Deer season for Lori and Mike Byrnes is sort of like Thanksgiving Day, but in this case about 20 guests tromp inside, dump their blaze orange caps, gloves and parkas, kick off their Iceman boots, and warm by the nearest heat vent.
Lori and Mike own and operate Hidden Acres Resort, about a mile south of Iron River, in northern Bayfield County.
Their guests have come not for turkey dinner, but to hunt deer. Most of them are serious hunters, too, driving about as far as anyone can drive in Wisconsin.
"Most are from the greater Milwaukee area in southeast Wisconsin, so they travel diagonally to the northwest corner, where we have four cabins on the shore of Iron Lake," Mike Byrnes said. "This fall has been dry, so there won't be a lot of mud tracked into the cabins. Plus, it's mostly sandy up here. In fact, snow isn't that bad, if we get some, because snow is just water."
Lori and Mike are in their ninth year of providing sleeping, eating and drying-off accommodations for deer hunters, mostly the same hunters, year after year.
"We did have a man call and cancel his group this year, partly due to age, partly due to illnesses," Mike said. "Lori looked at her waiting list the next morning and called a man, also in the Milwaukee area, and he was almost crying on the phone. It was like he won the lottery because we had a cabin for his group and a place to hunt."
About half of Bayfield County is public forest, mostly Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest, so finding a place to hunt is not difficult.
"A lot of the guys come early, even the Wednesday or Thursday before season opens. They arrive, zip in and unload, and head to the woods to scout," Mike said. "This year has been a breath of fresh air because we have a few young hunters coming along with one of the groups."
Mike, a hunter himself, usually is not inconvenienced by having to stay at the resort and help maintain equipment.
"Once we had a furnace go out, but we just used a couple electric units to get by until after the season. To find someone to do a furnace call during holy week in northern Wisconsin would be impossible," he said.
It's interesting to Mike and Lori that, other than gun-deer season, there seems to be very little interest in archery, muzzleloader and antlerless seasons in this region. At least they don't have calls asking about accommodations for those seasons, just gun-deer season.
For those hunters who do get a deer, or more, there are handy deer poles in the tall pines surrounding the cabins.
"Here in the north, some hunters do see a wolf or even a bear. That sends a shiver down their spines, but it's part of the experience," he said.
For those hunters who come back in the evening not having seen a deer, there is likely to be a few standing among the cabins, but those animals are off-limits.
Backtag is a 2009 column by Jerry Davis, outdoors writer, chronicling the gun-deer season and will appear daily through the season.
Jerry Davis Photo
The cabins are Hidden Acres Resort near Iron River are on the shore of Iron Lake. Lori and Mike Byrnes are in their ninth year of providing sleeping, eating and drying-off accommodations for deer hunters.
Jerry Davis Photo
Venison burgers always taste better when cooked on a grill in northern Wisconsin. Lori and Mike Byrnes are in their ninth year of providing sleeping, eating and drying-off accommodations for deer hunters.