So this morning I sat on a stand with my bow, passed on the same spike I saw Sunday after shooting a doe. On the way home I grabbed the scoped shotgun to walk through the neighbor's place in case there were any bucks cruising for does. I spotted a crab-clawed fork horn bedded down in a grassy field. I was about seventy yards away but knew that I could get within thirty the way the brush in the field was positioned. I decided to hike bck up to the truck and grab my bow. As I was approaching one of the brush stands, a doe pops up in it. She didn't freak out too much and walked, then trotted away, perpendicular to a line from myself to the buck. As I circled the brush to try to pinpoint the buck, another deer came trotting out the other direction at about sixty yards away. I could not tell if it had the small crab claw antlers or not. It was not a very big deer though. When I reached where I could view the field, the buck was no longer there.
Would you have shot him where he was bedded (or after he stood up, to remove that argument)? I could have leaned against a tree for a rest so offhand shooting would not be an issue.
On a side note, we have two deer in the freezer already and likely another one from an upcoming out of state hunt as well as my wife's 2nd deer doe tag for late archery.
