Friday November 21, 2014

It was 19 degrees this morning when I headed into the woods with a stiff East wind. At first light I saw a deer moving across the field above me. Although I couldn’t see it clearly if I had to guess I’d say it was a buck heading back to his bedding ground since the direction he was going is loaded with thick cover.

Shortly after he disappeared I had four does wind me. They also galloped across the field toward the bedding ground.

At 7:30 I had a small buck appear out of nowhere down in front of my stand. His ears rotated from left to right then back to front as he tried to identify anything unordinary in the area. As he stood motionless I could see his breath rise into the air every time he exhaled. I captured over four minutes of video before he lazily made his way up the hill and disappeared behind a small knob.

About 20 minutes later at 7:50 a doe quickly made her way out of the bottom and continued past me like she had someplace to get to. She passed within 10 yards of the tree I was in and didn’t have a clue I was there, which was somewhat surprising considering the way the wind was swirling around in the treetops.

At 8:20 my belly began to growl, so I reached inside my coat and pulled out the glucose monitor to check my blood. On this vacation I had given up on the Instant Glucose Monitor because it wouldn’t stay attached long enough to make it worth wearing. When the monitor beeped I glanced down and was pleased to see 88. I decided to get a pack of crackers out of my backpack, which was hanging on the back of the tree. When I was crinkling the package to retrieve a cracker something caught my eye on the other side of the tree where the doe had passed through earlier in the morning.

Without hesitation I stuffed the cracker in my mouth and dumped the rest of the package into my inside coat pocket. Looking at his extremely high, tight rack combined with some really long G-3s I decided I would shoot him if I got an opportunity.

Suddenly he put his nose on the ground and began following the doe’s tracks in the wrong direction. I drew the bow and  made a quick grunting noise to stop him, which worked perfectly. I settled the 40 yard pin onto the lower part of his chest and seconds later the arrow was on it’s way.

As soon as the arrow hit I could see pink blood spraying all over the leaves. I knew I had double lunged him. He crashed about 40 yards from where I hit him. I enjoyed the moment and took it all in while reflecting on the trip, the hunt and life.

While doing that two more does came by me feeding. When they hit the track of the fleeing buck they followed it. After they left I climbed down to see my deer. When I got to him I realized I had killed the buck we named Joe Jr. after the big buck my buddy Joe shot last year. That buck scored 175 and this buck was a scaled down version of him.

Dad sat in the cedar stand this morning. He saw two does and two bucks as well as three other deer he couldn’t identify. Tonight he sat in the South Plot and nothing showed up. After discussing a variety of things this evening dad decided he’s going out in the morning before we head home. He’s going to sit in the cedar stand because he has a good feeling about it.

I’m not sure what will happen tomorrow, but I can easily and undoubtedly tell you this has been an unforgettable trip. Hopefully my dad goes to the doctor for the chronic coughing when we get home. It makes me worry and unless you could see him in action he could easily fool you into thinking nothing is wrong with him. Here are a few pictures from today. The buck was a main-frame 10-pointer with a couple of stickers. The trail camera pictures of him were captured about a month before I got him.

 

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