Had another successful year up in our spot. Turned out to be the best worse year ever
. My dad decided because he still had meat he would wait and try to shoot a buck of a life time. well he had his chance and the story is funny.
Sunday: We went down and tried to push deer for my brother since he wasn't going to be able to go on the hunt with us. I get to the spot were I had pushed a nice 3X3 earlier in the year to a friend and I tell them both to sit in a certain spot because the deer run up out of the brush right there. I end up scaring another nice buck which my dad sees and has a shot but decides not to take it because he wants a monster buck this year.
Monday: We headed up from Yakima to our area. On the hike up we found a moose track and poop for the first time in our area ever. We got almost to the half way spot and spooked 7 does. Both of us have never seen that much deer sign and actual deer on the way up and he was getting pretty excited. A little farther up we spooked our first buck which was a small 2 point but glad to see him. We finally reached our resting point and I looked up to see that my trail camera was now facing completely the wrong way and hanging funny. So my dad looked into the draw as I went into some trees to grab it and out pops two more does. I start to go threw my camera to find out that a mama bear decided to claw the crap out of my camera while her cub was running around. I almost get to the end of the pictures and here is a wide 3 point at 1:53am that morning. I call my dad over to show him because at 5:15am there was also another small 3 point on the camera. We are looking at the pics while my dad just happens to look up into the draw again and here is another deer standing there at 75 yards watching us (and it has antlers!). He puts up his gun and its a nice 4X4 with brow tines. The back forks are nice but the front are crab clawed. He decides to pass up this buck as well.
Tuesday: My dad takes off to his lucky spot in the morning and ends up not seeing anything while I take off to try for a bear and end up seeing some deer. we meet up at lunch and head down to my lucky spot for the afternoon hunt. At 2:45 my dad sees a doe come out of the trees where my biggest buck came out and (wakes me up
) I get my spotting scope up and look into the trees to see another deer coming and it has antlers. I tell him "buck" and out walks a nice 3x3 with now brow tines. He asks if he should shoot and I say no because the front fork on the right side is crab clawed again and it has no brow tines.
Wednesday: Anybody that was up in the Pasayten probably experienced the massive down pours and fog that decided to roll in starting Wednesday. My dad heads out a little late to his spot in the morning because of the rain and gets about 10 yards from where he sits when he looks up and sees a deer standing at the top of the area. At first he thinks its a doe because of the smaller body. He takes his scope covers off and puts up the gun to see antlers. When he does this the scope starts to fog up and the buck turns and heads back into the trees. It is a young skinny antlered 4X4 which is actually a dang nice buck with Deep forks. He thinks each point might have been 7 inches or longer so he will be a dandy buck in the future. He saw a few more deer and then the rain started to come in so he headed back to camp. We ended up sitting in the tent for a few hours till about 2pm when he looked outside to see that the rain had stopped and the sun was out. He starts freaking out and rushing to get back up to his spot quick knowing the deer will be coming out to feed on the wet plants. He gets to the same exact spot 10 yards away from where he sits and sees a 2 point 30 yards away from him. He laughs to himself and says "man if you were a big buck I could just blast you!" About that time 5 yards behind that deer he sees tree branches (big A** Antlers) moving up from the ground. The Monster buck stands up and is looking right at him. He goes into panic mode (BUCK FEVER) thinking he only has a short time before they both start to run off. He takes off his scope covers puts the gun up and his scope instantly starts to fog up again (i think he was to excited and breathed all over it). He puts the cross hairs on the buck and shoots fast and turns to look to see the bullet trail go right past the bucks neck and hit some rocks behind him. THE BUCK CONTINUES TO JUST STAND THERE AND WATCH HIM! He loads another round and puts up the gun and he cant even see threw the scope. He starts using his glove, shirt, fingers, tissue, and anything else he can find to clean off the scope as they just watch him. He gets it just clear enough and shoots again. HE MISSED AGAIN
At this point both deer just turn around and WALK away for about 200 yards in plain sight.
The whole time he is trying to clean his scope and just gets it good enough to shoot again as the buck walks into the trees. He doesn't even know how many points it had haha. He estimated it to be about 28" wide and about 36" tall at least. Worst part is once again (it has happened before with a monster black tail) he did not sight his rifle in because he figured it was still good from the year before. It has been fun messing with him about it.
Thursday: We could barely see anything and hunted all day. We were seeing some deer and then the fog rolled in. We decided to spend the last couple of hours of light in my lucky spot since there had been 4 bucks down in there since Monday. We get down to the spot around 3:50pm and see 4 does and a two point feeding. It starts to get close to 5pm and I say this is starting to play out a lot like when I shot my biggest buck. We had the same amount of does and a 2 point when I shot mine at 5:10pm in 2012. 5:15 comes around and out walks two more does from where my trail camera was set up. Then all we see is a big bodied deer walk out behind them. My dad puts his gun up and can just see a huge body and antlers. He decides its definitely a shooter and gets ready and puts up MY gun (since I had sighted it in and we shoot about the same) the deer is broadside at about 100 yards down hill and he pulls the trigger and drops it. With the angle of shooting down hill and my rifle sighted in for two hundred yards he hit him high in the spine and broke his back above the shoulders. The buck tried getting up again and he finished him off with a neck shot.
All in all it was a super exciting trip and we saw a lot of deer. We ended up seeing;
4 unknown sex deer
31 does
4 2x2
3 4x4
3 button bucks
2 3x3
and 2 3x3 on camera
