Hanson said.

But Hanson's beautiful whitetail mount earns a fair amount of money for him and Butler through outdoors shows, reproductions, caps and the like. Butler became upset when Rompola's claims started to affect them financially.

"Some shows were kind of reluctant to book us," Hanson said. "They said they figured the Rompola buck would be coming down the road pretty soon. And we had just come out with nice prints of our deer, and here they were selling pictures of Rompola's buck."

So Butler, a no-nonsense guy, got a lawyer and called Rompola's bluff. And Rompola folded.

The agreement says Rompola won't claim his deer is a world record and won't try to enter it with B&C unless somebody kills one bigger than Hanson's. That last bit is legal language required, because in that case, Hanson's deer wouldn't be the record and he wouldn't have anything to complain about.

The agreement may have staved off a suit but otherwise won't make life much easier for Rompola.

Craig Calderone, owner of the Whitetail Hall of Fame Museum in Grass Lake and a longtime Rompola doubter and critic, said: "What do you say about something like this? Of course it says the antlers are a fake. And the bigger question is, what does this say about all those other record deer he claims to have killed over the years?"

Publicity about the world record already had caused people to analyze Rompola's claims to have killed anywhere from 12 to 21 record-book deer (he entered only a dozen but says he killed nine more) over a 20-year period in a part of northern Michigan where no one else has killed more than one (and where deer that score 150 are big).

A mathematical analysis of those claims by a statistician found them to be incredibly implausible.

And when I looked at Rompola's claims to have killed his first deer with a bow at age 9 (and with a field point) and to have killed the Missouri record non-typical with a bow at 14, they looked very shaky. In one instance, he claimed to have used a broadhead that wasn't sold until a couple of years later.

Oh, there still will be a few people who will claim Rompola is simply a martyr to never-identified powerful "interests," or that he's just an independent good ol' boy who wouldn't bow to the powers-that-be.

And there also are people who believe the U.S. Air Force has the bodies of little green men from Mars stashed in a hanger somewhere in the desert, and that the world was going to end Jan. 1, 2000.

But when I looked this morning, we were all still around.

NEW POPE & YOUNG RECORD
39 Point Buck!

Mike Beatty hunting near Zenia, Ohio last Nov. 8, 2000, saw it and had enough control to draw his bowstring, hold it and release his arrow into the chest cavity of a monster buck.

Mike obviously knew that he had an outstanding trophy, after shooting his 39-point buck when he took it to an official scorer of both Pope & Young and the Boone and Crocket Clubs.

After the drying period, official scorers measured the massive rack and agreed that the Beatty buck would be officially scored at 30-4 ⁶/₈, a new world record. The rack was the largest ever taken by a hunter with a bow or gun.

Beatty kind of looks like Burt Ottman, don't you think?

DOUBLE BEAM SHED

Randy Higley, back view of double beamed buck rack. Click on photo for larger view.

Today's topic: 
Troubleshooting Beer Problems

SYMPTOM:    Beer unusually pale and tasteless.
FAULT:           Glass empty.
ACTION:        Get someone to buy you another beer.

SYMPTOM:     Beer tasteless, front of your shirt is wet.
FAULT:            Mouth not open, or glass applied to wrong part of face.
ACTION:         Retire to gent's room, practice in mirror.

SYMPTOM:     Feet cold and wet.
FAULT:            Glass being held at incorrect angle.
ACTION:         Rotate glass so that open end points toward ceiling.

SYMPTOM:     Feet warm and wet.
FAULT:            Improper bladder control.
ACTION:         Stand next to nearest dog, complain about her house training.

SYMPTOM:     Floor blurred.
FAULT:            You are looking through bottom of empty glass.
ACTION:          Get someone to buy you another beer.

SYMPTOM:      Floor moving.
FAULT:             You are being carried out.
ACTION:           Find out if you are being taken to another bar.

SYMPTOM:      Opposite wall covered with fluorescent lights.
FAULT:             You have fallen over backward.
ACTION:           Have yourself lashed to bar.

SYMPTOM:      Mouth contains cigarette butts.
FAULT:             You have fallen forward.
ACTION:           See above.

SYMPTOM:      Room seems unusually dark.
FAULT:             Bar has closed.
ACTION:          Confirm home address with bartender.

ALL HUNTING LINKS

Classified Ads 
http://www.hunters.com/  - Classified ads, info, links, learn tips and tricks.

