Trad Gang
Topic Archives => Memorable Hunts => Topic started by: maineac on December 11, 2008, 09:48:00 AM
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After a fruitless archery season, and rifle (I have not gone over to the bow only mode) I decided to try with my new recurve again in an expanded archery zone in the town of Rockland. This is an archery only zone that opened for an extended season to try to control the deer population in a heavily developed town. My buddy had been scouting the property we had permission to hunt, and a scrape had been freshened near the tree we scouted in Sept.. He took his first deer, a big 4 point from, that tree as well as a small spike. When I set up a single line of tracks that looked like a good buck passed in front of the tree and headed into the thick cover bordering the property we have permission to hunt. As sunset approached I turned to face the area I thought the deer would come from. At 4:10 up pops a nice deer and walks down to me. I can see his body and antlers clearly against the snow on the ground. I am set up to shoot to my left with my right shoulder leaning on the tree as he pops up at 12:00 to the direction I am facing. He walks directly at me and hits a point where he can angle left (perfect) or right (not so perfect), he turns right. I start to move my arrow over some tiny branches from a neighboring tree, lightly hitting a tiny branch. At the sound he stops 8 yards from the base of the tree, looks around and then look up at me. He stares for about 30 seconds, drops his head and turns right. As he looks up at me I can see the white rings around his eyes and nose, and ten points on his rack. He takes a couple of steps and I draw to anchor and release as he steps into a shooting lane. I see and hear the arrow hit, a little further back than I wanted, but he is sharply quartering away and the arrow is headed for the opposite shoulder. He runs off, stops looks back and walks away. After getting down and meeting my buddy who was just down the hill from me we went back to the shot site and track him to where he starts walking. He walks up a four wheeler trail and heads to a thick power line full of brush and juniper. Since there is no blood yet we decided to back out for 4 hours.
When we got back we trailed him for 200 yards, with very little blood, except if he bumped into a tree or sapling. Thank goodness for the snow. I had a little trouble when he used the same trail as some does, but was able to work out where he separated. He crossed a big yard and road on a run. On the other side of the road we found good blood, but decided to back out considering how far he had come and the fact that he was running. I don't think we pushed him as he had never stopped or bedded down after the initial hit.
With two hours of sleep under my belt I finally got up at four and diddled around until I had to pick up my buddy and son at six. We headed back and got in to the woods at 6:45. It had snowed about a 1/4 inch during the night and made it tough to follow the track, especially with a fair number of doe tracks weaving through the woods. We finally started to hit good blood we could see through the snow. We tracked him to his bed which was about 400 yards from the hit site. He had gotten up and kept going. I was not sure why, there were doe tracks near by and some coyote tracks. the trail wa fairly easy to follow as he must have been moving near the end of the snow. I began to worry when any time we lost the track it was easy to find by looping onto one of the four sets of coyote tracks. After four hours of tracking we found him. A beautiful 10 pointer that would have dressed out in the 180's. Problem is the better set of trackers had gotten there first and left nothing but the head, neck and one shoulder. I was able to salvage a couple of sections of backstrap as well, the skin, head and neck. Not much to show up with at the tagging station. The total track was about 8/10 of mile from hit site to where we found him. I would never have been able to track him with out the snow. I wish I had gotten to him before the coyotes, but I don't regret backing out and giving him more time.
(http://i485.photobucket.com/albums/rr220/mstenstrom/081sm.jpg)
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Good job and good on you for not just leaving the rest for the coyotes.
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Good Job a true Sportsman ,,, Up here in canada we too have a coyote problem with wounded deer the dogs seem to get as many wounded deer as us ,it is a hard call to not find a less than perfectly hit deer right away as you know the coyotes will probably find it before you ...But we never give up , sometimes we even claim our trophy before the dogs ,,
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Congrats on your buck. :thumbsup:
Sounds like a couple coyote pelts would look good hang'n next to his rack. ;)
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:thumbsup:
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Congrats i hate coyotes :clapper:
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:thumbsup: :clapper:
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:thumbsup: :thumbsup:
Well done - sorry to hear about the coyotes
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Congrats on a VERY nice buck!!! Good trackin!! Joe
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Congrats way to stick with it! Last season I killed a Doe on opening day a 45 minutes before last light, took my stand down, went back to my truck, dropped off my gear, came back to drag the Doe out, the Coyotes got to her in a half hour. She died 45 yards from my stand. They did a number on her, I do a lot of Coyote hunting now a days, good fun!
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We moved him and flipped him over to take the picts. The side facing the camera was the one on the ground, so the yotes only ate down to the skin. It is amazing what 9 or ten coyotes can do in a short amount of time.
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Nice job, Mike. Do you ever get to the Poke and Hope shoot in Durham? If not you are missing out on a great event.
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Congrats :thumbsup:
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Nicw job. Congrats.
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Bill I have not. I will watch for it. When does it usually occur?
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Congrats on a fine buck. Way to stick with it.
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That's a heck of a way to kick off your 1st trad kill!
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Great story and a great Buck. :clapper: I'm glad you found him. Darn 'yotes we have them here in Jersey too.
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:thumbsup:
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Nice job!
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Very nice! Well done! Thanks for sharing! ;) :thumbsup:
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very nice,congrats :thumbsup: :clapper:
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:bigsmyl:
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nice deer,congrats on the tracking job.bill was right about poke and hope.great time,its held in durham me,2nd weekend of july.
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Nice Deer and nice tracking job! Good on ya! :thumbsup:
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Congrats, Persistance pays off!!
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Just want to say, "My hats off and respect to you!" Sorry that there wasn't much left to feast on your reward. Hope those dang yotes appreciated the free meal!
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you should be proud! Congratulations! :notworthy: :clapper:
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Fantastic job.
I will second what Morning Star said.
You did the right thing by backing out.
Big bucks can be just plain tough, and he surely fits the criteria for "big bucks".
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Tops!
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Congradultions did you ever determine where he was shot that he could go that long and far?
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The arrow entered at about the second rib forward on right side, angling down and forward to the opposite shoulder. No exit wound. Liver and paunch were gone. Looked like top of the left lobe of the lung had been cut. Autopsy was tough since the coyotes had removed most of the organs including the heart.
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you are traid.you have done it ... great job :archer: :clapper: :cool:
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Nice job on a great buck, congratulations.
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Sometimes you win, sometimes you win and lose at the same time, but you did the right thing, and because of your persistence, your first will always be a beautiful story. The Coyotes are hunters too.
Congrats
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Nice job start to finish! :thumbsup:
Absolutely, check out the Poke and Hope shoot. They even make we "foreigners" feel Welcome!!
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Good job on the deer, those coyotes are pretty good at their job.
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Way to stick with it.It all makes for a good "1st trad kill" story and that's a very nice buck,too.
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congrats ! Made a great picture !!
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Way to stay with it. I enjoy reading stories of tough tracking, good decisions, persistance, and success.