Dewy
Active Member
A DAY OF THREE FIRSTS November 22, 2004
Saturday, November 20th I was fortunate to experience three firsts; my first buck shooting left handed, my first deer taken from a Lonewolf tree stand, and my first mature buck with a bow. Although I have enjoyed bow hunting since I was in high school, I have rarely had the time until recently to truly develop a passion for the sport. Being involved in football as a high school athlete, as a college athlete, and as a high school coach for 11 seasons, left very little time for the stand. After the 2001 football season I resigned my coaching position to pursue a life that involved more time spent with my two young sons Jordan and Tanner ages, 6 and 9, my wife Marcy, and more time spent enjoying the changing of the seasons in the late fall.
The 1st First.
I began shooting left handed during the spring of this year due to failing vision in my right eye. Although I have been left eye dominant my entire life I learned to shoot both the gun and bow right handed and had managed quite well until several years ago. During the fall of 2002 and 2003 I found myself passing on several mature bucks simply because I could not pick out the vitals zone in the shadows of the timbers in which I hunt. I began looking for solutions for my problem from bow scopes to optimizers and combinations but nothing was satisfactory for my situation. My only feasible option was to switch to shooting left handed. As you might imagine it was more than a little awkward at first but within a couple of weeks I was shooting a cheap low weight recurve bow fairly well. I vowed to continue to shoot left handed until I dreamt about shooting left handed. This happened in late July of 2004 and with in days I had a year old quality compound bow and was chomping at the bit to get proficient with it. It wasn’t long before I was confident with my new weapon and was ready for the woods.
The 2nd First.
On Saturday, November 20th I arrived on a side hill that is bordered by a wide brushy ravine to the east and south, CRP, to the west, and a dense evergreen stand to the north. Although I had gun hunted the area while I growing up I had not been back for nearly 10 years and had never bow hunted the area. I relied on old memories to locate an old overgrown logging road and it provided me with a quite entry to the area which I had no real idea of where I would hang my Lonewolf. As light gradually began to chase away the night, I spotted a moderately sized hickory tree that looked over the logging road and provided me with at least one shooting lane in each general direction. After a fair number of hunting trips made with my stand I was in position within twenty minutes of identifying the “perfect†tree for my potential ambush. At 7:00 deer began to move both to the north and south of my location. Several does made there way past me and I was anxious to see a buck hot on their trail but was to be disappointed…again. The timber began to quite down as a “load mouth†flock of turkeys made their way out of the ravine below me and I began to shiver in the cold westerly wind that blew down my back. At 8:30 a small doe milled around my stand and made her bed 10 yards to the northeast of me. A half hour later an immature 8 pointer also decided to bed close by and my excitement began to rise. I knew that I was in the perfect location for an all day sit. Patience, although not my strong point, would be the key to success on this day.
At 9:55 the timber seemed to awaken from an endless slumber. Turkeys again began to cluck, purr, and yelp, squirrels began scampering and chattering, and low and behold, major deer movement began to happen. 5 does approached my stand from the north and were quickly greeted by the young buck that had been bedded close to me. He made short order of running them all back the direction they had just came from when movement caught my eye to the south. A mature buck was chasing does towards me and I quickly readied my bow for action. After checking one of the does he wheeled back to the south and for a moment I thought that he was gone for good. In desperation I gave him a couple of short grunts on my grunt tube. I am confident that I had no effect on him but the last doe in the caravan did. As the doe approached the downwind side of my stand, which was right in front of me due to a shift in wind direction, I began to get nervous. The buck stopped behind a cluster of trees to my right only 30 yards away as the doe managed to work directly down wind of me. It wasn’t long before she was as nervous as I was. The buck stepped out from behind the trees presenting me with a slightly quartering towards shot. As I drew my bow I glanced at the doe in front of me and she knew that I was there and that I shouldn’t be. Knowing that I did not have the “perfect†shot on the buck I settled my thirty yard pin just behind the shoulder. I knew that the doe in front of me was about to go and a “jail break†and I was not going let that happen with out letting my arrow fly.
The 3rd First
I released the arrow and tracked it to the mid section of the kill zone. A slightly quartering towards shot into the mid section of the kill zone would require some wait time. At best I knew I had made a good hit on one lung and perhaps the back of the second. I climbed down out of my stand and headed to my truck which was a half hour walk the opposite direction that buck departed by. I was too nervous to eat my sandwich and probably shouldn’t have been driving but managed to keep it between the lines for several miles before heading back to the woods. When I returned to my stand an hour and twenty minutes had passed and I began looking for the blood trail that would hopefully lead me to the buck. After thirty minutes of sorting things out I found the blood trail and carefully made my way to the east and then to the south. The blood was bright red with occasional air bubbles in it and I knew that I would find the buck dead soon but still had that level of anxiety that hopefully all hunters experience until they actually recover their quarry. Approximately 200 yards from where my arrow hit is where I found the tall tined bruiser. I was first taken back by the fact that I had just completed a bow season filled with excitement and the joy that spending a great deal of time in the woods brings a hunter. I was then taken back by the enormous body size of the buck. He was truly an Iowa corn fed bruit of a deer. As I admired the result of many long hours in the stand this season, it came to me that there was a simple irony in where I was located. I was only a thirty to forty yards from where I had harvested my first deer with a shotgun nearly fifteen years ago. He too was a mature buck and there are many similarities in the body size and the antler symmetry of the two deer. This made a very special moment all that more memorable.
My first mature buck taken by my first left handed bow from my first portable tree stand finishing the hunt where I had first developed a passion for deer hunting. Had I not committed to learning to shoot left handed when I did and had I not been able to place a stand in the location I did, the first mature buck part of the equation may have not been a possibility this season.
