After watching him for several years, I finally pulled the trigger on my first drop tine buck. He has looked different every year since he was 3 years old. His rack looked really unusual the last 2 years (see my previous thread titled “what happened to this buck”).
The hunt started out a little late Friday evening. My 8 yr old daughter and I didn’t get in the stand until 3:50. Feeders go off at 4:00. We got settled in a deer started slowly coming out. Had several young bucks and does eating in the senderos with no sign of rut. About 4:45 a mature 10 pt walked out under my east feeder. He’s a 150 class type deer that I will most likely let one of my other lease members shoot later in the year. Finally about 5:30 my buck showed up. He walked in from behind the feed pen and jumped right in to eat out of the trough. He always came in this way. After watching him eat for 15 minutes he finally decided to check a doe in front of the pen. I couldn’t shoot him in the pen without taking a chance hitting a hog panel. When he was about to jump out, I told my daughter to be still so I can take the shot. He jumped out and stopped broadside right in the middle of the sendero. I squeezed the trigger on my trusty weatherby mark V 7 mag. The recoil shook the stand but I could tell he was hit good. I watched him hunch over and take off in the brush. I looked at my daughter and told her I got. She was still watching down the sendero and said I just saw him fall. I looked back and their he was laying dead in the sendero. He ran in the brush and came back out 40 yards closer to me then fell over. What luck because he ran into some of the thickest brush and cactus on the ranch. A priceless moment with my daughter. She was so excited that she was with me when it all happened. He was 7.5 years old and ended up scoring 172 4/8. I’m sure that I will never get a chance to ever shoot another buck with this much character.
The hunt started out a little late Friday evening. My 8 yr old daughter and I didn’t get in the stand until 3:50. Feeders go off at 4:00. We got settled in a deer started slowly coming out. Had several young bucks and does eating in the senderos with no sign of rut. About 4:45 a mature 10 pt walked out under my east feeder. He’s a 150 class type deer that I will most likely let one of my other lease members shoot later in the year. Finally about 5:30 my buck showed up. He walked in from behind the feed pen and jumped right in to eat out of the trough. He always came in this way. After watching him eat for 15 minutes he finally decided to check a doe in front of the pen. I couldn’t shoot him in the pen without taking a chance hitting a hog panel. When he was about to jump out, I told my daughter to be still so I can take the shot. He jumped out and stopped broadside right in the middle of the sendero. I squeezed the trigger on my trusty weatherby mark V 7 mag. The recoil shook the stand but I could tell he was hit good. I watched him hunch over and take off in the brush. I looked at my daughter and told her I got. She was still watching down the sendero and said I just saw him fall. I looked back and their he was laying dead in the sendero. He ran in the brush and came back out 40 yards closer to me then fell over. What luck because he ran into some of the thickest brush and cactus on the ranch. A priceless moment with my daughter. She was so excited that she was with me when it all happened. He was 7.5 years old and ended up scoring 172 4/8. I’m sure that I will never get a chance to ever shoot another buck with this much character.
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