Great close to the firearm season

[Limbshot]

Well I made the decision to take a vacation day to hunt the last day of the firearm season and sit the stand where I missed to big 8 with my bow exactly two weeks prior. The morning was PERFECT! 24 degrees when I parked the car, crystal clear and not a breath of wind. The stage was set for a rematch, only this time, I had my trusty rifle. At 7:15, I had two does move across the ridge to my south and then something spooked them. They snorted and ran up the ridge and out of sight. At 8:20, I decided to rattle, hoping there was a cruising buck within earshot that was still looking for love. I completed a good fight sequence, hung my antlers up, grabbed my grunt call, grunted twice, then doe bleated twice, and grunted 4 or 5 more times and hung my call back on the hook. When I did, I looked across the field and saw a deer moving quickly behind some roses at about 80 yards. When he cleared the roses I could see a good solid rack with very good mass and I grabbed my rifle. He moved up to the field edge, about 60 yards away and stood there surveying the field, looking for the cause of all that commotion. Finding nothing, he turned and started walking east just inside the brush line, trying to get down wind as he walked through an opening at 60 yards, I grunted and he stopped perfectly. I settled the cross hairs and eased back on the trigger and BOOM. The deer hardly reacted and just walked forward about ten steps. Then he started doing the tail wiggle, once, twice, then non-stop and I knew he was hurting. He walked across the creek and bedded down. I started shaking. 15 minutes later as I stared his direction, he got up and walked 30 more yards and he bedded again. I knew he was in trouble. I waited 45 minutes after that and unloaded my rifle, lowered it and unhooked the safety harness and climbed down. Reloaded and slowly worked across the field. Took two steps into the woods and found great blood, followed it across the creek and up the steep incline and when I reached the top, I saw the deer stand up 30 yards away and he turned and walked straight away from me, then trotted a little then walked again. I could not get a follow up shot, nor was I going to shoot him up the rear. I decided to back out for 2 more hours to be safe. He was hit hard and losing a ton of blood. I returned two hours later and followed a pretty solid blood trail to where he laid expired. This deer is my personal best to date. I knew he was pretty good when I shot him, but had ZERO ground shrinkage. Honestly, when I walked up on him, he was bigger than I had expected. I was blown away by his mass and overall body size. I have not been this excited about a firearm kill of my own in a VERY long time.

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Couple more pics

[RB]

Congrats, awesome deer.

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Thanks Dave. The way the firearm season had been going, I almost didn't go, but I always say, it only takes one to change everything!!!

[RB]

That's all it takes. for your area he has a fairly big body too. Nice going and way to hang in there.

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I should also mention, this IS NOT the deer I missed with my bow. He was taller, wider and not quite as heavy.

[RB]

I should also mention, this IS NOT the deer I missed with my bow. He was taller, wider and not quite as heavy.

That's a good thing. Maybe he'll be there next year.

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Or late bow season...

[RB]

Or late bow season...

Don't be greedy.

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Hey, a guy can dream!!!

[PoisonSnake]

That is fantastic man.

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Thanks PS. Law of averages, sooner or later a good one had to cross my pass that I didn't mess up on!!!

[SAMCRO]

I will preface the below by stating the obvious fact that SAMCRO would not have shot this animal. It is not up to the CRO's standards, and only would have been killed by accident. However, if we're being realistic, LS shot this deer by accident, as well, although the accident was on the part of the buck. I'm sure he's up in buck heaven somewhere, royally pissed off that his days were ended by a sawed-off little bastard, who added insult to injury with what appears to be a less-than-perfect shot.

However, having gotten that out of the way, let the CRO say this is a fine buck, and LS exceeded my expectations of him with this one. Nice work, and good show.

[Limbshot]

LMAO, well I think hidden behind all the gibberish there is actually a comment hidden in there, so thank you Cro. I appreciate it. It was indeed an unfortunate day for one of us.