Clubs/Societies
http://www.cuc.com/ctg/cgi-bin/NAHC/home—North American Hunting Club
http://www.shedantlers.org/ - North American Shed Hunters Club
http://www.boone-crockett.org/ - Boone & Crokett Club
http://www.pope-young.org/ - Pope & Young Club
http://www.nra.org/ - National Rifle Association
http://www.bowsite.com/pbs/ - Professional Bowhunters Society
http://www.gunowners.org/ - Gun Owners of America
http://www.ruffedgrousesociety.org/ - Ruffled Grouse Society
http://www.shedantlers.org/  - North American Shed Hunters Club
http://www.wvp.com/deer/index.shtml  - The World's Greatest Whitetail - Trophy Deer of N.A.

Deer Hunting
http://www.deer.com/  - Extensive Directory of Information for Deer and Deer Hunting.
http://www.whitetailsunlimited.org/index.asp - Whitetails Unlimited
http://members.aol.com/jjvanis/deer.html  - Whitetail Deer Photos - Pics of bucks in velvet
http://www.donet.com/~kgraham/ - Deer Tales
http://www.hunting.net/introbox.html - The Hunting Network
http://www.deer.com/ - Deer and Deer Hunting
http://www.bowhunting.net/deerhunting.net/default.htm - Hunting Whitetails on the Web
http://www.mts.net/~ddutka/hunting.htm—Chasing Whitetails
http://www.angelfire.com/sys/popup_source.shtml?Category=  - Hunter Haven - Guy from the State of PA. Some nice photos and info
http://www.geocities.com/Yosemite/Gorge/1695/  Mr. Whitetails Bowhunting in Northern Wi.
http://www.geocities.com/yosemite/trails/3336/  - Adirondack Whitetail Hunting Page. Nice site.
http://www.buckmonkey.com/  - Cyber Deer Camp for Midwest Hunters

Fun
http://www.cctrap.com/~varmint/ahunt.htm—Varmit Al’s Page—Lots of links.
http://users.ntr.net/~csj/ - hunting camp tips and tricks, recipes, photos, etc.
http://www.huntinglinks.com/ - Hunting Links—Lots of them

Government
http://www.dnr.state.wi.us/org/caer/ce/news/or/ - WI. DNR Fishing and Hunting Outdoor Report separated by five different regions in the state
http://www.dnr.state.wi.us/org/caer/ce/news/calendar.html - WI. DNR Outdoors Calendar
http://www.dnr.state.wi.us/org/land/wildlife/hunt/ - WI. DNR Hunting Info.—Big Game, Upland, Waterfowl and Trapping. Hunter Hours Table. 
http://www.dnr.state.wi.us/org/land/wildlife/HUNT/deer/deer2000/index.htm—WI Deer Hunting, T-Zones, Deer Harvest Donations, Last year’s harvest info
http://www.fws.gov/ - US Fish and Wildlife

Magazines
http://www.bowhuntermag.com/ - Bowhunter Magazine
http://www.tradbow.com/ - Traditional Bowhunters Magazine
http://buckmasters.rivals.com/ - Buckmasters Magazine
http://www.primitivearcher.com/ - Primitive Archer Magazine
http://www.bowhunting.net/  - The home of bowhunting on the net.

Maps 
http://terraserver.microsoft.com/advfind.asp - Satellite Maps—Type in the closest town to your hunting spot.
http://terraserver.microsoft.com/terra_faq.asp - Frequently Asked Questions at Terraserve

Recipes
http://www.hunting.net/recipes/ - The Hunting Cookbook Collection - Recipes

Shopping
http://www.bowsite.com/ - Bowhunting and Archery Supersite
http://www.shootersoasis.com/ - Shooters Oasis
http://www.backcountryinc.com/ - Hunting Gear
http://www.bowhunterswarehouse.com/ - Bowhunters Discount Warehouse

TV
http://www.tonydean.com/  - the Tony Dean Show - Midwest hunting and fishing.

Weather
http://www.accuweather.com/  - Accuweather - Current weather conditions. 
http://www.weather.com/ - The Weather Channel

HUNTING STORIES
Submit your stories to Repacking@AOL.com

LOST IN A SNOW STORM (1991)

The Friday after Thanksgiving, Ralph Paoli and his son Jason decided to stalk deer back between the creeks. We knew the area between the creeks pretty good and you really couldn't get lost if you stayed between the creeks. It was a sunny afternoon and since we were just going between the creeks we didn't take our day packs which contained our flashlights, compass, rope, candy, etc.

Ralph hunted the east side ridge and Jason stayed on the west side ridge. Ralph would stalk 15 to 25 yards and stop while Jason watched, then Jason would stalk 15 to 25 yards while Ralph watched. They were seeing deer hunting this way and the deer weren't spooked. Ralph spotted a buck walking up from the creek bottom, it was going to walk in front of him towards Jason. He watched it for a while and then it disappeared.