Saturday, November 20th I was fortunate to experience three firsts; my first buck shooting left handed, my first deer taken from a Lonewolf tree stand, and my first mature buck with a bow. Although I have enjoyed bow hunting since I was in high school, I have rarely had the time until recently to truly develop a passion for the sport. Being involved in football as a high school athlete, as a college athlete, and as a high school coach for 11 seasons, left very little time for the stand. After the 2001 football season I resigned my coaching position to pursue a life that involved more time spent with my two young sons Jordan and Tanner ages, 6 and 9, my wife Marcy, and more time spent enjoying the changing of the seasons in the late fall.
The 1st First.
I began shooting left handed during the spring of this year due to failing vision in my right eye. Although I have been left eye dominant my entire life I learned to shoot both the gun and bow right handed and had managed quite well until several years ago. During the fall of 2002 and 2003 I found myself passing on several mature bucks simply because I could not pick out the vitals zone in the shadows of the timbers in which I hunt. I began looking for solutions for my problem from bow scopes to optimizers and combinations but nothing was satisfactory for my situation. My only feasible option was to switch to shooting left handed. As you might imagine it was more than a little awkward at first but within a couple of weeks I was shooting a cheap low weight recurve bow fairly well. I vowed to continue to shoot left handed until I dreamt about shooting left handed. This happened in late July of 2004 and with in days I had a year old quality compound bow and was chomping at the bit to get proficient with it. It wasn’t long before I was confident with my new weapon and was ready for the woods.
The 2nd First.
On Saturday, November 20th I arrived on a side hill that is bordered by a wide brushy ravine to the east and south, CRP, to the west, and a dense evergreen stand to the north. Although I had gun hunted the area while I growing up I had not been back for nearly 10 years and had never bow hunted the area. I relied on old memories to locate an old overgrown logging road and it provided me with a quite entry to the area which I had no real idea of where I would hang my Lonewolf. As light gradually began to chase away the night, I spotted a moderately sized hickory tree that looked over the logging road and provided me with at least one shooting lane in each general direction. After a fair number of hunting trips made with my stand I was in position within twenty minutes of identifying the “perfect†tree for my potential ambush. At 7:00 deer began to move both to the north and south of my location. Several does made there way past me and I was anxious to see a buck hot on their trail but was to be disappointed…again. The timber began to quite down as a “load mouth†flock of turkeys made their way out of the ravine below me and I began to shiver in the cold westerly wind that blew down my back. At 8:30 a small doe milled around my stand and made her bed 10 yards to the northeast of me. A half hour later an immature 8 pointer also decided to bed close by and my excitement began to rise. I knew that I was in the perfect location for an all day sit. Patience, although not my strong point, would be the key to success on this day.
At 9:55 the timber seemed to awaken from an endless slumber. Turkeys again began to cluck, purr, and yelp, squirrels began scampering and chattering, and low and behold, major deer movement began to happen. 5 does approached my stand from the north and were quickly greeted by the young buck that had been bedded close to me. He made short order of running them all back the direction they had just came from when movement caught my eye to the south. A mature buck was chasing does towards me and I quickly readied my bow for action. After checking one of the does he wheeled back to the south and for a moment I thought that he was gone for good. In desperation I gave him a couple of short grunts on my grunt tube. I am confident that I had no effect on him but the last doe in the caravan did. As the doe approached the downwind side of my stand, which was right in front of me due to a shift in wind direction, I began to get nervous. The buck stopped behind a cluster of trees to my right only 30 yards away as the doe managed to work directly down wind of me. It wasn’t long before she was as nervous as I was. The buck stepped out from behind the trees presenting me with a slightly quartering towards shot. As I drew my bow I glanced at the doe in front of me and she knew that I was there and that I shouldn’t be. Knowing that I did not have the “perfect†shot on the buck I settled my thirty yard pin just behind the shoulder. I knew that the doe in front of me was about to go and a “jail break†and I was not going let that happen with out letting my arrow fly.
The 3rd First
I released the arrow and tracked it to the mid section of the kill zone. A slightly quartering towards shot into the mid section of the kill zone would require some wait time. At best I knew I had made a good hit on one lung and perhaps the back of the second. I climbed down out of my stand and headed to my truck which was a half hour walk the opposite direction that buck departed by. I was too nervous to eat my sandwich and probably shouldn’t have been driving but managed to keep it between the lines for several miles before heading back to the woods. When I returned to my stand an hour and twenty minutes had passed and I began looking for the blood trail that would hopefully lead me to the buck. After thirty minutes of sorting things out I found the blood trail and carefully made my way to the east and then to the south. The blood was bright red with occasional air bubbles in it and I knew that I would find the buck dead soon but still had that level of anxiety that hopefully all hunters experience until they actually recover their quarry. Approximately 200 yards from where my arrow hit is where I found the tall tined bruiser. I was first taken back by the fact that I had just completed a bow season filled with excitement and the joy that spending a great deal of time in the woods brings a hunter. I was then taken back by the enormous body size of the buck. He was truly an Iowa corn fed bruit of a deer. As I admired the result of many long hours in the stand this season, it came to me that there was a simple irony in where I was located. I was only a thirty to forty yards from where I had harvested my first deer with a shotgun nearly fifteen years ago. He too was a mature buck and there are many similarities in the body size and the antler symmetry of the two deer. This made a very special moment all that more memorable.
My first mature buck taken by my first left handed bow from my first portable tree stand finishing the hunt where I had first developed a passion for deer hunting. Had I not committed to learning to shoot left handed when I did and had I not been able to place a stand in the location I did, the first mature buck part of the equation may have not been a possibility this season.
