Yesterday evening I hunted a community bow stand on our lease. The stand is on the edge of a pipeline where the deer like to cross. I can shoot the pipeline out in front me, and I had a small shooting hole in the woods at 23 yards. I have not hunted this area before so I wasn't sure what bucks were in this area. I pulled the card from the camera and it showed a ten point that we have on the do not shoot list coming through and a mature management eight that needed to go.
The evening started with a heavy mist/light rain and gusty NE winds that got me and all my gear pretty wet(I put my camera up in a ziploc)! I was seeing several does and yearlings early so I felt good about sticking it out in the nasty weather. About ten minutes till six the rain finally quit.
Shortly after the rain stopped I had two yearlings pop in to the apple corn I put out in the hole in the woods. Right behind them was a buck! It was still heavily overcast and they were in the woods, so I could not immediately tell what buck it was. I told myself that is a bull you need to shoot him. I then second guessed myself thinking maybe he only looked so heavy because he was with yearlings. This is my first year on the lease, I have wanted on for quite awhile and I did not want to shoot a young or off limits deer. The first trip out he only stood there for about ten seconds then stepped back into cover. Two minutes later he came back out for about thirty seconds more to eat corn, broadside and head down.
I tried to look through my binos but they were soaked and foggy. I could tell the deer had at least one weak G4. Now the only deer I was aware we had on camera that had a weak G4 like that was a deer named "Old Man". Old Man also had a broken left G2 that laid back, and this deer did not have the G2 flying backwards. Unsure of the buck I let him walk away. I got down at dark and pulled the card on that corn pile. My buddy checked the card for me as I drove us home. He said "Why in the @@@@ did you not shoot Old Man? I said it wasn't old man he didn't have the kicked back G2, this is when I learned that he had lost it a few weeks back!
This hit me in the guts! This is one of the top hit listers on the lease right now just because he is an old brute. He is not a high scoring deer, but to have a super mature deer at twenty-three yards in daylight does not happen that often in my part of East Texas. I immediately thought shooter when I saw him, but second guessed myself. So the moral of my sob story is, go with your gut!
Ill post the pics from yesterday and from velvet.
The evening started with a heavy mist/light rain and gusty NE winds that got me and all my gear pretty wet(I put my camera up in a ziploc)! I was seeing several does and yearlings early so I felt good about sticking it out in the nasty weather. About ten minutes till six the rain finally quit.
Shortly after the rain stopped I had two yearlings pop in to the apple corn I put out in the hole in the woods. Right behind them was a buck! It was still heavily overcast and they were in the woods, so I could not immediately tell what buck it was. I told myself that is a bull you need to shoot him. I then second guessed myself thinking maybe he only looked so heavy because he was with yearlings. This is my first year on the lease, I have wanted on for quite awhile and I did not want to shoot a young or off limits deer. The first trip out he only stood there for about ten seconds then stepped back into cover. Two minutes later he came back out for about thirty seconds more to eat corn, broadside and head down.
I tried to look through my binos but they were soaked and foggy. I could tell the deer had at least one weak G4. Now the only deer I was aware we had on camera that had a weak G4 like that was a deer named "Old Man". Old Man also had a broken left G2 that laid back, and this deer did not have the G2 flying backwards. Unsure of the buck I let him walk away. I got down at dark and pulled the card on that corn pile. My buddy checked the card for me as I drove us home. He said "Why in the @@@@ did you not shoot Old Man? I said it wasn't old man he didn't have the kicked back G2, this is when I learned that he had lost it a few weeks back!
This hit me in the guts! This is one of the top hit listers on the lease right now just because he is an old brute. He is not a high scoring deer, but to have a super mature deer at twenty-three yards in daylight does not happen that often in my part of East Texas. I immediately thought shooter when I saw him, but second guessed myself. So the moral of my sob story is, go with your gut!
Ill post the pics from yesterday and from velvet.
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