Last minute buck

The last hour of the hunt is just as good as the first hour of the hunt… The last hour of the hunt is just as good as the first hour of the hunt. I kept thinking about that line I read in a magazine article by Bill Winke earlier this morning while drinking coffee at the house. I needed to keep telling myself that as my hunting time in Ohio was winding down. It was very warm, in the 60’s, and windy this last morning of my hunt, and at 8:15am, the rain started coming too. I had planned to get out of the tree at 10:00am, go pick up Brian and head to the house where we would give it a good cleaning, pack up and head for home by noon. We had just arrived Sunday afternoon, November 11th, but both had to return home by Wednesday evening, the 14th, for other obligations, so this trip would be shorter than anticipated. It had been a rough season for all of us. My brother’s buck was the only big one taken and only one or two other shooter bucks seen among our group of 11 hunters over the last 3 weeks. The rut seemed sporadic and mostly little bucks were running the does, we were all baffled and getting a bit discouraged.

As I sat in my stand thinking about that line, I was also going over scenarios in my head about how the perfect hunt would go down at this spot. This season, I have been having serious problems with both shoulders, and drawing my bow has become more than a chore, actually it’s more like an Olympic Powerlifter attempting a deadlift on a world record amount of iron. It takes me quite a bit of effort to get my bow back, and because of that, a few opportunities have been spoiled this season. I cannot draw smoothly with minimal effort, and any deer within shooting distance is going to pick me off while trying to wrangle my bow to full draw. So I sat there, visualizing the most perfect scenario for a shot at this stand…let’s see, if the buck comes along that hillside, and goes behind those three trees growing close together I can draw when he's blocked by them. Then when he steps out, I have a perfect broadside 20 yard shot. Well, it’s nice to dream anyway, there isn’t even a deer trail there.

By 8:55am, the rain had let up a little, but the wind still swayed the trees and it felt more like a spring day than mid November. My cell phone buzzed. Got a text message from Brian…you see any? No, I replied, just a few dogs, how about you? Nothing, he replied, No deer for you, just dogs? Dogs…, I replied. As I folded the phone up and placed it in my pocket, I looked up and saw two deer standing on the hillside 85 yards away. A doe and a fawn had slipped in, it was now 8:58am, and the last hour of the hunt was upon me. I watched them browse over the crest of the hill, and they were joined by a button buck a minute or so later. Well, at least some deer are moving now I thought, so I kept a watchful eye on that hill and just a few minutes later I saw a crown of antlers bobbing towards me. I watched as the buck closed the distance and stopped where the doe and fawn had been, then he looked down the hill. He was looking down the hill and I was looking at him through my binoculars trying to decide if I wanted to shoot him. Then I saw a doe emerge from a clump of trees, and knew what he was looking at. The doe meandered down the hill, and the buck started to follow. It looked like they were going to go off the hill about 70 yards away, then the doe changed course and started towards my stand. The buck came towards her down the hill and she seemed not to be ready for that and sprinted away from him, right towards me, stopping 8 yards from the base of my tree. The buck then started to close the distance and I figured I’d pick up my bow just in case. I still wasn’t sure this was a shooter, but as he got closer, I could see he was a heavy 3.5 year old buck with some junk on his bases, which were pretty massive. I decided he was good enough and watched in awe as he seemed to have read my thoughts from earlier. He stayed about 30 yards uphill of the doe and walked along the hillside…right behind those three trees, as if he had read the script. I came to full draw and decided to complete the story. He did hear something when I drew, and stopped behind the trees. I waited. The buck peeled up the hill a little and emerged from the trees only to walk behind another. I placed my pin right next to that tree and watched as his head and antlers, then neck, and finally shoulder cleared the tree. He stopped, I settled in, and released. The arrow traveled the 22 yards to his shoulder and found it’s mark, center punching both lungs. At first glance it seemed high, but as he ran up the hill I could see the trail would be easy to follow. He covered the 40 yards to the top, lurched into a pine thicket and crashed down about 7 seconds after the shot. He was done. I looked at my phone…9:16am, the last hour of the hunt. My brother killed his buck in the first hour of our Ohio hunt on October 27th, and here I am in the last hour of my last day, putting truth to Bill Winke’s words. Yes, the last hour was just as good as the first. Well, almost, Brian’s buck was bigger.

Brians Buck.