I went out Sunday night in a ground blind for my evening hunt. This was the first time I had smoked up and to be honest, I was sitting there thinking that you guys that do this, must be totally and completely nuts.
My eyes felt like they were bulging out of my head, and I was getting a headache from the smell of my clothes. And this is coming from a daily smoker! For awhile I even felt like abandoning my hunt just so I could go home, shower, and take some tylenol. Yea, it was that bad.
Anyway, some does came in and funny how whatever is bothering you (smoke smell, cold, sleepy, whatever!) leaves when deer come in!
I watched a doe and 2 of her fawns for quite awhile. The doe was super skittish and kept circling and smelling, but the one fawn could care less and just kept pigging out on the pumpkins we had used as bait.
I knew a buck was in the vicinity and could tell by the way the fawn kept watching, that he was to my right somewhere.
About 30 minutes after the does left, I heard some sticks break and thought, “Ok, he's on the way”. A minute or two later, I heard lots of brush snapping and thought he must be rubbing his rack on his way in.
Then he appeared almost right up against my blind, on a straight path to the pumpkins. He was directly in front of me so all I had was an ass shot.
He remained in this position for close to 8 minutes. At this point, I was greatly thanking my husband (in my mind) for buying me a “balancing stick” (don't know what it's called) that helps to steady the front of my bow. This is the first year I've used it, as I have had trouble in the past, holding that front-end weight for any length of time and I end up wobbling the bow if it wasn't rested on top of a crossed leg. Anyway I was really thankful to have that new piece of equipment this year.
I looked the buck over and knew I was going to try and get a shot at him. And he is a decent buck for me, but I did think he was a bit bigger than what he actually turned out to be. This is because I have trouble “connecting the dots”. I seem to fixate on one aspect, rather than the whole. Meaning, I might notice mass but nothing else. Or length, but nothing else. At some point, I need to learn (and remember) to look at a rack in total in order to learn better judgment of size.
Regardless, I kept waiting for this buck to turn. He finally quartered away from me (my favorite shot) and I pulled the trigger.
And he simply trotted off. He didn't jump, or kick, or hunch, or even run very fast. Just trotted off like the sound had startled him. I heard 2 small sticks break and then total silence. All I could think was that I had somehow missed even though it was only a 20 yard shot.
He gave absolutely no indication that he had been hit and I was disappointed and upset. I sat there for 15 more minutes, then left without even looking for my arrow. Since I didn't know where he was or if he was hit, I didn't want to go looking for the arrow, I just wanted out of there.
I went home and didn't call Rick since I thought it was a missed shot, so I didn't want to mess up Rick's hunt by calling him home for nothing. It was a long 45 minute wait on Rick, who came bursting in the door to tell me all about his hunt without even stopping to think I might have shot at one. When he finally took a breath, I told him that I had taken a shot but that I thought it was a miss.
He thought his shot was not perfect so we should go look for my arrow first.
I found one of my pink fletches, but no arrow and no blood. It never dawned on me about the creek I was near, until Rick has us crossing the steepish banks. As we're doing this, all I could picture was me rolling down the bank through the mud, but I made it! LOL
Sure enough, between 60 to 70 yards from my original shot, we found him laying there. I couldn't believe it. I guess he had crossed the creek and that accounted for the no noise factor.
I couldn't understand why I could not see or find an entrance wound, just the exit wound. Rick kept showing me the left-sided exit wound saying that was the entrance and I kept telling him that was impossible as I had shot the buck on the right side.
Well, it turns out that I must have pulled left because I somehow shot him in the ass. Seriously! Therefore no entrance wound was showing on his right side.
As we were gutting him, Rick went to push his back legs open and said, “WTF?”. My arrow was broken on both ends and was laying across his pelvic bone inside his body.
No wonder he didn't kick or run fast! I mean really, he had an arrow up his ass and then sideways through his pelvis! No wonder he didn't kick.......he couldn't! It all made sense then! lmao
And then, Rick spent most of the day on Monday giving me “lessons”. Any and all deer pictures he pulled up on the computer, he would call me over to show me which end was the head and which end was the ass, and I don't expect those lessons to end any time soon! :smiley_chinrub:
Oh wells. I got points for my team, have my buck and now get to spend the rest of the year playing with my Ghillie suit on does. Life is good.
ickle:
I still haven't taken the measurements, so when we get around to that, I'll post the stats in the harvest thread.
