Had the hunt of a lifetime last Saturday...
I hunt at my parent’s place with my Bro-in-law and Nephew. They had filled their tags by 9:30 am with a basket-rack 8-pt and a half-rack 3-pt. They had dragged their deer out by 11:00 on both sides of me, making a lot of noise and leaving a lot of human scent. I kind figured my day was over because of that. I had just eaten a sandwich and had my gun sitting beside me in my stand when a doe came charging in over my right shoulder over the ridge and stopped dead in her tracks, half-way down, once she noticed me. Then I heard a big grunt – she was being followed by a beast. I grabbed my gun and she made 90 deg turn in back and away from me - and the buck followed – thought I blew it. Then I think she cut the deer drag trail left by the other two and it scared her back down the hill and the buck followed her. They were far to my right and it was going to be a Hail Mary, but I told myself if he presented himself broadside in the clearing above the creek bottom I was gonna pull the trigger and he did, so I did.
He took off like a bullet into the bottoms and I thought I’d missed him, I went to look where he stood and found no hair or blood, I had pretty much chalked it up to a failure. But I decided to go check out the area he ran towards and looked around for 10-15 min and finally found a speck of blood - then a few more. I followed a faint trail to the creek bank and then I felt a sinking feeling as I realized that he could run through the flowing creek either way for yards and I wouldn’t be able to track him, now I was fearing I had lost him wounded. I walked up the creek about 20 feet where a few logs had fallen over the bank found blood on a small sandy area where he had ducked to get under a log. Then I looked up and saw him. He had laid down in the creek, put his head on a log and died. All-in-all he probably didn’t make it 100 ft from where I shot him. But it’s not like he crashed-down, it’s almost like he posed. You couldn’t stage a more peaceful scene. I could just see his back against the log and his head was perfectly propped so I could see his rack sticking up. It was unreal, very emotional and an experience I’ll never forget. Beautiful 10 point symmetrical rack with a 16” inside spread. I caped him out and am having a shoulder mount done. Got 60 lbs of meat out of him – and that’s with having to throw out half the left shoulder from the shot, you’re lucky to get 45 lbs on an average buck – he was an absolute mule! Took 3 of us a couple of hours to drag him out through awful undergrowth, prickly ash and brush – I think the deer got the last laugh on that one.
Pics of him in the water were exactly how I found him - I did not re-position anything for the shot, except for the last one when we moved him up on the bank to dress him out.
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