It was a mild evening on the eve of the rut. The sun had begun to set to my right. I was hunting just off of a bait pile. I had been in my stand all day and I was anxious. My legs had started to get that tingling feeling they get after sitting perfectly still for almost an hour. You see for nearly an hour I had been watching a group of deer. Watching and waiting. What I was waiting for I’m not sure. I like to think it was my hunting intuition. This night felt different. It was really getting dark now. I ever so carefully stood up. The group of deer had made their way directly underneath me. I figured being thirty feet up in a big pine would be enough to keep out of eyesight. My thought was right. Oh the joy of owning a climber.
I was beginning to go against my better judgment. I had picked out a big doe to shoot. I put my trigger release on its loop and raised my bow. My pin was set. My finger was on the release. NO WAIT. My brain froze just long enough to catch a glimpse of big ivory spikes to my right. My brain almost didn’t even register the image. Just ten yards below my stand, the biggest buck I had ever see while hunting was walking towards the group of does. He lunged at the does as they all scattered. At that same moment he stopped, quartered away from me and stuck his nose down where a doe had stood a second before. He was sniffing to find out if she was in heat. From the time I first saw him to this very moment I felt as if an eternity had just passed by. In actuality it had probably been ten seconds. I snapped back from my dream state. My bow was still drawn and my finger on the release. I estimated the shot to be twenty yards. I aimed and pulled the trigger release. I watched the vanes of the arrow spin as the arrow flew towards the brute. (I always shoot with both eyes open so that I can watch my arrow in flight). The arrow stuck as it hit home right into the boiler maker. I froze in shock. Only two things on me were moving. My eyes as they watched the deer take off, crashing through the brush out of sight with my arrow still in him. The other was my heart which was beating so hard that I became lightheaded. I had finally done it. My quest for a wall hanger was finally over. How wrong that thought was.
I waited in my stand and passed the time by calling my friends and family who hunt. I told them what had just happened. The whole time other deer were still filtering through to have their evening meal. I guess they had figured out that I wasn’t going to shoot them this night because they didn’t seem to care that I was thirty yards from them and talking at normal volume on my phone. So after at least a half an hour had passed and dark had set in I climbed down. I walked immediately over to where I had shot him. I had hair and a few drops of blood. This is good I say with delight. I began to track him through the brush, across the land owner’s driveway, and into the big woods beyond. I lost his trail after that though. There is a fence that borders the neighbor’s property and the deer often flee over the fence so I thought maybe I could pick up the blood trail again at the fence. Sure enough he had crossed it so under the fence I went. Across the stretch of woods, across the neighbor’s driveway, and into another big woods I followed again. This time the trail was heavy.
I must admit, at this point I should have backed out and waited until morning. After all, I had just traveled about one hundred fifty yards at this point. Alas, I continued the pursuit. Down into the woods I went following the thick crimson trail. Suddenly I stopped up as I heard crashing just up ahead. I figured that I had definitely just spooked up the buck. Sure enough in twenty more yards I came across a big thicket. I crawled on hands and knees following his blood trail until I came upon his bedding area. Blood was everywhere. That was it I thought to myself. I’ll never find him now. All the same, I crawled the rest of the way out of the thicket and marked the spot. I marked a trail all the way back to my hunting area and called it a night. What a long night that was.
The next day my hunting buddy, Matt and I, went back and followed the ribbon back to where I had left off. We back tracked first because we both thought that my arrow should have fallen out somewhere along the way and I had just passed over it in the dark. We looked and looked but couldn’t find it so we went back to the marking tape. On and on we tracked. Finally after three spots where he had nearly dried up and one attempt at circling back to lose us we came up to a deep ditch. Down into the ditch the trail continued and we thought for sure he would be somewhere at the bottom. After all, we had gone across four properties and an approximate eight hundred yards at this point. I know, almost sounds impossible doesn’t it? But no he had somehow made it up the ditch and into someone’s backyard; someone whom we hadn’t been able to get permission from to be on their property. Luckily though they were outside so I could yell to them and ask for their permission and tell them what I was doing. By now I was standing in their yard and by the time I was done telling him we were tracking down my deer he was pointing and saying “Oh you mean that one”.
Low and behold no more than thirty yards off to my right was the deer. I hadn’t noticed it before because half of him was covered by a fallen branch. The way I figured it the buck had barely made it up the ditch and, dizzy with all the blood loss, must have ran right into the branch and became lodged in it. To weak to get up again, he drew his last breath right where he laid. Strangely enough my arrow was still lodged in him and in one piece. Matt and I thanked the old couple for telling us he was there and we drug him up to their driveway. We walked back using the side road going to the couples house and all the way back around to the property where my truck was and we retrieved the deer. I drove us back to the hunting property to field dress him. I wanted to know exactly what I punctured with my arrow. So while dressing him I was checking organs. The liver was fine. Both lungs were fine. I got to the heart. Now as if him traveling some eight hundred and fifty yards with half an arrow stuck in him wasn’t hard enough to imagine, what I found next was unfathomable. I had managed to pierce his heart. Not all the way though but come on seriously. So somehow this animal traveled eight hundred and fifty yards with an arrow sticking half way out of him and making mincemeat out of his heart every step of the way.
At the end of all this he wasn’t quite as big as I thought he was. Ground shrinkage really can do a number on gross score. I didn’t care though. This was an incredible journey and I felt like I truly bonded with this magnificent animal. Depending on what stage of hunting you’re in the journey makes the hunt. This truly was a once in a lifetime experience.
Late October 2011
Weapon: PSX XForce
Arrow: Carbon Express Predator 2
Broad Head: NAP Thunderhead 125 Grain
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