Big Deer

Saturday 22 November 2008 was a lot of firsts for me in my 33 year hunting career. I was fortunate enough to bag my second buck during the Maryland bow hunting season. I've bought a bonus tag every year in Maryland anticipating shooting two bucks in the same year, until recently the money I have spent on bonus tags was just my contribution to Maryland DNR without bagging a second buck. In 2008 it was a Novemba to Rememba!! I headed to the stand around noon, based on the temperature being around 30 degrees all day I suited up with my cold weather gear for a 5 plus hour hunt. At 1300 hrs a doe brought a nice eight point by my stand. He wasn't big enough to fill my second tag. I didn't start seeing deer again until 1500 hrs. I videoed some small bucks, does, and button bucks while waiting for a chance at Mr. Big.

About 1600 hrs a doe came running by my stand at about 45 yards heading away from my stand. I grabbed my camera to catch some rut activity on video. I saw a large bodied deer in the thicket and could only assume he was the one following the doe. I kept the camera on him waiting for him to step out. When he did I kept the camera rolling for a couple minutes while he stood looking at the doe. What I saw on the camera was definitely a shooter. I put my camera down and grabbed my grunt call to see if I could turn him around and get a shot with my bow. When I hit the grunt call the doe spun around and ran right past my stand at 10 yards. Of course you know what happened next. Mr. Big turned and started walking right behind her. I couldn't move, I didn't have my bow in my hand and the buck was walking right towards my stand. The doe walked about 30 yards away from my stand. He was watching her every move. Luck started to turn my way one more time. I had hung some Excite lure (recommended by a guide on one of my trips to Illinois) about 25 yards from my stand. As he walked down wind of the Excite he turned and started walking directly to the lure.

I had two large trees in front on me. When his head went behind the first one I grabbed my bow and stood up, when his head went behind the second tree I came to full draw. He stopped for a few seconds and then he took two steps, he stretched his nose out to smell the lure, I took the shot, he exploded out and knocked my cotton lure swab about 10 feet in the air. I knew it was a good hit based on the sound of the impact. He ran what ended up being 50 yards and made a terrible crash. I knew he was down. I retrieved my arrow, plenty of blood and a complete pass through so I back out of the spot and headed back to the trailer to get help. When I got there no one else was hunting so I called one of my friends to help me get him out. I'm glad I did he ended up being a 200 lbs 10 point with an inside spread of 21 inches and an outside spread of 24 inches. My next stop was Creative Whitetails to have this buck mounted and give him the respect he deserves. It's been eight years since I have had a deer mounted but I knew there was only one man for the job Dean Ursiti of Creative Whitetails. We shared a few hunting stories and Mr. Big was on his way to be hanging on my wall. I won't be hunting bucks with my bow anymore this year but plan on shooting a lot of video the remainder of the bow hunting season.

It was November 3, 2008 I busted out of work early to get set up based on the Moon Guide time of 4:22. I walked to the stand at 2:45 jumped a deer going in. Was set up by 3:00. About 4:00 tons of geese started flying over and landing in the field behind me. Three does hopped by reacting to the flocks of geese honking and flying over. It was noisier than downtown D.C. Finally the geese stopped flying in and the woods started to settle down at about 4:15. I started making doe bleets every 15 minutes and about 4:45 I could here deer walking through the woods in the distance. I thought I heard a buck grunt but wasn't sure, then a doe busted out past me at about 4:50. Then I heard the grunt again, but it sounded what I thought to be a small buck. A couple minutes later a nice eight point walk in the open and started thrashing overhead tree limbs on a holly tree. I decided he was a shooter but two things were working against me, he was following the doe that just past through and he was heading away from me.

That's when I reach for my Primos grunt call and left out a few doe bleets, he continued to walk away as I watched him make a scrape out of bow range. I had already started planning on how I was going to close the distance for the next hunt to get a shot at Mr. 8. I gave another doe bleet, I heard him stop walking but couldn't see him, I hit the doe bleet one last time, that's when he turned and came looking for me. He came in looking for the doe and I didn't let him get closer than 25 yards when I left the arrow go at about 5:05. I could tell by the sound of the hit and the way the buck ran off it was a good hit. I went to the spot of the shot and didn't see any blood. I backed off and took my gear to the truck to wait for one of my hunting buddies to finish his hunt. When I got to my truck another friend was there and all pumped up about killing his first buck (9 point) with a bow a few minutes earlier. I helped him get his buck out. Then the three of us started tracking my deer. We found blood about 15 yards from the shot, followed the trail for about 50 more yards and there he laid. Not a monster but a decent 8 point and a hell of a memory.

