- Joined
- Sep 6, 2014
- Messages
- 967
For me, a drop tine buck is my "holy grail". I've always wanted one. In 43 years of bowhunting I've never even seen one while hunting. I've only seen 1 on the hoof. I can finally say I got one. My main area has been decimated by EHD. It seems to have affected only certain areas but my area was a ghost town so there was no point in wasting time there. So I've been scrambling to find other deer especially does since the bucks will show up sooner or later. I've been using my jet boat to get to hard to access public land on the river. I found some deer and small bucks. I even saw a shooter in the distance. My plan was to go after him On TG morning. The wind was completely wrong for that location so I had to adjust that plan. I tried an island that I've never hunted before. It looked great. Had all right ingredients. No pressure, Thick cover. Trails. Good wind direction. and A Good tree to hang a saddle. Looks like EHD got there as well. I saw 1 mouse and 2 pheasants on my side of the river and 7 WT's and 7 MD's on the opposite side of the river about 3/4 of mile away. I sat till 11AM not seeing anything that looked like a deer on my side of the river. I said screw it. I'm done for the year. I gave it a good try. Maybe next year. Then I thought maybe I'll hunt at the house before dinner and get a doe. There's been plenty deer there and they don't seem to be affected at all by EHD. We have a family that I give a deer to every year. They love venison. I do too but My wife does not care for deer meat but loves elk meat) Anyway, I get to the house at 12 noon. There's a 10pt in the driveway! Never seen him before. But I knew what he's going to do. I run into the house. Ask the wife when is everyone is showing up. She's says 5PM. I ask her if there's anything she needs me to do. She says No and "go get him". Now that I had her blessing, I made a plan. My clothes were wet so I put them in the dryer. While waiting for them to dry, I figured I would set my steps and my Ambush platform on the back corner Of my property. I hustled out back and climbed the tree. I literally set the platform and look up and here comes a nice spike that we see fairly often. He come directly under me and headed down the creek to our yard. I knew where he was going. The deer and pheasants love our birdfeeder. Plus we threw the rotten pumpkins over there as well. Also I found out later that my wife threw the apples she was going to bake for the pies there as well. She said they went bad. Anyway, I get down make a big circle around the house trying not to disturb him. He's there eating and can't believe his good fortune w/ all the unexpected treats. The wife's gone. (She went to get more apples for the pies!) I grab my stuff and head out the door. He's gone. This time I sneak up the creek. I'm bundled up cause it's cold. Normally I put my clothes on when I'm in the tree. This time I figured it's a short walk so I wouldn't get too sweated up if I wore them into the tree. Also I brought a book that I wanted to finish. I had 20 pages left so figured it wouldn't be be a big deal to bring it. All the deer are going to show up at dark anyway! LOL I'm climbing the tree but having a hard time cause of all the clothes. Just as I was about to swing on the platform, I drop the dang book! I climb down. Grab the book. stuff it in my jacket and climb back up. Pull up the bow, snap on an arrow and here comes that buck again. He Literally goes right where the book fell. Didn't even flinch about the scent. I hear a snap and here comes 2 more bucks. A 6pt and and 8 pt. 25 yds. The winds changes and the 6pt winds me and takes the 8pt with him. Not great but I haven't been in the tree for 5 minutes and have seen 3 bucks. A good sign that bucks up on their feet. I sit there for while and see a little spike and a doe to my right at 40 yds. 100 yds to my left is a fence line. The deer like to come down that fence and get a drink at the horse water trough. A little buck comes down gets a drink then come over to our property. My wife sent me pic of him eating her apples. 5 minutes later he walked by me where the little spike went through. About an hour before dinner, I see 3 bucks come down the fence chasing a doe. One was smaller but had weird antlers, the other was a nice 8pt and the last was the 10pt. I was glassing them, hoping the 10pt would come over to my side. Something didn't look right with 8pt. That's when I figured it out. He's got drop tine! A decent one too. Normally I would let a nice 8pt walk so he can grow up. Before I was focused on the 10pt but the drop tine changed my focus. . He just made the potential candidate list! I figured I had nothing to lose so I hit the bucks w/ a grunt. Maybe one or the other would come over. The weird buck and the 10pt didn't even look but the DT buck picked his head up. He surveyed the situation and looked around at the 10pt. Then back in my direction and he came on a string. He jumped the fence to our side. When he got to the creek, he was 25yds away. He had a steep straight down bank so he had to go left or right. For me, He needed to make the left. He looked down into the creek for the buck he heard. Didn't see anything. Then he made the left! At that point, I knew I was going to get the shot. I was 19' up but was basically level with him cause my tree was in the bottom of the creek bed and he was on top. There was wall of brush between him and I at 15 yds. He continued along the bank and He stepped out 10 yds. I gave him a little "erp". He stopped and I immediately let 'r eat. I didn't see the arrow at all but I heard it zip through him. I've heard it many times before so I knew it was good shot plus it's pretty dang hard to miss at 10 yds broadside. I watched him run out and tip over about 80 yds away. I get down and boogied to the house. Wife says our daughter and her family are going to be here in 20 minutes. I call my SnL. I ask him to ask the kids if they want to track a deer. Their 1st tracking job ever. He did and they said absolutely. He later said they were almost crawling out of their car seats in anticipation. I got undressed and got my stuff ready. The kids get there and they wanted to go. Now! However my nephew was pulling in with his wife and daughter. The G kids had to wait few minutes for me to talk to my nephew and tell him the new developments. His daughter wants to go too! So off we go, 3 grandkids, my SnL, my niece, and the dog! At first, I tried to actually blood trail the deer so I could give a little tracking lesson. However the tracks were so obvious in the snow so they just followed the tracks. The dog was a blue tick hound so she was on it immediately. There was no stopping her. She found it with in minutes. The G kids were right behind her. They were so excited. For me it was the best part. The Drop tine didn't hurt either so I was pretty pumped about that. Then we dragged him back to the shop and hung him up. I Never did finish that book either! Sadly, In the rush to get ready for dinner, other guests showing up and all the commotion, we forgot to takes pics. I'm going to unhang him and take some post hunt pics. Maybe someone here can post them for me since I'm challenged in that department.
