Nights are cool, just above freezing, and the days are enjoyable at 50 and sunny. And Halloween always seems to be a good time to be in the deer woods. So, Sunday at 4:00pm I hiked out behind the house up and then over the first ridge. There's a hollow there with plenty of browse and a small stream. I picked a tree, standing alone but with leave cover behind it, and set up the Lone Wolf hand climber. Up nearly 20 ft - higher than usual but with the ridge behind me I wanted to use height to make up for lack of cover.
I settled in and soon the rustling of sguirrels kept me entertained. A redtail hawk flew to a nearby tree, drawn perhaps by the same noises, and the alarm went out. Minutes later that hawk set out to scout another hunting area and the treebears made their way back into the open. Within minutes, I heard rustling in the leaves behind and to the left. Slowly turning I saw the buck slowly approaching through the brush, browsing on foliage as he came. His antlers were just barely as wide as his ears - my self imposed criteria for bucks- and at first I decided to let him walk. A careful look showed his right side antler considerably smaller than the left and I decided, in some kind of hunting logic, that he was something of a cull buck. Waiting 3 years wasn't likely to make him a record book buck and also wouldn't improve the meat!
Down wind of me but calm, he stopped at 15 yards and began half heartedly working a small sapling. I looked hard at "the spot" but waited for him to move his right leg forward. Instead, he finished rubbing and turned toward my tree and resumed feeding as he came. I began to think luck was with him and he'd scent me. He walked directly under my stand, and never even paused. Despite this, I had another problem. He was passing directly away, offering only a tail end view as he started up the very trail that I had walked just 30 minutes earlier!
This buck was hungry though, and was busily pulling brush and munching leaves. He turned partly to right to reach for a tender morsel and as he streched out for that last mouthful I drew 50 lbs of Navajo limbs fitted to an old Myles Keller XI compound riser and aimed steeply down through the deer to his farside shoulder. The Goldtip Traditional flew true. 200 grains of Steel force single bevel broadhead entered high at the last rib, barely clipped the liver and passed through the far lung and down to the elbow where it stopped on bone.
My buck bolted up over the hill, followed my path 200yds toward home, and laid to rest some 100yds from my back yard.
A short drag, and he was weighed at 165#, gutted and hanging, and I was back in street clothes well before dark.
Topic: A Nice 8, and an Easy Drag... (Read 7224 times)
