First time getting my target buck!

[lokidog]

Will write more later when I get home.

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[Timberstalker]

Awesome!  Looking forward to the story. Congrats Loki.

[h2ofowlr]

Nice island buck!

[SemperFidelis97]

Nice work Loki, I am glad holding out payed off for you.  Great buck btw

[jasnt]

Congrats Ed.  Looking forward to your story

[MLBowhunting]

Nice   

[Mfowl]

  Congrats!

[Watimberghost]

Nice buck! Congrats

[huntnphool]

 

[robb92]

Nice buck, congrats!!

[Widgeondeke]

That is Saweet!    Glad you got him. 

 

[lokidog]

Thanks!

Not a big story though... well, I can stretch it I guess....   

So, I went out opening morning and actually passed up two bucks, one a decent mature forky, the other a little smaller, when they passed by my tree stand at five yards. 

I had seen a large buck this summer on the other side of the island and I was hoping I would not regret passing this slam dunk. See Hit List Bucks Thread http://hunting-washington.com/smf/index.php/topic,197393.0.html reply #11.

[carpsniperg2]

Congrats

[lokidog]

Last Sunday, we had an event looking for bats at our next door neighbor's place and jumped a nice three point when we went in to his picnic pavilion to set up, so Monday evening I walked through there just before dark.  I saw two does, a fawn and a small spike but did not see what I was hoping for.

Tuesday evening I sat in a spot sort of near where I had seen the big guy.  I figured I'd just give it a shot wearing my jeans and a brown and beige flannel shirt.  I just tucked myself into a bit of a hole about fifteen yards from my handful of apples.  I had a doe and a fawn come in to eat, they kept looking at me, but since I did not move, they just ignored me.  As the evening progressed, a spike and two does came out about 40 yards away and proceeded to cross the road about fifteen yards from my parked truck. I decided to check the yard out by my truck so left my "stand" about fifteen minutes early.  As I got to my truck, i could see one of the does just watching me from about fifteen yards away.  No deer in the yard though.

Wednesday evening I did not go out, but Weathergirl decided she wanted to try to get a really big spike behind the house.  Unfortunately, he was a lot more skittish than the two does, one fawn, and three other spikes back there, no dice.  We had seen Mr Crabs, the little crab-claw fork, that I posted pics of, earlier that day and later that night, with a flashlight from the bedroom window, I saw a really cool looking "shooter" that had front forks that were about twice as long as the back ones, hope he shows up for Weathergirl sometime in daylight.

Photo of Mr. Crabs and the largest of the smaller spikes.

[Whitpirate]

Great job Ed!

[lokidog]

Then comes tonight.  We had a potluck to celebrate the first week of school at 6 this evening.  I got there about 6:15 since my crab cakes took longer than expected to cook....  I wolfed down a few choice items and then said my goodbyes.

Someone asked where I was going, jokingly, I said I had a date with a big buck with my name on it.  My son asked if it was on his antlers.    I said maybe.

I'll admit it, I'm a baiter.     Of course I'm a cheapskate and only put three or four apples out at a time, mostly to see if deer are actually coming through the area, but it is nice to get them to stop and pay attention to something other than my bow being drawn if need be.  I had an idea last year that if I hung a bag of apples up out of their reach, they might keep coming back to se if any had fallen yet and I would have an attractant even after the apples I put out had been eaten.  Finally, today I decided to try it out.  I had placed a small bag earlier where I had seen the two bucks opening day but I did not have time to prebait where I wanted to go this evening for the last hour of daylight.  I dragged the black plastic oyster bag with me stuffed full of fermenting pomace from my cider squeezings earlier this week.

I parked in the usual spot and saw a doe and fawn in the yard as I walked to my stand.  Being so late, I just decided to leave the pomace bag on the ground.  Well, I had a doe and fawn come out about ten yards away, they obviously smelled the apples, but when the doe saw that black bag there, she tensed up and ended up taking off.  Another doe worked her way down toward me from near my truck, she did the same thing upon seeing the black bag.  Attention person talking about wearing black in the thread about camo... probably not a good idea outside of a blind....   

