Okay, finally a chance to sit down. The story really starts last weekend. As I mentioned previously, the bow arrived minutes before I was walking out the door. I didn't expect it to make it in until after the weekend. I put it together, ran a few arrows through it and took it out.
I have a stand several hundered yards from a fence line and a wheat field on the other side. It's a great travel channel from their bedding area to several food sources. I also have a feeder set up there as well. I had been saving this stand for Hope. I've had 7-10 doe within 5-15 yards viturally every time I've sat this stand. I also had two nice 8 points within 3 yards the weekend before! I just knew it would be perfect. Well, the racoons managed to tear up the cage on the feeder and emptied the entire thing. The wind was very high and I had a feeling they might not be just traveling through with the feeder out of commission, so I high tailed it a ground blind I built right on the edge of a field.
An hour before dark I saw two doe and what looked to be a nice buck coming down a fence line headed my direction. It was the last weekend to shoot a buck so I was pretty excited. They disappeared into the brushline (as they normally do) but for whatever reason they never came out. As I was getting ready to call it a night, something starting growling and snorting downwind. I knew it was a lone boar letting anyone know he was coming in. Come in he did, running off several racoons. He was a good medium sized black boar, probably 200+. I flipped my headlight on and let him adjust to the light for a bit. Everything settled and he gave me a 17 yard broadside shot. I had been rehearsing my shot mentally for 2 hours now (as my last shot on a deer several weeks prior went awry). I drew, anchored, and the arrow was away.....
Unfortunately, as the arrow was about to leave the bow the top limb hit the top of the ground blind (I usually shoot my 56" out of this blind and I guess the extra 2" made the difference). The sound of the "ding" and my arrow soaring over his back left a sick feeling in my gut. I hoped he might come back in but no luck.
I sat the next morning at the stand I previously mentioned but the wind was very high and not much was moving. Late morning I see the herd of doe move into the wheat field several hundred yards off. I know that all I have to do is wait for them to move back to their bedding area for them to walk right past me. And then all hell broke loose, they start running every where and I can't figure out what has them so spooked. Then I see a jeep driving across the field! I guess the land owners decided to go for a joy ride and blow my entire morning.
The weekend wasn't a total loss, I did manage to make a head shot on this guy on my walk out. A little Texas dillo for Hope. More to come....