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Passing the Time

boneil

boneil

Member
Shot my biggest deer ever this morning. Made myself come into town to let him lay down. Figured if I at least post something, that will make me sit here a little longer. Hopefully I can post the story tonight. Most intense hunt I have had.
 
Most intense hunt? WHAT HAPPENED? Did you get busted, and still fling an arrow? Sounds like he is yours, can't wait to see a pic....
 
No happy ending yet to the story. Morning started off in the blind with a good friend and a decoy set out in front of us at 20 in a small hidden bean field. Ended up seeing nothing this morning. Good set-up, good wind, no deer. Decided at about 9:30 to head back to the truck. Once we are at the truck, figure I might as well check one of my trail cameras so we drive over to the farm to see if I have any pictures. On our way in we didn't take our bows just planned on grabbing the card and get out of there. We are checking out some nice rubs and ground scrapes on the way back and I happen to look down in a crick bottom and there he is. Probably 50 yards away going up the opposite bank, he never sees us. We drop down to our knees and watch him for 3-4 minutes. Tell my buddy to go back to the truck and grab my bow, and I will watch to see what he is going to do. Friend heads back to the truck and I watch this buck bed down. After I see him bed down, I crawl out of the spot I was at to collect myself and wait for Lance to come back. We come up with a game plan. He will sit at the top of the ridge where we first saw him and I will crawl down the deer trail to close the distance. We figured he was about 65 yards away from the top of the ridge. I spend about an hour crawling down the trail and get to within 20 yards. Wind was in my face the whole time and that is the way he was laying down. Only problem is he is across the crick and I have some trees between me and him. I finally turn around to Lance and give him the ok to try to grunt to him. Lance grunts 5-6 times. Buck looks toward him, doesn't see me as I worked my way kind of behind a tree for some cover. We wait. After what felt like forever I turned back to Lance, somehow he figured out that I wanted him to snort wheeze. Worked like a charm, buck stands up, I am able to draw and find a hole to release an arrow. Arrow hits him pretty good but doesn't penetrate real deep. He takes off towards a picked bean field. I am trying to watch him with a huge rush of adrenalin going through me. Lance has a better view of him and watches him run off. I saw the arrow go in at least halfway, but didn't get a great look at to where it hit him. Lance said it hit a little back, but wasn't low. We back out and go get my camera and then head to the bean field to start tracking and see if he lost the arrow. We end up finding his footprints in the bean field where he ran and then pick up some blood about 80 yards later. That is when I decided to leave him alone. Went back out at 12:30 to pick up the trail, hoping to find him over the next hill. Ended up tracking him for what we thought was about 300 yards, not a lot of blood, and then it just ended. Never found the arrow, pretty positive it is still in him, as the cover we went through, pretty sure we would have found it. Going back out in the morning to continue the search. I am no expert at guessing size of antlers, but I have a 140" in the basement and this one made it look tiny. My gut tells me that he is dead, but so much corn out there, and we finally lost the blood trail.Please deer gods be on my side in the morning.
 
Last edited:
boneil said:
No happy ending yet to the story. Morning started off in the blind with a good friend and a decoy set out in front of us at 20 in a small hidden bean field. Ended up seeing nothing this morning. Good set-up, good wind, no deer. Decided at about 9:30 to head back to the truck. Once we are at the truck, figure I might as well check one of my trail cameras so we drive over to the farm to see if I have any pictures. On our way in we didn't take our bows just planned on grabbing the card and get out of there. We are checking out some nice rubs and ground scrapes on the way back and I happen to look down in a crick bottom and there he is. Probably 50 yards away going up the opposite bank, he never sees us. We drop down to our knees and watch him for 3-4 minutes. Tell my buddy to go back to the truck and grab my bow, and I will watch to see what he is going to do. Friend heads back to the truck and I watch this buck bed down. After I see him bed down, I crawl out of the spot I was at to collect myself and wait for Lance to come back. We come up with a game plan. He will sit at the top of the ridge where we first saw him and I will crawl down the deer trail to close the distance. We figured he was about 65 yards away from the top of the ridge. I spend about an hour crawling down the trail and get to within 20 yards. Wind was in my face the whole time and that is the way he was laying down. Only problem is he is across the crick and I have some trees between me and him. I finally turn around to Lance and give him the ok to try to grunt to him. Lance grunts 5-6 times. Buck looks toward him, doesn't see me as I worked my way kind of behind a tree for some cover. We wait. After what felt like forever I turned back to Lance, somehow he figured out that I wanted him to snort wheeze. Worked like a charm, buck stands up, I am able to draw and find a hole to release an arrow. Arrow hits him pretty good but doesn't penetrate real deep. He takes off towards a picked bean field. I am trying to watch him with a huge rush of adrenalin going through me. Lance has a better view of him and watches him run off. I saw the arrow go in at least halfway, but didn't get a great look at to where it hit him. Lance said it hit a little back, but wasn't low. We back out and go get my camera and then head to the bean field to start tracking and see if he lost the arrow. We end up finding his footprints in the bean field where he ran and then pick up some blood about 80 yards later. That is when I decided to leave him alone. Went back out at 12:30 to pick up the trail, hoping to find him over the next hill. Ended up tracking him for what we thought was about 300 yards, not a lot of blood, and then it just ended. Never found the arrow, pretty positive it is still in him, as the cover we went through, pretty sure we would have found it. Going back out in the morning to continue the search. I am no expert at guessing size of antlers, but I have a 140" in the basement and this one made it look tiny. My gut tells me that he is dead, but so much corn out there, and we finally lost the blood trail.Please deer gods be on my side in the morning.
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Hope you find him, sounded like a really fun hunt also.
 
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