My two older daughters Emily (14) and McKenzie (11) and myself started out the weekend with 6 Washington deer tags. I put all of us in for 2nd deer separately thinking we might get one or two extra tags surprisingly we all drew 2nd deer and McKenzie a youth any deer tag.
Opening day rolls around and girls and I are set up to glass before shooting light. About 45 minutes into shooting light we've seen a few does but no bucks when Emily glasses up a bedded whitetail buck 300 yards from us. We confirmed it was legal and she says "can I shoot your gun" (270 wsm). She easily dings steel out to 400 at the range so I said ok. We get her sitting and gun set up on tripod. She gets dialed in and we run a dryfire practice shot on the deer to see if she's comfortable then it's go time. She drops the hammer buck never stands up just rolls down the hill then attempts to stand and she lays another one on him and he doesn't move. We pack up head on over to her buck and to my surprise it's a dandy whitetail buck.
After getting her buck cut up and back to camp McKenzie is up to bat that evening head out to glass can't turn up any bucks so she decides she'll fill her antlerless tag. Get her set up prone and dialed in and she makes a great 325 yard shot with a 6.5 creedmoor. Deer doesn't go 30 yards and flops over. When we get to the deer I find out it's got boy parts and antlers that looked like he shed them already still had scabs on them.
Day 2 starts and we bump into a bedded buck 100 yards below us but we can't get McKenzies set up in time for a shot. We watch the deer get out into some cliffs and he stops finally but McKenzie isn't comfortably with the shot and position of the shot so she doesn't shoot. As the deer starts to wrap around out of sight I set up for a shot and connect another buck down.
I was able to fill my 2nd tag sunday evening then Emily filled hers Monday morning on a couple does. We never could turn up a buck with real antlers for McKenzie but we came home with 5 of 6 deer tags filled. Both girls made great shots and McKenzie made a hard decision to not shoot when it didn't feel right. Definitely be a weekend the girlies and I will remember.
