first and foremost this was a crazy season. i had assumed all year long that id hunt the same spot with my same partner and we would get me a buck. it ended up like that but it was a bit of a roller coaster to get me my deer this year.
started out with a phone call to my buddy a day or two before the season to 'confirm' our plans and he tells me oh yea i cant go out opening day i gotta work (hes a farmer and they were seeding) so i instantly get really bummed while im still on the phone with him. its his land we hunt and hes always been my personal 'guide'. so we talk for a bit more and he finally puts me at ease at the end of the conversation when he tells me well you go on ahead by yerself and you call me if you get a deer down. so im like sweetnes im good to go.
well the phone rang about 45 minutes later and it was my buddy and i was dreading picking it up cause i was scared he had changed his mind. his family all hunts and theyre pretty particular about who they let hunt down there on there property. i was just scared to death his dad had said no way when he went to tell him were id be so they wouldnt be suprised to find me down there. so i answer the phone and he tells me he can go with me for the morning. so blessing in disguise i got my guide back!
opening morning i show up at his house at 5:30am ready to go and hes still in bed. so after rousting him and waiting for him to get dressed we head down to the backside of his parents property. its still pretty dark but we start in and instantly were seeing tons of deer. problem is we cant make out what they are. now my buddys got eyes like a hawk and if he says its a buck then its a damn buck so finally after standing there glassing and waiting for a few more minutes of light he says all does lets move up the hill but were gunna have to walk out in the alfalfa field along the edge to get to the road that takes us up the hill. so we walk quietly but steady through the alfalfa field and spooked off a good part of the deer that were out there. finally we reached our road and started up it. it was pretty steep and about half way up he tells me to walk infront incase we see something. so im walking along and i can just feel him behind me (hes like a mountain goat never seems to tire and is impossibly fast to keep up with). so i pick up the pace just a bit cause i dont want to look like a slacker and im assuming were trying to get to our 'spot' hes got for us as quickly as possible cause its getting light fast. no sooner had i started picking it up when bam he quietly whistles and points down below us and whispers BUCK! i back track 10 steps or so and i see a real nice deer standing there, then he was gone. afterwards i slowed it down a bit and we got to our spot were as soon as we walked out on the bluff we kicked up another decent buck! shortly after sitting down we spot a small dinker out in the alfalfa field and we decide immediatly hes not a shooter. we glass a bit and spot 2 more bucks on the opposit hillside just under his brother who cant see them cause of the rocks. we ranged them and it was about 650 yards, just to far for me to shoot. so we sat and watched those two bucks for about 40 minutes before they finally wandered off. finally i think my buddys ass was getting sore so he said lets walk a bit.
we headed down to two more bluffs and didnt see anything and it was starting to get a little later in the morning so we decided to hunt back to the truck. on the way back to the truck we kicked up 3 more bucks, 2 of which were shooters in my book but neither of those 2 presented any sort of a shot as they bolted up and over the hill on us.
we finally reached the road that goes back to the truck and my buddy says lets hit this other spot for a few and see if one doesnt pass by us. i agree and we head to another bulff but this ones in thick cover next to a thickly covered draw. we sit there for an hour and see 4 or 5 does but never a buck. finally my buddy says hes gotta get back so we head out. upon getting back to his place i ask him about getting together again and he says well see, call me on sunday after you drop the kids off. so i take the kids home an hour or so early and give him a call and he doesnt answer so i leave a message.
well tuesday rolls around and i still havnt heard back from my buddy. now im pretty bummed at this time cause im figuring ive either worn out my welcome, or hes real busy. i wasnt sure which but either way i was bummed cause it was sinking in fast that i was going to have to make this happen at a different spot and pry with out my deer hunting guru guide.
weds morning i woke up at 4am and packed my stuff and headed out taking matters into my own hands. i decided id head west of home and hit a small piece of land that ive hunted before (never for deer) and id seen a few deer there over the last few years. figured pry wouldnt see another hunter being middle of the week and there was another chunk of land not far away that i had seen a small 2x2 at a few weeks prior so figured if the first place didnt pan out id hit the second place on the way home.
