This is hilly...
We have what I call small mountains in Cullman. Jackson Co. guys have real mountains!

just one of the reasons that i bought a 338 lapua was for hunting in jackson county. well that and the fact that a man can never have to many guns.

All you folks talking of 8-10 hour drags, how long of a walk is it with out a deer?

It's not to bad were I hunt most of the time, takes about 45min to walk in. But there is a spot on the WMA I hunt that takes me 2 hours to get to to by walking, even longer on the way out, hardly ever see a soul down there, and for good reason, it's a long dang ways. But I enjoy the workout, have not shot a deer there, seen plenty, but none worth the drag out. Hopefully this year will be different, I'll prob have it mostly to myself again, which is fine by me

Y'all go walk around on wolf creek wma for a little bit. My father inlaw has 200 acres there and some hollars you would have to have repelling gear to get up and down. Some 70-80 ft straight down rock bluffs.

There are a couple of places around here that I swear I would cape it and pack it out if it ever went down out there.....

And I concur, you can go LOTS of places with a four wheeler....

I can believe that. There are parts of bankhead where it amazes me that folks could even cut the timber out of there. Those mules must have been the toughest one's ever bred.

I hunted family land around Cheaha Mountain. Closer to Pulpit rock than Bald rock. I ran across 2 or 3 old plane wrecks up there and had a good spot where I sat with my back against one of them.
I shot a basket 6 up there one day. I was about 17 at the time and it was no fun pulling that thing up. Thing probably took me out twice coming down. Got on them leaves and just picked up speed and took my legs out.

I shot another and it ran up amongst them boulders. Looking back I should have left that one for the buzzards. No way I'd shoot anything other than a Sasquatch or deer with diamond encrusted rack (10 point minimum).

Interesting area to hike around if you ever get the chance though.

turkey season we chased some birds from top of ridge to left of pic to the spot I'm standing then across the ridge on the right. Got on a big bird but couple hens cut us off when he was bout 60 yards out.

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I've been looking for a blind mule for years.

I've got a good way to get em out. Buddy of mine thats a taxidermist showed me. Its a deer sled and he drilled holes in it on the sides and took some small rope and made it look like a shoelace. He can put the whole deer in and tie its legs in there and pull it where ever. He said if its really far or really steep he will cape it out and put the meat in garbage bags and tie it to his tree stand and just walk on back to the truck. The whole setup he showed me MIGHT weigh 1 lb.

I will promise there is places on that lease I would leave deer if they ran off in.

Heres a pic I took of where my deer ran off. The picture don't do it justice as to how steep it was. It took 3 of us an hour and a half to get him 80 yards up the mountain. I was able to get my ole foreman to the top of the bluff there and haul him the rest of the way on it.

Have done a couple 4 hour drags out from under mountains, I have gotten them as close as possible then tied rope to the cable on the winch and got them out that way. Go look at a topo map of the Jacobs Mountain track that's a new WMA now and check out some of those bluffs and deep hollers. If a man parks up top and kills one at the bottom at 7 am he more than likely will spend the rest of the day getting it out. Most of them steep nasty bluffs and deep hollers only grow rocks, cedars and mountain laurels too!

Most of our hollers have roads on the ridge tops. I keep 150' of rope in the truck to go with the 50' of winch cable on my teryx. Most of the areas are just steep with no rocks/bluffs so we should be Abe to winch them out in most situations.

The majority of the Jacobs Mountain tract looks like this picture. About the only flat ground on that place is cutover so thick deer have to get on their bellies to crawl through because they can't even walk through it.

I imagine there will be some folks die of heart attacks trying to retrieve deer on that place if they only allow access from the top.

There are lots of times I have to be choosy about what I shoot and what time of day I shoot it.

I've let lots of deer walk because I wasn't willing to deal with the consequences.

Actually that is true. Since I moved here and started night hunting from the road my success has really improved. I actually look forward to the time change so I can get home earlier. Brinkmanship make a good light btw

Quote from a friend when asked why he didn't try duck hunting since he liked deer hunting so much "heck coach them sucks fly too fast for the spotlight"