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- Sep 19, 2014
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Yesterday morning was probably my fastest hunt, but it’s been years in the making to finally kill a buck of this caliber.
I’ve been hunting this small piece of timber company land in Ohio for four years now. It seems every year there’s a different “hot spot” on the property and this year it was the end of ridge point where six different trails intersect near the end of the point that drops into a steep creek bed that borders a clear cut. When the acorns hit this spot is good and they hit good this year!
In September I hung trail cams at all the normal spots and this spot was lighting up with bucks. Lots of bucks! I made a couple quick trips over and sat this area but only saw does and some decent smaller bucks. I had a cell cam on the end of this point and this past week it’s like a switch was flipped. Multiple shooter bucks in the daylight. I pretty much dropped everything, packed up the trailer and headed over Sunday morning
Sunday night was WINDY with gusts over 40mph so I opted for a different area sheltered from the wind but still ended up getting down early and calling the hunt. Monday morning I was up at 4am and it was cold with a stiff breeze out of the west. Perfect for the ridge point where all those bucks had been cruising.
An hour before light I setup in an oak tree that has five trunks and climbed to 32’ feet using my spikes. It’s a KILLER setup with a ton of cover with all the converging trails crossing my strong side anywhere from 10-25 yards away with a big community scrape at 12 yards.
I was settled in and waiting for light and just as I could start to make out my surroundings I heard a deer coming up the ridge point followed by a low grunt....and my heart started pounding. He was at 25 yards slowly walking when I finally got a look at his rack through the binos. All I saw was MASS and put the binos down and grabbed my bow. Legal shooting time in Ohio was 6:27. It was 6:30 So still pretty dang dark! He followed the trail right under my tree and started working the scrape that was 12 yards away. I’m thankful he did because it bought me a few minutes of light that I needed to see to make a good shot. He finally finished the scrape and walked behind a clump of trees and I came to full draw. He stepped out broadside at 14 yards and I grunted to stop him. I settled the pin and squeezed it off and watched the arrow go through him and bury in the dirt! He tore off the end of the point and I heard him stop after 60 yards followed by a few seconds of silence then CRASH.
I was confident I had shot a good buck but I really wasn’t sure what he was or how big he was. I started second guessing everything at that point. Did I really hear him crash? Was he as big as I thought?
After several phone calls to my dad, wife and buddies I slowly packed up and got down quietly. The arrow was buried 10” in the dirt and was coated in blood. Good sign! I made it to the edge of the point before finding first blood and looked down 60 yards away and saw a white belly! He was down right where I heard the crash!
I slowly made my way down and what I saw sticking up looked much bigger than I thought it would! The closer I got the bigger he got! When I got to him I absolutely lost it. A main frame ten with awesome mass and a cool sticker inside his main beam. Not to mention he was a TANK of a deer. A mature buck no doubt. I had hit him perfect entering high lung and exited right through the arm pit. He was dead in seconds.
As I was gutting him I felt something inside the chest cavity that felt odd. I started pulling and cutting and eventually pulled out a 7” section of crossbow bolt with an Atom broadhead buried half way in his left lung sitting on top of the heart! The lung he grown completely around the bolt and he was perfectly healthy. Turns out the neighbors daughter had shot this buck two years prior and they were never able to find him. Crazy how tough this critters are!
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I’ve been hunting this small piece of timber company land in Ohio for four years now. It seems every year there’s a different “hot spot” on the property and this year it was the end of ridge point where six different trails intersect near the end of the point that drops into a steep creek bed that borders a clear cut. When the acorns hit this spot is good and they hit good this year!
In September I hung trail cams at all the normal spots and this spot was lighting up with bucks. Lots of bucks! I made a couple quick trips over and sat this area but only saw does and some decent smaller bucks. I had a cell cam on the end of this point and this past week it’s like a switch was flipped. Multiple shooter bucks in the daylight. I pretty much dropped everything, packed up the trailer and headed over Sunday morning
Sunday night was WINDY with gusts over 40mph so I opted for a different area sheltered from the wind but still ended up getting down early and calling the hunt. Monday morning I was up at 4am and it was cold with a stiff breeze out of the west. Perfect for the ridge point where all those bucks had been cruising.
An hour before light I setup in an oak tree that has five trunks and climbed to 32’ feet using my spikes. It’s a KILLER setup with a ton of cover with all the converging trails crossing my strong side anywhere from 10-25 yards away with a big community scrape at 12 yards.
I was settled in and waiting for light and just as I could start to make out my surroundings I heard a deer coming up the ridge point followed by a low grunt....and my heart started pounding. He was at 25 yards slowly walking when I finally got a look at his rack through the binos. All I saw was MASS and put the binos down and grabbed my bow. Legal shooting time in Ohio was 6:27. It was 6:30 So still pretty dang dark! He followed the trail right under my tree and started working the scrape that was 12 yards away. I’m thankful he did because it bought me a few minutes of light that I needed to see to make a good shot. He finally finished the scrape and walked behind a clump of trees and I came to full draw. He stepped out broadside at 14 yards and I grunted to stop him. I settled the pin and squeezed it off and watched the arrow go through him and bury in the dirt! He tore off the end of the point and I heard him stop after 60 yards followed by a few seconds of silence then CRASH.
I was confident I had shot a good buck but I really wasn’t sure what he was or how big he was. I started second guessing everything at that point. Did I really hear him crash? Was he as big as I thought?
After several phone calls to my dad, wife and buddies I slowly packed up and got down quietly. The arrow was buried 10” in the dirt and was coated in blood. Good sign! I made it to the edge of the point before finding first blood and looked down 60 yards away and saw a white belly! He was down right where I heard the crash!
I slowly made my way down and what I saw sticking up looked much bigger than I thought it would! The closer I got the bigger he got! When I got to him I absolutely lost it. A main frame ten with awesome mass and a cool sticker inside his main beam. Not to mention he was a TANK of a deer. A mature buck no doubt. I had hit him perfect entering high lung and exited right through the arm pit. He was dead in seconds.
As I was gutting him I felt something inside the chest cavity that felt odd. I started pulling and cutting and eventually pulled out a 7” section of crossbow bolt with an Atom broadhead buried half way in his left lung sitting on top of the heart! The lung he grown completely around the bolt and he was perfectly healthy. Turns out the neighbors daughter had shot this buck two years prior and they were never able to find him. Crazy how tough this critters are!
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
