John_Boy
PMA Member
Here's the story leading up to the hammer falling.
September 23, 2007 2:30pm
We received a phone call from Steve Cannon (Canjo) to see if Halee and I wanted to hunt on one of his farms and he would film. I talked it over with Halee and she was game. We were off to Madison County, and an eventful evening, setting up in a fencerow with alfalfa bordering a heavy bedding area. We saw around twenty deer that evening and three nice bucks but no opportunities to shoot.
September 25, 2007 4:00pm
After picking Halee up from school we made a mad dash to go home and change for tonight’s hunt, we were heading back to the alfalfa field. We got a little greedy and set-up 20 yrds from where we saw the bucks the night before, turned out to bite us later. We had does working the alfalfa around 6:00pm, we were covered up in does, so many they finally caught our movement and a mature doe was out to make it known to all we where there. She closed to 10yds stomping and snorting at Halee trying to get her to move. She was rock solid, other than a faint giggle and whispering “dad what is she doing?” I explained that deer stomp their hoof and snort in attempt to make you flinch or move confirming that you’re not suppose to be there. Steve, Halee and I remained motionless and the doe eventually moved off to our right. She would eventually circle downwind of us sounding the 911 alarm alerting deer everywhere. We thought that’s it were done no deer will come out after that but, around 7:00pm all was quite and the deer came back out about 150 yrds to our left just out of comfortable range for Halee to shoot. We glassed the deer in the field until 7:20pm when the bucks started coming into the field, eventually a giant buck would show himself with 5 minutes remaining in legal light. We studied him well; Steve and I guessed he was at least a 150’s class buck. We lost that round, as no shots were presented that evening. Steve went home and reviewed the video footage deciding that he was much larger than we thought. We decided to give it a night off and come back on Thursday.
September 27, 2007 4:00pm
I picked up Halee from school and we proceeded to rush home again to get changed in time to make the 30 min drive to the Madison County farm. Steve called stating he forgot the video camera and he would be late, we discussed set-up strategy and he voted we go get set-up and he would catch up to us. The set-up tonight would be in small wooded depression in the middle of the field, which offered the best wind conditions and cover with large round hay bales behind us. Steve showed up 10 minutes behind us, we were ready for the evening hunt. Around 6:30pm the first deer made there way into the field a doe and a fawn. They where heading right to us. They didn’t see us but she eventually got downwind of us busting out of the field. We figured that was it, we were busted again. We talked ourselves into believing it would be okay knowing we only had an hour left, then it happened around 7:00pm the deer appeared out of nowhere. They were all over in front of us, to the right of us and behind us. The bucks came cruising out to our right with two nice 130’s-140’s bucks offering Halee a shot. But wait she couldn’t get on them, her chair was facing north and the bucks were on the east side. I had to grab her chair and slowly turn it so she could get the crosshairs on the bigger of the two. In doing so, a doe a 40 yrds to our right busted my movement and started the stomp and snort. You would think we were done, but all the commotion in the fielded enticed the giant buck from the other night to crest the hill and present a broadside shot at 100yrds. Halee was on him but, time was running out the Big Buck would certainly have enough of the snorting and disappear. Fate would have it that Halee would steady the muzzleloader on her rest and snap a shot off. It happened so fast I didn’t see the impact and couldn’t see the buck when the smoke cleared. As we sat in awe of what had just happened, we heard two loud crashes about a minute apart. I told Steve he just crashed I heard it. He said he heard it also; we had a mini celebration and replayed the footage. It appeared Halee hit her mark as the Buck did a mule kick just as a doe almost eclipsed his vitals. That was close, a split second later and Halee would have shot doe number two. After 30 mins and no blood in the field our celebration was moving to despair. We searched back and forth circling for blood no luck; we then focused on the fence crossing still no luck. I jumped over the fence and searched for ten more minutes before finding a speck of blood. The buck had ran so fast and cleared the fence, he didn’t bleed a drop for 40 yards. Halee tracked the blood and Steve had spotted him first, what a giant in the moonlight we could see his massive rack glowing in the dark. Halee’s bullet had penetrated the front shoulder taking out both lungs a great 100yrd shot, a great ending to a magnificent hunt. Congrats to Halee!!!
