Blake Herndon, 12, of Saint Clair, was in the woods of Union Township this morning with his grandfather, his junior hunting license and a bolt-action rifle.
"Last year, I got a 10-pointer," Herndon, a seventh-grade student at Saint Clair Area Elementary-Middle School, said Wednesday.
He's not sure he'll bag a buck today, the first day of the two-week statewide firearms deer season. But Herndon, who's been hunting for four years, said the first day out may not always be the best.
"We have better luck second day or the first weekend because on the first day, everybody's out, so many people. On the second day, the pressure calms down," said his grandfather, Dave Mengel, 48, of Saint Clair.
"On day two, they're less antsy," Herndon said of the deer.
Herndon said he shot his buck last year on the second day of rifle deer season in 2012.
"I didn't get one on the first day last year. I got one on the second Friday, a doe," Mengel said.
But you can never predict how well a day of hunting is going to go, Herndon said.
"If you see something, you see something," he said.
The deer are out there, according to a Nov. 22 press release on the website for the Pennsylvania Game Commission at www.pgc.state.pa.us.
"The Pennsylvania Game Commission is tracking deer populations as stable or increasing in nearly all of the state's 23 wildlife-management units. That means another good opportunity awaits the approximate 750,000 hunters expected to take to deer woods on the Dec. 2 opener, and for those hunting during the remainder of the season," according to the release.
"The opening day of the firearms deer season is something most hunters look forward to all year, and waiting out those few extra days when the season falls late like this can test one's patience. But by 7 a.m. that first Monday, the wait all across Pennsylvania will be over, and tens of thousands of lasting memories will be made in the hours, days and weeks that follow," Game Commission Executive Director Carl G. Roe said in the release.
On Thursday night, Jake Humes, 17, of Lake Hauto, a junior at Tamaqua Area High School, took a walk with friends near Catawissa Road in Walker Township.
It's the area where he plans to hunt with his bolt-action rifle today.
"We were out scouting and we saw 12 deer in the field. So hopefully on Monday we'll get something. We'll see," Humes said Friday.
According to the National Weather Service website at www.weather.gov, today will be mostly cloudy, with a high near 42.
"If it's cooler, the hunters move around more and that chases the deer, which is a good thing. You want to get them moving. If they sit tight and get comfortable, you'll have less of a chance to see them," Mengel said.
"I hope it snows. The ground cover can help you see the tracks better," Herndon said Wednesday.
"You can see the deer better too on a white background as compared to a backdrop of trees. But I'm hearing it's going to be overcast and there's a 30 percent chance of rain," Mengel said.
Since 2010, Herndon has bagged four deer: a doe in 2010, a doe in 2011, 10-point buck in 2012 and a doe in October during a junior doe hunting season.
In September, the Associated Press reported sporting-goods stores in Pennsylvania were noticing a national shortage of firearms shortage.
As a result, the price of ammunition has been on the rise, according to Ken Mills, owner of Ken's Guns and Ammo, Saint Clair.
"The price of ammo is crazy, if you can even get it. I think the government's buying it. They can't get a ban on guns, so the government's buying out the ammo. Then they're going to make it more expensive for people to buy it," Mills said.
Humes said in 2012, a box of 20 rounds of .30-06 rifle ammunition cost "about $19" and this year it cost "around $26."