He was standing behind my tree eating acorns and the whole time I'm thinking, "I KNEW I SHOULD HAVE SET MY STAND FACING THE OTHER WAY!"
The previous night as I checked the weather forecast it called fors a NW wind was to be blowing 15-20mph the whole day. I woke up the next morning hopeful but in my tired state and looking at the current forecast of all the "WIND", I decided to stay in my good warm bed. I woke up again about 7am and saw that there was hardly any wind blowing at all. I was upset. I knew the rainy cold front that had just passed the previous day would have the deer up and eating. I left my house at 2:00 to go climb my stand. After taking my time to not get too sweaty, after a 45min walk I got up and settled in the stand good at about 3:30pm. I sat for about 10min and when the wind would blow, it was cold on my legs. I had to stand to create air space between my pants and legs thus making it alil warmer. Besides, its harder to get busted while standing. 4:20 I see 2 does walk up to the bench im on from behind me and slowly turn and feed the other way. "Hmm, maybe I should face that way," I thought to myself. I was excited to already see deer moving. The wind would blow hard and then die off for a few seconds. I wanted to make sure I was prepared so I took out some hot hands packets to make sure my hands wouldn't get too cold. (The first 45deg cool day of season is always "cold" when its 85 the day before!)
I hadn't even got my hot hands packets in my pockets and I see another deer come up the same way the does did. This is a young 4pt buck. BUT DADGUMMIT! ITS THE FIRST WEEK OF SEASON AND IM WANTING TO SHOOT ANY DEER! He feeds behind my stand slowly. Now I'm thinking, "Crap! If this deer moves off, I'm definitely going to reposition my stand on this tree!" The wind would blow hard and rest and blow hard again and rest. Im looking at him behind my tree on the right side of the tree. He picks his head up abit and looks uphill. "Please dont wind me!" I pray. He picks his head up high and is looking intently. "What is he looking at?" I slowwwwly turn to the left side of the tree. "Oh my gosh! Look at the body on this guy!!" He was about even with my and coming down the hill so he looked even bigger! haha.. He fed down to the young deer and fed and fed and fed some more. He was just GORGING on acorns. The closer he got to my tree the more worried I got that he would smell where I had been. Well, as fate would have it, he stayed just far enough away and as he walked just 4 steps from the base of my tree, slightly quartered away, I found my mark high on his ribs. I blinked in slow motion and as I opened my eyes his body grew bigger. I leaned out over my stand and got even closer. He seemed to be just a few feet away. I pulled back my string visually unaware of the bow or arrow. All I could see was this "spot" to hit. Instinctively I let the arrow fly. I never saw it in flight, but my "spot" disappeared and was covered with a bright orange lumenok. I heard the impact as arrow burried inside. Boy! Did he ever take off!! I knew the shot was good, but also knew there was no exit hole and was going to be a hard track to follow. After 30min of looking, I found a drop of blood at the last place I saw him and then another about 5yds farther. It was getting dark and knew I was going to need some help.
Fortunately I know a guy, Tom Munoz, with some dogs trained to blood trail deer. German wire haired dachsunds. As we drove to the trees in his truck I was asked what I used to shoot the deer with. "A Black Widow recurve" I replied. Tom hit the brakes and came to a complete stop. "You mean to tell me that you shot this buck with a recurve?!?!" -my first thought was, "dang, hes gonna think theres no way we are going to find it since its with a trad bow"- "Yes sir I did!" I firmly replied. He said, "Wow! You are a serious hunter if you are doing it with a recurve. I really respect that! WE ARE GOING TO FIND YOUR DEER EVEN IF WE HAVE TO COME BACK IN THE MORNING WITH BOTH DOGS!" I just grinned and was feeling very proud. The dog got on trail and worked very fast. He started whimpering a bit and that meant that he was hot on the trail. All of a sudden I looked up ahead and there was a BRIGHT orange glow in the black of the wooded night. "ITS MY ARROW! DID IT BREAK OFF? DID IT COME OUT?! IS IT IN MY DEER?!?!" Sure enough it was in my deer. After high fives were given and pictures taken, it was a successful hunt for me and the dog and his trainer! here's the video
Topic: My first harvest of 2011 (Read 463 times)
