I got this buck last Saturday, 12/22/12. This was a big, old 7 point that we have seen several times on trail cams, but this was my first live sighting of him.
We played a game of cat and mouse starting at about 7:00 am, with him leaving, circling, coming in from a different direction, getting within 5 yards of me, then circling again, etc, etc...
I finally had him quartering away at 30 yards at 7:15 and got a shot. The shot was a bit back, getting liver and the opposite lung. I waited 30 minutes before getting out to check my arrow. I had good blood and followed it for about 80 yards into some of the thickest briars on our place. One step into the briars and the buck jumped up and bolted. Dang! I had pushed him! I backed out and went back to camp for a couple of hours before resuming my track. I went right back to where I jumped him and started again. After following the blood into the thick stuff I realized that it was a different deer that I had jumped. The blood went right, the deer I had jumped was to the left. It wasn't the buck I had shot! Sure enough, the blood led me to my deer just a short distance away.
When I walked up on him, I realized I had my hands full getting this big son of a gun out of there by myself (Chuck was running about 25 hours late, surprise surprise).
Well, I struggled, huffed and puffed, and finally got him drug through all of the thick crap and into an opening where I could get the golf cart. But I knew there was no way I would be able to get him into the cart by myself...
So I went back to camp to put the rack on the cart so hopefully I could drag him up on it. It took some effort, but I finally got him loaded onto the rack to take him back to camp.
I got back to camp and wanted to take some pictures. It was then I realized I had remembered my tripod, but not my camera! All I had was my phone and no easy way to take self portraits. So, unfortunately all I have are these iPhone photos.
I was, and am, proud of getting this old fellow!
We played a game of cat and mouse starting at about 7:00 am, with him leaving, circling, coming in from a different direction, getting within 5 yards of me, then circling again, etc, etc...
I finally had him quartering away at 30 yards at 7:15 and got a shot. The shot was a bit back, getting liver and the opposite lung. I waited 30 minutes before getting out to check my arrow. I had good blood and followed it for about 80 yards into some of the thickest briars on our place. One step into the briars and the buck jumped up and bolted. Dang! I had pushed him! I backed out and went back to camp for a couple of hours before resuming my track. I went right back to where I jumped him and started again. After following the blood into the thick stuff I realized that it was a different deer that I had jumped. The blood went right, the deer I had jumped was to the left. It wasn't the buck I had shot! Sure enough, the blood led me to my deer just a short distance away.
When I walked up on him, I realized I had my hands full getting this big son of a gun out of there by myself (Chuck was running about 25 hours late, surprise surprise).
Well, I struggled, huffed and puffed, and finally got him drug through all of the thick crap and into an opening where I could get the golf cart. But I knew there was no way I would be able to get him into the cart by myself...
So I went back to camp to put the rack on the cart so hopefully I could drag him up on it. It took some effort, but I finally got him loaded onto the rack to take him back to camp.
I got back to camp and wanted to take some pictures. It was then I realized I had remembered my tripod, but not my camera! All I had was my phone and no easy way to take self portraits. So, unfortunately all I have are these iPhone photos.
I was, and am, proud of getting this old fellow!
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