so i hunted my ass off sneaking through every bush and around every tree till i figured i pretty much had the place hunted out. didnt see a deer or much deer sign. so i loaded up and headed to spot #2 were upon arriving im thinking ok this is nice i can do some glassing here and maybe sit and wait till dark see if i can catch something moving at evening time. well im not even 30 feet inside the gate were you walk in and i hear pop pop pop pop pop pop someones target shooting REAL CLOSE! well that basically ruined that hunt but i figured i was there so i might as well walk a bit further and just glass the area. so i waste an hour or so and glass but dont see jack. so im really starting to bumm now. i still havnt heard from my buddy, its starting to sink in with the difficulty of hunting public land especially with out pre-scouting.
thursday morning i woke up at 4am again and left the house for a spot north of home. its a place id never deer hunted as well but had seen plenty of deer there while i turkey hunted. i got up there and i started seeing alot of deer sign. so im getting pretty jacked up that i might get lucky if i hunt hard. im doing my thing creeping through the woods slowly recalling the lay out of the land from turkey hunting there 2 years ago and i finally get to a nice spot that i tell myself theres got to be a deer that comes through here. so i sit down and figure ill relax for a bit. about 10 minutes later i hear this huge crash to my right back in the trees and i can hear something big hitting the creek and moving through it. HOPING doesnt even describe what i was feeling, more like praying that a buck would show it self would be closer. finally about 10 minutes later i see a huge head stick its head through the bush and start into the clear cut. i had my gun ready and was ready to seal the deal except it was a cow moose and not a deer. the moose came with in about 30 yards of me and she had a calf with her. i sat and watched them feed and work their way up the hillside and never paid me any mind. so i figured i was set up good and i sat there for another hour or so but didnt see jack. finally i got a work phone call and decided id hunted enough and headed to town to deal with work.
(cow moose pic)
i showed up at the jobsite and was dealing with employees when my phone rang and when i looked at the caller ID and it was like the stars lined up and the heavens themselves opend, it was my buddy calling. after a brief but albeit relieved conversation he told me to call him at noon on friday and we would get together for an evening hunt and that even if he wasnt available i could hunt down on his property saturday. so i finshed up work and sped home were i promptly went out and bought a few toys (rattling bag and a grunt tube) to play with just incase i had to hunt by myself. now i know this isnt really the time of year to 'call' in deer, but i figured if nothing else it would make me feel better and after the emotional roller coaster i had been on over this deer hunting thing i figured i deserved a few toys.
friday afternoon rolled around and after contacting my buddy to make sure we were still on i headed to his place at about 4pm and he headed right out. he was even sitting on his porch camoed up ready to go this time, i was feeling really positive now. we hunted from about 4:15 till dark and we didnt see any deer except for a handfull of does through out the afternoon and early evening. didnt see any bucks till after dark walking back to the truck. this is pretty untypical so i was a bit down but knew i had saturday to try and make it happen. it was obvious that the deer just werent moving that evening so thats just the way that it was.
saturday morning i showed up at 6am and again he was still asleep (seems to be a pattern for morning hunts) but we got out and down behind his parents house on the opposite side of the alfalfa field on the bluffs over looking the field just before good light we spotted 1 buck right away on the opposite hillside about 650 yards away were we had hunted the saturday before but decide he was far away and my buddy said he was just average so lets move down the bluffs and see if we see anything. i tell him hes the boss and off we went.
several hours passed and we saw quite a few does moving around but no more bucks. finally moving to another bluff while crossing another draw we kicked up a REAL nice deer. now when my buddy says wow thats a nice deer i know its a nice deer but the damn thing just didnt co-operate and never stoped presenting me with a shot. we glass the opposit hillside some more and we see that same buck still bedded down. i didnt think much of it except he was farther then i wanted to shoot and we needed to find a buck on this side of the field. so more walking and still no deer when i bring up to my buddy how far do you think it would be if we went down to the edge of the last draw and set up on that deer we had seen bedded down for so long. he told me he guess 400 yards. i told him my longest shot was just over 300 but i felt like if we had time to set up id be comfortable trying for it. he then told me, well are you sure its just an average deer. thats when i looked him right in the eyes and said im fine with an average deer. so after a few minutes of discussing we came up with a game plan and started putting our stalk on.