It was 20 minutes later that Ralph saw the buck right in front of him in a small gully feeding. He watched it for awhile and then saw Jason moving through the woods. He wanted Jason to shot a buck, so he though if he shot it in the brisket and wounded it, Jason might be able to finish him off.

Ralph shot and hit the buck in the brisket, it turned and ran straight for Jason. Standing behind a poplar tree, Ralph yelled to Jason "the bucks coming your way". The buck stopped and looked at Ralph when he yelled to Jason, it was standing between them.

Ralph watched as Jason raised his gun on the deer and looked at him through his scope. Ralph waited and waited for Jason to shoot, it was the longest time, Jason had a good shot, only 50 to 60 yards. Then the deer turned and ran north between the two of them and out of sight.

Ralph asked Jason why he didn't shot the buck and he said " I couldn't shot because I didn't know where you were."  He must have paid attention in his hunter safety course!

They started tracking the buck and jumped it a couple of times but couldn't get a shot off.  The buck was heading north, the same directions the creeks flow. The buck passed the point where the two creeks come together and flow as one into Lake Superior. The buck crossed the creek and then crossed back over again, back and forth, back and forth, this went on all afternoon. Now the surroundings weren't familiar, they had never hunted in this area before.

It was about 1/2 hour before dusk when they decided to give up and head back to camp. Since Ralph didn't have a compass, he knew all he had to do was to keep the creek on his left side and eventually they would run into their four-wheeler trail. From there all they had to do was to follow it back to camp.

Ralph didn't know at the time he was on the wrong side, so in keeping the creek on his left side he was heading in the wrong direction. As they walked Ralph didn't recognize any of his surroundings, they should've hit the four wheeler trail by now. 

It was now dark and starting to snow, Ralph and Jason knew they were lost. They looked for the North Star, but the sky was to cloudy. They listened for sounds from cars, trucks, or anything that could help them figure out where they were - nothing. They woods were silent.

As they walked they came across a snowmobile track. Ralph and Jason decided to follow the snowmobile trial as it has to come out somewhere. They walked for about an hour following the trail when it ended. The snowmobiler had turn around and headed back out. So they turned around and followed the trail back out. 

By now it was snowing very hard and starting to cover up the snowmobile trail, soon the trail was covered completely. Now they were just wondering around in the woods, getting wet and tired. It was about 9pm when they decided to spend the night in the woods, so they looked for a spot that had plenty of downed fire wood. They found a spot under a huge white pine, built a fire and started to warm themselves up. The wind was blowing hard, the snow flakes were huge and by now there was over a foot of new snow on the ground.

While sitting around the fire,  Ralph thought he heard someone yell his name. He yelled back and listened for an answer - nothing. He shot his gun three times and listened for an answer - nothing. 

Back at the hunting camp, Van Peterson was pacing the floor. He told the other guys "we've got to go look for them." Dan Dugger opened the from door, the wind was howling, snow blew inside and said, "where do we start - we don't even know where they went. There's so much snow we can't even get out of the driveway."  Dan was right, where would they start looking, they couldn't go to far because the snow was waist deep and yelling for them in this blowing wind would be useless. He knew Ralph and Jason would build a fire and spend the night in the woods and they would find them the next morning.

Once again Ralph though he heard someone call his name. Again he yelled back and listened for an answer - nothing.  He again shot his gun three times and listened for an answer - again nothing. 

The Turra Camp on Tar Paper Alley has an outpost camp further back in the woods. Back at the outpost camp, one of the hunters got up that night and went outside to pee. It was while he was peeing that he heard the three shots from Ralph's gun. He knew these woods and back here those shots had to come from someone who's lost.  He went inside, got dressed, grabbed a flashlight and walked out into the woods.

Ralph just happened to see a light flicker in the woods. He got up and ran out from the fire yelling. Jason looked at him like he was losing his mind. But when someone yelled back, Jason got up and ran over towards his dad.

They were taken back to the outpost camp, the Turra's put a pot of coffee on and fed the fire. After they were warmed up, they were taken by snowmobile back to the main camp. At the main camp, one of the Turra boys offered to drive them back to the Bois Brule camp, about a 10 mile drive.

It was a good thing he had a snow plow, because he had to plow trail all the way down Tar Paper Alley out to Highway 13. When they got out to Highway 13, it wasn't plowed either, so he ended up plowing the whole ten miles.

It was in the middle of the night when Ralph and Jason got back to camp and woke everybody up. They all sat around the wood stove and retold the story. By morning there was over 18 inches of snow on the ground.

Now, Ralph and Jason don't leave the camp without their day packs and always let someone know where they'll be hunting.