Post by: kellama2001 on October 14, 2016, 11:02:53 AM
My deer season started after a 7-day frustrating muzzy elk hunt in the Manashtash, rubbing shoulders with 1,000 other hunters and catching a nasty cold/cough/sinus infection, and no tag filled. I now had two days to try to fill my deer tag, and I was running low on energy. (Does anybody else hate that muzzy deer and elk run concurrent?!!?) After returning home, I washed my camo, re-organized my pack and truck and headed out solo Saturday morning (10/8/16). My plan was to hike about a mile out to a glassing point and try to see which way the deer were headed after feeding.
About 3/4 mi in I got busted by a small herd with a couple legal bucks, and they took off. Apparently they were moving earlier than I expected. I decided to continue to my glassing point and when I was almost there, got busted again by two bucks about 250 yds away. Actually, only the one buck saw me (a forky) but the bigger buck kept eating. The bigger buck was beautiful, with a really white face and a double throat patch. He looked so pretty and angelic that I nicknamed him Angel. I was pinned in open ground and the wind was all wrong. I decided to backtrack, letting them see me leave, and try to go around the hill and get in front of them upwind. Every time I popped over the hill they weren't where I expected them to be, and the annoying little forky, who was hyper-alert, saw me first. I nicknamed him Guard Dog. Three times I made a play for Angel, but every single time Guard Dog busted me and I couldn't get closer than 180 yds. I finally watched them bed down and decided to try again in the afternoon. I was exhausted and was having a hard time breathing and decided to take a short rest. I never could find them that afternoon, and finally sat a stand at a funnel point til dark, but had no action. Saturday night I had a little pity party for myself and felt defeated, bummed that I was going to have to resort to a late season hunt. My husband tried to talk me into skipping Sunday's hunt and just plan for late season, but I told him I'd just do a half a day. If I didn't have a deer down by noon, I'd come home.
So Sunday am, I headed out extra early, taking a slightly different route so that I could be waiting for the deer as they fed up. Just after first light I was walking down a little draw, expecting the deer to be coming in from my left. As I glanced at the hillside to my right I see a deer looking at me...it was Guard Dog! But Angel was with him too, so I re-routed and got out of sight. I dropped my pack and belly crawled until I could see them. 160 yds...just a bit further than I'm comfortable with for my gun. But I had no more moves to make without being seen, so I watched them feed away over then next ridge. Once they were out of sight, I ran down and along the bottom of the draw trying to close the distance. Thankfully there was enough wind (in the perfect direction this time) to cover my noise. When I thought I was far enough, I slowed down, and peered up where I thought they'd be. No deer. I looked up higher, thinking they had fed up and over already, but no deer. I started back down the hill, but peeked over down lower and saw Angel with his head up! I dropped and tried to crawl and peek over, but they had seen me already. They had both trotted out about 90 yards and were standing broadside looking at me. That distance I could do, so I shot free-hand, half kneeling half crouching and dropped Angel in his tracks! HALLELUJAH! I was so relieved! I got him tagged, gutted and hiked back to the truck for the deer cart. After I got him on it, it suffered some catastrophic breakdown (damn cheap pins!) that all my country girl ingenuity, duct tape and baling twine couldn't fix. I knew that this year I didn't have the strength to drag him the 2 miles alone, or even quarter him and make that many trips. I just had no energy left. So I hiked back to the truck, drove to cell service and called my little brother. Luckily he answered and came out and we managed to get him out. We then got him home, skinned and ready for the butcher. Fortunately it was a cold day, as long as the pack-out took. Taking care of the meat is my number one priority! It was a long hard day, but super worth it. I'm so proud and humbled and blessed to have this buck! I couldn't have done it without help from the Good Lord, the best little brother in the world, and support from my parents and husband.
Here are some pictures of my Angel (the tag is on his left hind leg for all you internet police out there). You can see how exhausted and haggard I look in my picture lol! It was definitely hard earned this year, but then again, when isn't it? :)
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Post by: kellama2001 on October 14, 2016, 12:19:17 PM
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Post by: Curly on October 14, 2016, 03:32:06 PM
:brew:
:party1:
:EAT:
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