we came down to were we wanted to set up directly across from the buck. i got my bi-pods out and we hit the range finder on him it was 450 yards. little further then i wanted to poke but i figured what the hell atleast its not a moving target. i prepared myself for the shot and touched off holding over with my best judgement. the buck didnt move. i jacked another round in and fired again, this time he stood up. i jacked in another one and fired again this time the deer started moving down the draw at us a bit so i was like sweet ill getem when he runs across the field twords us. so i jacked in another round and just about then the deer decided to side tail it across the hillside instead of crossing the field. so finally i get back on the deer im not sure of the actual yardage at this point cause my buddys glassing the deer now to watch where it runs to. so i let my shot fly and he yells out you broke its leg. so im thinking well thats great. thats when i tell my buddy something very embarassing. i whisper to him im out of bullets. now i think when he heard it he thought i just had to reload. what he didnt realize is that i was truly out of ammunition. so finally i whisper again im out of bullets thats when he looked at me and told me you came hunting with 4 bullets? i said yea im a sniper 1 shot 1 kill (its an inside joke between us) he proceeded to roll on the ground laughing. so after he chuckles it up at me he hands me his cannon of a rifle with so many numbers to the caliber i dont even know what it is honestly. i tell him when he hands it to me im a little scared to shoot the thing and all he says is come on lets go.
so we start to cut diagonal across the field to try and keep the deer from getting off the hillside into thicker cover when we kick up a real nice buck that stoped and i could have shot 3 times over. we knew were the one we shot had bedded after i took his wheel off so kept moving. id already made it up in my mind that i wouldnt shoot another deer even if we couldnt find or finish the one i had wounded, i just wouldnt feel right about that.
so we reach the edge of the creek and he tells me to go in and get the deer hes going to stay back to see if he can see it if it bolts on us. i nod and cross the creek and head up the hillside wide of the deer then start beating bush. finally i got close and the deer stood up maybe 10 yards away and stood there for a second. i couldnt believe it was the same deer so i didnt shoot. i was paranoid that id bumped another buck cause this one didnt seem to be limping that bad and from the way my buddy described the deers leg after i pegged it i expected the sucker to be limping like a pimp on main street. so the deer runs off and as soon as i cant see it anymore my buddy yells thats the deer. so im like great missed my opportunity to seal the deal. finally i get back to my buddy in the field and were going over our next approach on the deer except this time he tells me to stay there and hes going to go up on the hillside and push it out so i can blast it.
i agree and a minute or two later he yells HERE HE COMES. i raised the rifle on the deer im guessing 60 yards or so away (buddy had my rangefinder and wouldnt have been time to use it) and i let one go with his cannon. i was very suprised at the very light recoil but didnt like how LOUD the damn thing was. the deer keeps walking but i was sure i hit it. so i jacked in another round and put it on the deer again and fire. this time the thing takes 2 steps then folds his legs to take a dirt nap. i yell out to my buddy BUCK DOWN and i can see him fist pumping as he makes his way to me.
we got to the deer a few minutes later and i was tickled pink. my buddy was right it was just an average sized deer for the area and a little smaller then the one i got last year, but i told him again that id shoot one of those 'average' bucks every year and never complain once. this is my 4th deer taken in 4 consecutive years there and all of them were average but to me there all lifetime trophies.
we got it cleaned and draged to a spot we could get to it with the 4 wheeler and came down, loaded up and took it upto the barn were i got to break in my new skinning pole.
(skinning pole in use)
all in all it was one hell of a adventure, a deer season i wont forget for quite some time. i did however fill my tag, took a decent buck and made one hell of a memory with my buddy. cant ask for much more then that. felt bad that it wasnt a cleaner kill and that the deer had to go through all of that but i guess thats hunting. im really just thankfull that we were able to find and finish the deer.
the deer is currently at the butchers were he will become jerky, peperoni sticks, hot links and german sausages with chedder and jalapenos.
(2010 deer pic w/ cell phone. we took pictures at the kill site but was with a disposable need to get film developed.)
i cant believe all that worrying i did for nothing!
-bh2bt
