Last Friday evening marked the 6th time I had gotten out so far this season. Earlier that day I was perched in a white oak and witnessed two bruisers do battle as the sun rose and gave way to a beautiful morning. The two bucks fought for about 5 minutes with the loser left searching for new territory. I grabbed my rattling antlers and did my best to imitate the previous scenerio. This marked only the second time I had witnessed an all out battle by two mature bucks. There is usually quite a bit of sparring that can be seen in the fall, but all out battles are of a different nature.
After I rattled I wheezed and shortly thereafter a beautiful 5x5 walked in to 40 yards. Steam billowing out of his mouth as his tongue hung out, obviously worn out from the recent battle. He stopped and wheezed back at me as I stood ready for the coming shot. Moments later I could hear a deer walking on the other side of me and when he angled by I could see he was a smaller racked 4x4. Usually it is the doe that steers the buck off course in those last few needed yards and spoils the shot, but this time it was a younger buck who foiled my attempt. The smaller buck was soon cut off by the larger 5x5 taking him away from my perch rather than allowing him to continue on the path towards me. I did manage to wheeze him back in to 40 yards, but once again two smaller bucks entered the area and again he walked them off. Things slowed down by about 11 am and I needed to get back in the shop for a few hours in order to make it our for an evening hunt.
The evening hunt found me in a new stand that had not been hunted before. The stand sets in small point of timber that juts out from the main body of timber. For years we have watched deer work their way around this point and finally this summer a stand was set there. On my way in I hung a set cam on a tree about 25 yards away, facing a scrape with the stand in the background. At about 5:00 I noticed a doe and fawn to the east of me at about 40 yards feeding on acorns on the edge of the timber. A few minutes later I noticed a tine move in the timber. The buck was standing about 20 yards behind the doe and fawn patiently watching and following. The deer fed for about 45 minutes moving only a couple yards the entire time. The does stepped out and began to make their way along the field edge. They walked through my shooting lanes and went and stood in the scrape, looking at the camera. On cue the 5x4 walked by and stopped in my second shooting lane, almost. There he was, broadside, 10 yards and looking ahead at the does. Only problem was is that his vitals were covered by a 4" sapling. I had placed some doe in estrous urine out just a yard or so in front of his position in hopes that I could get a buck to stop and lower his head. The buck finished urinating on his tarsals and took one step forward and stopped again, this time with his vitals in the wide open. It wasn't until this moment that I decided that I was going to take the shot. His body was heavy and his head big and blocky. His body size and behaviour of slowly following and being patient with the doe led me to believe that he was a solid mature buck and at that time I decided to shoot. The cedar shaft zipped through the buck taking out both lungs along the way. About 75 yards later he stopped, rapidly twitched his tail and fell over. I sat until dark watching a few does come by and even thought about filling another doe tag along the way. I figured it was good enough as it was and left the remaining arrows snug in the quiver to use another day.
Dad had been hunting another farm but came over after dark to help out. We worked out the trail and found him in a matter of minutes, snapped a few pictures and got him loaded up for the ride out. Best of luck to everyone. Pick a spot and enjoy every moment!
Topic: TallTines on a Friday night (Read 1428 times)