My eyes felt like they were bulging out of my head, and I was getting a headache from the smell of my clothes. And this is coming from a daily smoker! For awhile I even felt like abandoning my hunt just so I could go home, shower, and take some tylenol. Yea, it was that bad.
Anyway, some does came in and funny how whatever is bothering you (smoke smell, cold, sleepy, whatever!) leaves when deer come in!
I watched a doe and 2 of her fawns for quite awhile. The doe was super skittish and kept circling and smelling, but the one fawn could care less and just kept pigging out on the pumpkins we had used as bait.
I knew a buck was in the vicinity and could tell by the way the fawn kept watching, that he was to my right somewhere.
About 30 minutes after the does left, I heard some sticks break and thought, “Ok, he's on the way”. A minute or two later, I heard lots of brush snapping and thought he must be rubbing his rack on his way in.
Then he appeared almost right up against my blind, on a straight path to the pumpkins. He was directly in front of me so all I had was an ass shot.
He remained in this position for close to 8 minutes. At this point, I was greatly thanking my husband (in my mind) for buying me a “balancing stick” (don't know what it's called) that helps to steady the front of my bow. This is the first year I've used it, as I have had trouble in the past, holding that front-end weight for any length of time and I end up wobbling the bow if it wasn't rested on top of a crossed leg. Anyway I was really thankful to have that new piece of equipment this year.
I looked the buck over and knew I was going to try and get a shot at him. And he is a decent buck for me, but I did think he was a bit bigger than what he actually turned out to be. This is because I have trouble “connecting the dots”. I seem to fixate on one aspect, rather than the whole. Meaning, I might notice mass but nothing else. Or length, but nothing else. At some point, I need to learn (and remember) to look at a rack in total in order to learn better judgment of size.
Regardless, I kept waiting for this buck to turn. He finally quartered away from me (my favorite shot) and I pulled the trigger.
And he simply trotted off. He didn't jump, or kick, or hunch, or even run very fast. Just trotted off like the sound had startled him. I heard 2 small sticks break and then total silence. All I could think was that I had somehow missed even though it was only a 20 yard shot.
He gave absolutely no indication that he had been hit and I was disappointed and upset. I sat there for 15 more minutes, then left without even looking for my arrow. Since I didn't know where he was or if he was hit, I didn't want to go looking for the arrow, I just wanted out of there.
I went home and didn't call Rick since I thought it was a missed shot, so I didn't want to mess up Rick's hunt by calling him home for nothing. It was a long 45 minute wait on Rick, who came bursting in the door to tell me all about his hunt without even stopping to think I might have shot at one. When he finally took a breath, I told him that I had taken a shot but that I thought it was a miss.
He thought his shot was not perfect so we should go look for my arrow first.
I found one of my pink fletches, but no arrow and no blood. It never dawned on me about the creek I was near, until Rick has us crossing the steepish banks. As we're doing this, all I could picture was me rolling down the bank through the mud, but I made it! LOL
Sure enough, between 60 to 70 yards from my original shot, we found him laying there. I couldn't believe it. I guess he had crossed the creek and that accounted for the no noise factor.
I couldn't understand why I could not see or find an entrance wound, just the exit wound. Rick kept showing me the left-sided exit wound saying that was the entrance and I kept telling him that was impossible as I had shot the buck on the right side.
Well, it turns out that I must have pulled left because I somehow shot him in the ass. Seriously! Therefore no entrance wound was showing on his right side.
As we were gutting him, Rick went to push his back legs open and said, “WTF?”. My arrow was broken on both ends and was laying across his pelvic bone inside his body.
No wonder he didn't kick or run fast! I mean really, he had an arrow up his ass and then sideways through his pelvis! No wonder he didn't kick.......he couldn't! It all made sense then! lmao
And then, Rick spent most of the day on Monday giving me “lessons”. Any and all deer pictures he pulled up on the computer, he would call me over to show me which end was the head and which end was the ass, and I don't expect those lessons to end any time soon! :smiley_chinrub:
Oh wells. I got points for my team, have my buck and now get to spend the rest of the year playing with my Ghillie suit on does. Life is good.
ickle:I still haven't taken the measurements, so when we get around to that, I'll post the stats in the harvest thread.