Anyways, about fifteen minutes before shooting time was up, I decided to look to see if there were any other deer in the yard with the doe and fawn I had seen earlier.  I crept around the gate and saw a deer, a good sized buck.  I couldn't make out his antlers other than to tell they were fairly tall, but he was big enough bodied for me. I raised my bow and had to take a step more to clear some branches, he stopped eating, raised his head and took a step slightly toward me.  I estimated the distance at about fifteen yards.  Forgetting that I wanted to aim a coulle of inches low at that distance, I drew and let fly.  I have little feather fluffs around the base of my nocks so it was easy to see the impact point of my Radical Archery Design's TiCon tipped arrow... high and slightly back of where I wanted it.    I could tell it was a complete pass through and darted forward as the deer took off across the yard so i could see which trail he would use to go into the woods.  There is one main trail in that direction and that was the one he took.  I headed home to give him some time as I was not sure how long it might take for him to expire with a high lung shot that might have only caught one lung since he had turned toward me just before I shot. Time: 7:56.

After an agonizing 45 minutes I rounded up my son to go with me to look for the deer.  He is always excited about getting to track, and is pretty good at it as well. Normally Weathergirl would have gone as well, but she has been battling a cold this week and needed to head to bed.

We took a quick look for my arrow but it had passed through the edge of the brush and will have to be discovered later. Pacing out the distance to the bucks divots, it turned out to be 20 yards.  After walking fifty yards across the lawn and not seeing any blood, I was getting a bit more nervous.  Luckily, I had seen where he went into the brush so we started there.  Of course, the trail forked almost immediately... but my son found a drop of blood on a leaf, woohoo!  We followed the trail slowly as there was little blood.  It was all on the exit side of the trail though.  Fortunately, we found the expired buck only about 20-25 yards later.  As he lay photo first.

I realized this was The One, when we pulled his left antler out of the duff and I saw the little nib on the back of the rear fork.  Knowing that this may well be the largest bodied Blacktail I ever shoot (it is by far the largest I have seen on the island), we took lots of photos since I will just be doing a Euro mount.  I'll have to do a little editing though as they mostly seem a bit washed out with the flash.

I don't like leaving gut piles in my neighbor's yards, especially when they are nice enough to let me hunt, so we dragged him out whole.  I got a deer butchering kit from my brother last year for Christmas and discovered it had a scale, which I had forgotten, so I was able to weigh him.  On the hoof weight - right at 180 pounds!!!!

His neck at the base of the skull is 17 1/2", in front of his shoulder is 40", and behind his front legs is 44".  I am just so amazed, thrilled, and lucky to be able to harvest a deer like this in, almost, my back yard.

[lokidog]

Thanks for reading.

And finally.....

[redi]

Great buck and great family memories. Congrats.

[Becky]

That thing is beefy!! Great job Ed!

[grundy53]

Nice work Ed! Great write up.

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[Timberstalker]

What a dandy buck Ed. Thanks for sharing the story.

[dog]

Nice!

[bearhunter99]

Congrats!  Looks like he will be a good eating little porker

[Eli346]

Nice! I ended up getting the one I was after on the last day of late buck one time. It's a great feeling.

[syoungs]

Nice job! That's a stud deer!

[Rainier10]

Way to go man.  That has to feel good.  Great looking deer.

[Netminder01]

Congrats Loki!

[BGLEMIN]

Too cool, congrats!!

[Dan-o]

That's gotta be cool to target and tag a buck like that.   

[lokidog]

That's gotta be cool to target and tag a buck like that.   

The reality is I saw him once, thought Wow! he'd be a nice one to get, then lucked out that the next time I saw him I had the bow in my hands.  But yeah, it's still cool! 

Oh yeah, found my arrow this morning stuck in the grass about five yards behind him, not sure how it ended up so close, not broken either.   

[HUNTINCOUPLE]

Real nice one!!!!

[DOUBLELUNG]

Nice one Ed, I like everything about that hunt.

[quadrafire]

That's awesome .....you got a good tracker there!!!
Way to go. Thanks for sharing the story