Battletoad
FNG
- Joined
- Dec 29, 2013
- Messages
- 40
Been a member here for a couple years and I’ve learned a ton. I’ve just recently gotten into western hunting so I haven’t really had much to post, but I always enjoy reading everyone’s hunt recaps. I figured I could at least contribute a little by doing a little write up about my opening weekend WI archery buck. So here it goes…
I bowhunt on the farm I grew up on which is now only about a 30 minute drive from where I currently live. I’m very lucky to always have some great deer running around, usually one or two in the 150 class or better. Being so close I can get a pretty good idea of what’s in the area between scouting evenings and running trail cams in the summer. Well this year was definitely the exception. I kept checking cams all summer long thinking one of the big boys had to turn up sooner or later, but they never did. I also usually have all my treestands in place by June and shoot my bow all summer long and this year between two young children and some travel for work I was way behind schedule.
Fast forward to opening day, I had thought about not even going out but decided it was sacrilegious as I’ve hunted the evening of the opener for as long as I’ve been bowhunting. Without any deer in particular to go after, I decided to give the trail cams one last check on Saturday morning. Well it was a good thing I did because one of the deer I was expecting to be around this season showed back up and I had him feeding on an apple tree in daylight 2 of the last 5 days. I didn’t have a treestand in this area so I knew I’d have to do a hang and hunt.
The wind was perfect that afternoon so I snuck in around 4 pm and got a set put up in a maple tree about 20 yards from the apple tree I had the trail camera on. I had a few natural shooting lanes but did very minimal trimming as I figured the big guy had to be bedding pretty close to there and I didn’t want to disturb the area too much. It took me about half an hour to get settled in and I sat until dark seeing about 10 deer with 3 small bucks that sparred right underneath me for about an hour. So a pretty solid first sit of the season.
The next night the wind was still good so I headed back out to the same stand. It was muggy and the mosquitoes were eating me alive. It was already 6:30 and all I had seen was a doe and two fawns. I was about ready to write the night off when I reminded myself that two biggest deer I ever shot were the only deer I saw that day. About 15 minutes later I look up and about 30 yards in front of me a big buck comes feeding into view. I immediately recognize it as the one I’m after. He feeds into 25 yards but I have no shot because he’s on the opposite side of the apple tree and all the low hanging branches are in the way. I know I have plenty of time before dark and he just needs to feed a couple more yards and I’ll have a nice 20 yard broadside shot. So I wait about a minute and all of the sudden a doe blows directly behind me. All hell breaks loose and he bolts down the hill about 10 yards. He stops for maybe a second then starts to walk away. I had one lane that he might walk through so I draw and hold on it. It’s a pretty steep hill so he’s moving fairly slow picking his way down. Just as he steps into my lane I put the 40 yard pin on him and pull the trigger. I hear a loud thwack and he goes tearing down the hill. I’m pretty much beside myself at this point as a perfect scenario devolved into a real shit show in about 10 seconds. I have no idea where I hit him so I climb down before it’s dark to mark where he was when I shot. Right where I hit him, I find the front 10 inches of my arrow covered in blood and start to feel a little bit better. On the walk back to the house I called one of my buddies and we both agreed it would be ok to go look for the deer after about an hour. The buck was quartering away hard on the shot so we figured he was either done or I blew it through his backstraps so there wouldn’t be any harming in looking right away. It was about an hour and a half from the time of the shot when we got back and took up the blood trail. It was pretty sparse to start and we mainly just followed the tracks as the buck was throwing a lot of dirt as he tore out of there downhill. I still was having my doubts about the shot until about 75 yards later I looked up and saw him lying right in front of us. Talk about relief. I actually made about a perfect shot as it hit between his last two ribs and came out in front of the off-side shoulder. He didn’t have any ground shrinkage and is one of my better deer to date. It was a great way to start off the hunting season and now I’m ready to get going for my Colorado elk hunt in October.
I bowhunt on the farm I grew up on which is now only about a 30 minute drive from where I currently live. I’m very lucky to always have some great deer running around, usually one or two in the 150 class or better. Being so close I can get a pretty good idea of what’s in the area between scouting evenings and running trail cams in the summer. Well this year was definitely the exception. I kept checking cams all summer long thinking one of the big boys had to turn up sooner or later, but they never did. I also usually have all my treestands in place by June and shoot my bow all summer long and this year between two young children and some travel for work I was way behind schedule.
Fast forward to opening day, I had thought about not even going out but decided it was sacrilegious as I’ve hunted the evening of the opener for as long as I’ve been bowhunting. Without any deer in particular to go after, I decided to give the trail cams one last check on Saturday morning. Well it was a good thing I did because one of the deer I was expecting to be around this season showed back up and I had him feeding on an apple tree in daylight 2 of the last 5 days. I didn’t have a treestand in this area so I knew I’d have to do a hang and hunt.
The wind was perfect that afternoon so I snuck in around 4 pm and got a set put up in a maple tree about 20 yards from the apple tree I had the trail camera on. I had a few natural shooting lanes but did very minimal trimming as I figured the big guy had to be bedding pretty close to there and I didn’t want to disturb the area too much. It took me about half an hour to get settled in and I sat until dark seeing about 10 deer with 3 small bucks that sparred right underneath me for about an hour. So a pretty solid first sit of the season.
The next night the wind was still good so I headed back out to the same stand. It was muggy and the mosquitoes were eating me alive. It was already 6:30 and all I had seen was a doe and two fawns. I was about ready to write the night off when I reminded myself that two biggest deer I ever shot were the only deer I saw that day. About 15 minutes later I look up and about 30 yards in front of me a big buck comes feeding into view. I immediately recognize it as the one I’m after. He feeds into 25 yards but I have no shot because he’s on the opposite side of the apple tree and all the low hanging branches are in the way. I know I have plenty of time before dark and he just needs to feed a couple more yards and I’ll have a nice 20 yard broadside shot. So I wait about a minute and all of the sudden a doe blows directly behind me. All hell breaks loose and he bolts down the hill about 10 yards. He stops for maybe a second then starts to walk away. I had one lane that he might walk through so I draw and hold on it. It’s a pretty steep hill so he’s moving fairly slow picking his way down. Just as he steps into my lane I put the 40 yard pin on him and pull the trigger. I hear a loud thwack and he goes tearing down the hill. I’m pretty much beside myself at this point as a perfect scenario devolved into a real shit show in about 10 seconds. I have no idea where I hit him so I climb down before it’s dark to mark where he was when I shot. Right where I hit him, I find the front 10 inches of my arrow covered in blood and start to feel a little bit better. On the walk back to the house I called one of my buddies and we both agreed it would be ok to go look for the deer after about an hour. The buck was quartering away hard on the shot so we figured he was either done or I blew it through his backstraps so there wouldn’t be any harming in looking right away. It was about an hour and a half from the time of the shot when we got back and took up the blood trail. It was pretty sparse to start and we mainly just followed the tracks as the buck was throwing a lot of dirt as he tore out of there downhill. I still was having my doubts about the shot until about 75 yards later I looked up and saw him lying right in front of us. Talk about relief. I actually made about a perfect shot as it hit between his last two ribs and came out in front of the off-side shoulder. He didn’t have any ground shrinkage and is one of my better deer to date. It was a great way to start off the hunting season and now I’m ready to get going for my Colorado elk hunt in October.
