So much has happened since my last post...alot has gone on in my personal life but we won't speak of that! Let's get "to the hunt".
To sum things up, I lost my sweet little farm land when my friend moved to Texas. That stinks in more ways than one. So we had to try to find another spot. A gentleman from church hooked me up with his grandson to hunt about 30 acres with a huge soybean field taking up much of that.
What a story we have here...so I meet the grandson (20ish) and he seems to be an avid hunter, he seems to have a clue and he has been working this property for a couple months trying to get ready for deer season. So we come to an agreement I give him $50 and he'll get a couple 55 gallon drums of corn from a relative. Fair enough I think. He is set up on what is the 'sweeter' area of the land and I am in a smaller area that looks ok. He has cameras all around and has seen several big bucks and is convinced that there are 2 buck that look similar but, he does not want the bigger one shot (apparently he is a budding land/herd manager). I only see one big buck on my camera! Then he proceeds to tell me to age the deer on the hoof and don't shoot anything under 3 years old! (Insert confused look.) I agree....somewhat...
So all is well I am getting good pictures of deer, several bucks coming in and so on. I have my stand on the edge of the woods looking over the soybeans with about a 20 yard swath of grasses between the woods edge and the beans. I bait it heavily with corn and the deer come.
See that guy in the center? Makes your heart skip a beat doesn't it?
The deer come alright they come at night, early in the morning.... just not during the day when I am there! Well not in the field at least. I was sitting in my stand one afternoon and heard noise behind me the woods are crawling with deer but I am faced the wrong way and slightly out of bow range.
Fortunately I had an old, rickety, homemade ladder stand to set in the woods. I got that stand up, sort of strapped in and I was got to go. Or so I thought...I climbed up in it and it wasn't quite as stable as I had hoped. No sooner than I got in it I saw movement coming my way. Sure enough an old saddle-backed buck with broken antlers comes up with a yearling buck in tow. They lead deer nearly bumped into the ladder that I was on! But because the stand was so unstable I felt like I was gonna fall out if I drew my bow!
Hall Pass for those two.
Because of the unsteady stand I used the bean stand until I could bring out tools to fix the it.
Remember the big guy up above? I had him at 17yds broadside from the bean stand! And I passed because of the grandson! I texted him and told him I passed on it and he said it would be worth it! Worth it!???!!! ....That was the biggest buck I have ever had an opportunity to arrow and I passed! It better be worth it! Later that day he checked his camera and sent me a picture of the buck I passed on and he says "oh you could have shot him"!!!!!(insert angry face with hands out to choke someone).
Wait it gets better. Grandpa shows me a picture of grandson's deer that he shot. Grandson thought it was a doe...until they retrieved it and it was a spike buck with 4" antlers! He thought it was a doe! I'm supposed to age them on the hoof and he shoots a spike because he thought it was a doe!!!!
Wait there's more. I talk to his younger brother and he tells me that he went to the field to check cameras and saw a big buck in the field in the beam of his flashlight while walking down there, so he goes back to the truck to get his bow. He shines the deer, sets down his light, shoots an arrow, then shines his light back, sees that he misses and tries again!
And here's me passing on the biggest buck of my hunting career! I got one brother telling me to age them on the hoof while he shoots a yearling buck thinking it's a doe and his brother is attempting to poach deer at night!
All in all I passed on 6 deer out there last season.
Not this year! 26 of the 30 acres has been sold this season and guess who is on the last four that did not get sold? ME! that's right! I have the legal area! (do a little dance).
So we moved the stand off the field back into the woods, I cleared a small spot, and planted a miniature food plot,
And we hung an automatic feeder a little ways off. Hopefully we have created a staging area and I will be able to arrow some venison this year! I will try to put up some trail cam pics soon.
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