It started this summer when I took stock of my arrow supply. The attrition of previous seasons left me with three crooked hunters with strange flight characteristics. The situation called for an order to Allegheny Mountain Arrow Woods. I asked Bill to send me 4 dozen tapered Douglas fur shafts. When the order arrived there were 49 dowels. As I put the dowels through the process of building the shafts into arrows, I wondered if the extra shaft might have special lucky qualities. The dozen hunters that received the 160 grains snuffers had a finished weight of 600 grains. When they were flight tested to receive their rank number, it was difficult to pick the best. I did get them numbered and decided that #1 was also #49 of the batch- putting the luck up front. My wife informed me that we were out of ground venison and put in an order. It’s tough work but I don’t mind. My friend had been complaining about deer eating his hostas and had asked me to help out. So now I had a good excuse and a place to “execute” the order. The property had a nice oak tree in the perfect place to hunt on a southwest wind. When the wind finally went southwest I went hunting. Things change – the tree that I intended to hunt was prone on the ground. This necessitated improvisation. The tree that I ended up roosting in was back in cover and only offered two shooting lanes. The trade off was that I had world class background cover.

As I settled into the hunt I became aware of how mellow the afternoon had become. I had my bow hung-up with #1 nocked and ready. After watching and listening for an hour, I heard an animal approaching from behind me. The wind had died down and that wonderful windstill condition settled in. The animal turned out to be a medium size buck without antlers. He had lumpy pedicels, a wide span between his ears, but nothing above the hairline. I caught glimpses of him through the thick cover. He entered a thicket. Then I lost him to sight and sound. I wondered if maybe he was a steer. About twenty minutes later I sensed the presence of another animal in the area. I stood as slowly as possible and unhung my bow. Looking back in the cover I saw the moving white line between a deer’s tail and flank moving toward the thicket. Shortly two of the three saplings at the head of the thicket began to shake violently. This development commanded my full attention. After awhile the trees quit shaking and a large buck emerged from the thicket and stopped with a tulip poplar tree blocking the forward part of his shoulder. Decision time – by leaning left I could see his ribcage but didn’t like the feel of the shot, so I waited. This deer was a monster in every sense of the word - his antlers were a solid mass in profile. His body was huge with a deep chest and torso that made his legs look small. His face looked oddly small with a pronounced Roman nose.
The deer was wired into the mellow groove of the evening. He would take three steps and just space out awhile before moving again. His course brought him around into my main shooting lane where he stopped broadside to look around. The distance was twenty yards.

The bow drew quietly and #49 slipped into the evening air. The buck leaped and gave the double back leg mule kick. He the roared down through he woods like an avalanche. His flight startled some deer in his path and they came down with the cosmic snorts. Shot analysis time had come. The shot had been quiet in every respect. The hit had not generated that hollow "thunk" of a good chest hit or the crack of hitting bone. I had been leery of hitting him in the massive shoulder as my recurve bow pulls only 56 pounds. I concluded that the shot was probably a bit too far back. I descended the tree, assembled my kit and proceeded to run several errands.
The next morning I was on the trail early. The blood was sparse but not difficult to follow. After about two hundred years the sign lessened and trailing became difficult. As time went on I would loose the track then check openings and trails until I again found sign. What helped was that the animal seemed headed in a general direction. After two and a half hours of trailing I found I was on a point protruding into the river. As I hadn’t jumped the deer I concluded that he must be down and probably in very thick cover. I turned around and climbed into a fallen treetop and inspected it thoroughly. Then I proceeded from blow down to thicket inspecting every inch of the ground. About three hours into the search I looked over a bush pile I was inspecting and saw the white underfur and massive heap of the buck.

