I already posted a short version on here but here is the long version if you want details.
I joined a lease this year that some buddies of mine have. I spent all of early bow season and the first day of muzzleloading hunting down there and became frustrated because I wasn't seeing any deer. I came home on the second day of muzzleloading and that afternoon I carried my two older daughters, Samantha (6) and Hayli (5), out on the farm so maybe they would get to see a deer. I picked a spot that I had never hunted before but had seen deer cross this field in the past. I built us a little stick n' burlap blind and we sat on the ground against this big oak tree just inside the field. We were overlooking about 10 acres of field with thickets on the east and south. We ended up seeing eight deer that afternoon! After that we would sit out there every chance we got and would see from 1-8 deer per sitting. FYI, I missed two doe that first afternoon.
Six days later, on saturday afternoon right before dark, Samantha and I were sitting in a outhouse blind that I put up a bit closer to where all the deer were crossing. We were watching a doe and her two little ones making their way across the field coming toward us when I began hearing branches break in the thicket to the south. I watch the fencerow for awhile but dismissed the sound. I told Sam that I would take the doe when she came in within forty yards. The doe was sixty yards out and I was watching her through the scope when she started staring at the thicket where the sounds had come. While still watching her through the scope, she broke and ran the other way taking her yearlings with her. Wondering what spooked her, I panned my scope to the right to see two more deer standing just inside the field sixty five yards out. The one I got in the scope was in the rear and "Monster Bucks" was the first thought that went threw my mind. I didn't even look at the other deer or bother counting points on this "ol" boy. I could tell his tines were long and his rack looked wide. A sure 'nuf shooter around here. I told Sam to be still (who first saw the buck enter the field and tried to tell me but I Shhhed her) I set the crosshairs on his shoulder and BOOM. The blind filled with smoke! I jumped out the front of the blind and the buck was gone. One deer stood in the middle of the field about 100 yards out. Light was fading and the deer just walked away from us. I got him in the scope but he didn't appear to be the one I shot. It was dark by the time I went to look for him. As we neared the fence a deer jumped up and ran just inside the thicket. I figured it was him and we had pushed him a little farther in. The next morning I looked all around where I shot him, where we had heard the deer jump up from and all threw that thicket. There was nairy a hair or drop of blood indicating he was hit. "There was no way I could have missed him at that range. Maybe, I hit him high to where he didn't bleed out right away", I thought. Thoughts began filling my mind of a wounded deer running off and dying. I looked in those thickets for days and felt sick for the next couple of weeks. The night of the modern gun opener, my fears were put to rest when I went to my uncles house. He lives there on the farm and he told me there was a big buck in his yard with a doe when they arrived home. I rode over there on the 4wheeler and we got out the spotlight and sure enough, there he was! Unharmed.
The next friday afternoon, the seventh day of season, I was back out at the "honey hole" where I had missed him. Six does came out into the field and made their way towards me. This time I was sitting in an old bailer body about forty yards north of my outhouse blind. There was once an old road that went through here and a few white oaks still stood either side of where it was. Well, the does pass by me and went to the oaks on my left. One doe actually passed six yards upwind of me. I was unable to see them from inside the bailer. I sat there and watched where they had come out. I had one buck tag left and wanted to end the season with a decent buck. Surely one of those does were in heat and a buck would come out any minute. About ten minutes had passed since the does came by. I peeked around the side of the bailer and they were still feed fifty yards or so away. I was standing up inside the bailer and a doe came back into view just to where I could see her. She began blowing and hopping about. It was strange, she wasn't blowing at me. She walked off, back across the field with four other doe in tow. I kinda wondered where the sixth doe had gotten off to so I peeked around the back of the side of the bailer. There were two doe standing there under the oaks looking at me. I eased my head back in and began to ponder, "Five and two makes seven, only six came out. So where did the other come from?" Puzzled, I peeked around the front of the side of the bailer and there was a buck! His head was down, feeding on acorns. He had a nice rack. His tines looked long. Light was fading and I was trying to manuver a way to shoot around the side of the bailer when he began walking off in the direction the other five doe had gone. This path offered me one shot threw a hole in the overlying tree branches. When he entered that shot window, he was facing straight away. Normally, I wouldn't take this shot but having killed my other buck in the same manner gave me confidence. I put the crosshairs dead center of his rearend and BOOM! The sound of the shot almost deafened me inside that metal hull. He hunkered down a bit and ran off over a rise with his tail down. He was running but it was a slow kinda run. I could tell he was hit. I climbed out of my bailer blind and walked to the spot I had marked. I had to use my flashlight to see. There was white hair everywhere. While standing there I heard what sounded like a deer crashing in the thicket. I felt he was down but wanted to give him time to expire. I threw my orange hat down to mark the spot and went back to my Grandpa's house. My wife called me and said I needed to stop shooting deer right at dark. She had been on our front porch and heard the shot. 45 min later my dad, grandpa, cousin and I were back out there with grandpa's cow dog, Tiger. Tiger moonlights as a tracker. Tiger picked up the trail and found him lying seventy yards from where I shot him. The buck hadn't even made it out of the field before going down. There was some Hoopin' and Hollerin' when we found him. He turned out to be the biggun' I missed during muzzleloading. His G2s were 11" (his left one was forked), his G3s were 9.5", G4s were 4" and his inside spread was 16.75". He is the largest buck I have taken and the largest buck ever taken on our farm. I aged his jawbone at 3.5yrs but took it to work and Bob Scott and Donnie Harris said he was 2.5yrs. When I get the jawbone back, I will post a pic for you guys to judge. 2.5 is kinda hard to swallow. I guess I should let him walk? Not.:thumb:
Do I get the record for the longest story? I am blessed with the gift of gab.:biggrin:
http://www.photochicken.com/ims/pic/123n0PWo/4253.jpg
