Rut activity has really picked up around here. Had some bad luck yesterday morning. Had a buck come in dogging three does. His head and shoulder went behind a small tree leaving his last three ribs exposed for a shot. For some reason....does moving around, two more does coming up another trail, bow noise....not sure, he dropped when I released. The arrow hit him in the shoulder blade and deflected due to the quartering angle I guess. Found about two tablespoons of blood total. He ran off about 50 yards and checked a scrape which is the only place I found blood bigger than a pin head sized drop. He then turned and trotted down a hill and jumped the creek. I followed his tracks in the creek bottom and found no more blood. Called a friend and we did a grid search with negative results. I was positive from the hit and watching him through the binos work a scrape that the hit was superficial, but I still made the effort.
It was late when I finished my search so I called it a day rather hunt the afternoon. Hit the woods this a.m. and rattled in two small bucks right after sunrise. Around 10:00 I had a very nice buck push two does past me, but no shot was available. 20 minutes later a lone doe came through and followed the same path as the others. A very good morning!
Went back out this afternoon and hunted from the ground in a creek bottom. Thought there might be more activity in the bottom out of the wind. Saw one small buck in the bottom at sunset. I pulled out and still hunted my way out of the woods for the last 30 minutes of shooting light. Got out to the field where I turn to go to the truck and there were 3 bucks feeding. Two of them were pretty small....I had to use the binos to see their antlers! The third buck was pretty decent so I stayed put with about 7 minutes of shooting light left. No shot developed but I got a heck of a show! As they fed they moved closer together. One of the small bucks went after the other one as the bigger buck stood and watched. They apparently got too close to his "space" and he took off after them. It finally got too dark to see them, but I could hear them chasing each other around as I walked down to the truck!!
A great day overall! Tomorrow is supposed to be even windier with rain forecast for all day so I am sleeping in and heading to church. Good luck to all....hunt hard, hunt safe! Mike