The rush was incredible; I went from a condition of fatigued doubt to one of exuberant elation. As I approached the fallen deer his size and bulk both amazed me and dismayed me. The animal looked to easily approach 300 lbs. I had tracked him over a distance of ½ mile, crossing two fences and one deeply incised ravine. I am a senior bowhunter weighing 150 lbs.A bit of planning seemed in order. Back in the truck I had a hauler rated to 500 lbs, it won’t jump fences. Having some experience with moving dead weight I knew the ravine was beyond possibility.The plan that looked doable was to drag the buck down grade to the river bank. After marking a tree branch with my red bandana handkerchief I returned to the truck, drove home, loaded a 2 ton come-along and a 12 foot aluminum skiff and returned.I launched the skiff and rowed down the river until sighting the handkerchief. I beached the boat in a depression of the bank and with some exertion loaded the buck. His weight made moving the boat very hard. I could slide it about 6 inches at a heave, eventually getting it launched. The row back was pure pleasure, I love hydraulics. I dreaded the arrival at the pier because I didn’t see how I could lift the deer up onto the dock from the bobbing boat. Good fortune smiled as the dock came into view, there was a lower level platform below the main surface.After lashing both ends of the skiff securely to the pilings, I was able to heave and pull in stages until I moved the buck onto the stage and up onto the pier. I went to the truck and returned with the hauler. After a considerable struggle I loaded the deer and rolled to the end of the pier. At that point it was uphill from the river to the lane where the truck was parked. By pulling ten feet uphill then turning across slope I could stop and let my cardio descent from redline to something more reasonable. Eventually the buck and I made I to the road. I backed the truck up and placed two 2x10 ramp boards onto the truck bed.

After examining the steepness of the ramp I knew I couldn’t roll the weight up into the truck. At that point I secured the come-along to the front of the truckbed and extended the wire cable back to the deer.Antlers are lovely, the perfect attachment for a line to connect to the come-along hook. Click by click I cranked the buck up into the truckbed. I loaded the ramp boards and cart, then beached the skiff and flipped it over. By the time I reached home six hours had elapsed from the start of trailing in the morning. I tried for some sympathy from my wife for my worn-out condition. She just gave me hell for shooting something so hard to retrieve. I guess I’ll have to try for something smaller next time.

For my Christmas present/senior trip my dad blessed me with a hunting adventure to Canada. I had to wait 11 months, until November 1st, to really unwrap my present. When the first arrived we flew into Saskatoon Sk. and slept there at a hotel that night. Our guides from Clear Sand Outfitters came pick us up the next morning. We took a nice 3 1/2 hour truck ride out to the middle of nowhere. The camp was nice along with some cool weather. Monday everyone was wide awake and anxious to sit on their stands. Me and my dad sat together and saw 12 does. One guy ended up killing a decent deer. Tuesday we all went back out and I went sit by myself. 4 people ended up killing including my dad who shot a nice 8 point. Wednesday 3 more guys killed and again I saw nothing that was worth shooting. This meant I was the only one left to hunt. Thursday I knew I would get one but it didn't happen. Friday didn't bring me luck either.

Saturday we are planned to go back to the hotel. We pushed that trip back until noon so I can try hunting one more time. I look at my watch at 11:20 and wanted to cry. I just put my head down in disappointment knowing the hunt was almost over for good and I never got a buck. Right when I picked my head up this joker showed up. I picked up my rifle and popped a quick round before he disappeared into the woods. He was probably going check his scrapes I think. My shot stopped him in his tracks, but he did not fall. I bolted my rifle and shot again. This time he slowly ran off, out of my vision. I got on the radio and called in my shots to my guide. He was already down the road waiting to come get me and he had heard the shots. He said hang tight I will be there soon. When Jesse (guide) arrived I climbed down and got onto the 4wheeler with him. He told me he had seen my buck laying on the trail, about 35-40 yards from where I had shot. I was super excited, I was shaking so hard I thought I would rattle the tires off the 4-wheeler. When we got to see him I was thrilled with my trophy. I helped load him and we headed back to the area that we park the trucks and 4-wheelers. My dad was already there waiting to see my kill. He was so excited you couldn't tell who had killed the buck!

When we brought him into the camp he ended up weighing 300lbs and we roughly scored him in the mid 130's-140 class. He had really dark chocolate horns and bladed G2's. Also he had a decent bit of mass. All the guys at the camp were happy for me. I ended up with the 2nd biggest deer of the week, but the best story. The night before one of our guides made me read a magazine article entitled "Last Hour of the Last Day". Never thought I would end up being the guy who could have a story like this. Defiantly worth the wait.