I would like to start off by saying that this 2009 archery season
was by far the best I personally had ever seen & been fortunate enough to be a
part of. I mean I had more encounters with bucks , than I had ever seen in all 37 years of my hunting . I'll begin by telling
you that I had up close & personal encounters with 14 different bucks. The smallest being a spike, and the largest that
would have made the pope & young without question. early the 1st week of bow season I had a 6 point that had a rack that
looked high just like he was a reindeer, however he was a whitetail. The encounter I had with him brought me within 12 yards
of him , from a groundblind position. One problem ! the one spot I had not cleared a shooting lane in is where he appeared
in, go figure lol. He had 2 young doe's with him, Both walked right in front of me at 6 yards no more, without busting me.
I so wanted the 6 that I just waited anxiously for what seemed an eternity. In reality it was about 5 minutes. after standing
there for all that time , he finally walked over to a old big clump of trees about 40 yards away & (YEP) he layed down
, without one shot opportunity :( . A few min after that something spooked the 3 deer & they bolted back to the
heavy bedding thicket they came from. Well folks it just went downhill after that bigtime.
About ten min after that a fiesty red squirrel came in front of me , he caught me
moving or heard me move etc. Well he started screaming as loud as he could. Most any hunter who's experienced an encounter
with a red squirrel knows what I'm talking about. grrrrr it was the screach that commands all the animals in the woods to
stop & listen!!! Well after 5 min. of that he really got to me as it was prime time around 4:15 pm. Well foolish me let
him get me to the point I finally took a small stick & tossed it up the tree trying to shoo it away. What happend next
you ask??? Yep you guessed it as my arm was comming down, I seen movement!! I focused on the movement & low & behold
it was the ten point I had seen several times just pryor to the bow opener. He busted me outright :( one look & 3 or 4
bounds & poof he was gone grrrrrr. I was really peed to say the least, two close encounters & NO DEER to show for
it. I couldn't let myself get discouraged as it was only the 3rd day & there was buck sign everywhere. That night my trail
cam had picked up a 5-pt . cull buck we decided to take if we had the opportunity as we are trying to take the lesser class
bucks who won't ever amount to a good class breeding buck . We knew there are several nice 8- pt's & 2 nice 10 pt's
as well as several 6- pointers that eventually will turn into nice breeders, If left to live for a couple years.
Well I had spent time in several different ladder stands I had placed along various travel routes, we know to be heavily regular
routes the deer travel through. Well I had checked the cams on day 2 , of the archery & discovered the 5- point buck we
decided to take if we had the opportunity had been traveling this one trail on a regular basis, so I decided to hunt that
stand the following day. So the next morning I got out & into the new stand I had put up a couple weeks earlier , around
5:45 am . At 7:45 am I heard noise from behind me . I looked & seen it was a buck headed right toward where I had layed
a trail of C'mere deer several day's in a row. The buck turned out to be the very 5-pt cull buck we decided to take . He continued
following the trail right past my stand where he got out about 10 to 15 yrds out in front of my I was already at full draw
at that point , just waiting for him to turn for a quartering away shot. He finally did , and I let the arrow fly!!!! the
arrow slid right directly behind the shoulder & Through. The buck leaped a couple times & disapeared in the thickets
ahead of me. I heard him stop at that point, so I waited about 5 minutes before hearing another noise like the buck falling
down. After a couple more minutes I lowered my bow by the rope & hook, climbed down out of the stand. walked over &
found my bloody arrow, telling me I had a great frothy blood on it indicating a good lung / heart shot. I walked in the direction
the deer ran, found a good blood trail & 30 yards later there layed the buck . He was the 5 point cull buck we wanted
to remove from the heard. I was a happy camper to score on day 3 was awesome. We only had to drag the buck mabye 60 yards
back to camp, which was even better :). The weather got too warm that day over 55-60 so Myself & Carol had to quarter
out the buck , we took him home & left him in the refridgerator for 4 day's Then went home & cut him up.
That 4 day's made that buck as tender as tender can be. But we had alot of doe tags now too fill So we cut him up took a day
off, went back & started hunting again. However the does we saw all summer just left the area all together due to
all the very heavy buck rutting activity going on by our camp. I had never seen this much buck rutting activity in all my
years of hunting. Ya just had to see it all to even believe it . But it nearly killed all our chances at taking doe's, it
just chased them outside our area completely, for the 1st time in over 5 years. I have a story about the rutting Bucks &
My rattling sessions , That I just can't write here as it's so unbelievable so I will tell it in
a video, & I had my wife right there not 25 yrds away to bare witness to it all !!!! All I can say it was so intense
I prob had a spot in my drawers after the encounter lol So stay tuned I will be adding that video story real soon. I hope
you enjoyed this story , as I did reliving it again while writing it to yous'