September 23, 2007 2:30pm
We received a phone call from Steve Cannon (Canjo) to see if Halee and I wanted to hunt on one of his farms and he would film. I talked it over with Halee and she was game. We were off to Madison County, and an eventful evening, setting up in a fencerow with alfalfa bordering a heavy bedding area. We saw around twenty deer that evening and three nice bucks but no opportunities to shoot.
September 25, 2007 4:00pm
After picking Halee up from school we made a mad dash to go home and change for tonight’s hunt, we were heading back to the alfalfa field. We got a little greedy and set-up 20 yrds from where we saw the bucks the night before, turned out to bite us later. We had does working the alfalfa around 6:00pm, we were covered up in does, so many they finally caught our movement and a mature doe was out to make it known to all we where there. She closed to 10yds stomping and snorting at Halee trying to get her to move. She was rock solid, other than a faint giggle and whispering “dad what is she doing?” I explained that deer stomp their hoof and snort in attempt to make you flinch or move confirming that you’re not suppose to be there. Steve, Halee and I remained motionless and the doe eventually moved off to our right. She would eventually circle downwind of us sounding the 911 alarm alerting deer everywhere. We thought that’s it were done no deer will come out after that but, around 7:00pm all was quite and the deer came back out about 150 yrds to our left just out of comfortable range for Halee to shoot. We glassed the deer in the field until 7:20pm when the bucks started coming into the field, eventually a giant buck would show himself with 5 minutes remaining in legal light. We studied him well; Steve and I guessed he was at least a 150’s class buck. We lost that round, as no shots were presented that evening. Steve went home and reviewed the video footage deciding that he was much larger than we thought. We decided to give it a night off and come back on Thursday.
September 27, 2007 4:00pm
I picked up Halee from school and we proceeded to rush home again to get changed in time to make the 30 min drive to the Madison County farm. Steve called stating he forgot the video camera and he would be late, we discussed set-up strategy and he voted we go get set-up and he would catch up to us. The set-up tonight would be in small wooded depression in the middle of the field, which offered the best wind conditions and cover with large round hay bales behind us. Steve showed up 10 minutes behind us, we were ready for the evening hunt. Around 6:30pm the first deer made there way into the field a doe and a fawn. They where heading right to us. They didn’t see us but she eventually got downwind of us busting out of the field. We figured that was it, we were busted again. We talked ourselves into believing it would be okay knowing we only had an hour left, then it happened around 7:00pm the deer appeared out of nowhere. They were all over in front of us, to the right of us and behind us. The bucks came cruising out to our right with two nice 130’s-140’s bucks offering Halee a shot. But wait she couldn’t get on them, her chair was facing north and the bucks were on the east side. I had to grab her chair and slowly turn it so she could get the crosshairs on the bigger of the two. In doing so, a doe a 40 yrds to our right busted my movement and started the stomp and snort. You would think we were done, but all the commotion in the fielded enticed the giant buck from the other night to crest the hill and present a broadside shot at 100yrds. Halee was on him but, time was running out the Big Buck would certainly have enough of the snorting and disappear. Fate would have it that Halee would steady the muzzleloader on her rest and snap a shot off. It happened so fast I didn’t see the impact and couldn’t see the buck when the smoke cleared. As we sat in awe of what had just happened, we heard two loud crashes about a minute apart. I told Steve he just crashed I heard it. He said he heard it also; we had a mini celebration and replayed the footage. It appeared Halee hit her mark as the Buck did a mule kick just as a doe almost eclipsed his vitals. That was close, a split second later and Halee would have shot doe number two. After 30 mins and no blood in the field our celebration was moving to despair. We searched back and forth circling for blood no luck; we then focused on the fence crossing still no luck. I jumped over the fence and searched for ten more minutes before finding a speck of blood. The buck had ran so fast and cleared the fence, he didn’t bleed a drop for 40 yards. Halee tracked the blood and Steve had spotted him first, what a giant in the moonlight we could see his massive rack glowing in the dark. Halee’s bullet had penetrated the front shoulder taking out both lungs a great 100yrd shot, a great ending to a magnificent hunt. Congrats to Halee!!!
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