Work
Weekend
Fellow
pro-staffers, and good friends, Mark and Matt Casper and myself
headed North to my dad’s property in Clark County for our
annual work weekend to prepare for the upcoming rifle season.
With everyone’s busy schedule, kids, etc. finding a weekend
to get up there is challenging.
I headed up Friday afternoon early enough to hunt Friday evening.
Mark and Matt was not able to head up till Saturday afternoon.
The forecast for the weekend was perfect…..overcast and
cool. Friday night I saw three in my honey hole so I couldn’t
ask for a better start to the weekend.
Saturday morning I awoke to a heavy frost, the first one for the
year. The night before I had decided to hunt a farm we call Bono’s.
Bono’s is an 80+ acre tracking that is mostly set-aside,
but there are a few draws that are natural funnels. Over the years
it has produced several good bucks. The particular stand I was
going to hunt had two does harvested out of it by prostaffers
Mark and Jason last year.
The morning got off to a great start. As the sun rose over the
hill and it started melting the frost of the trees and the leaves
were raining down. At about 7:30 or so I saw 3 does out in the
field which was out of range. About a half an hour or so passed
and I heard a splash to the North. When I turned that direction
I saw two nice sized does headed my direction. They milled around
20 yards in front of me before the bigger doe offered a nice quartering
away broadside shot. I had watched these deer for about 10 minutes,
so I had time to relax and get my nerves in check. I put the pin
right on her and squeezed the trigger. Whack! She looked up at
me and walked off. After she got out of sight I got down to see
what happened, and there was my new Rage 2 blade broadhead buried
in an oak tree. After looking back through my window I had clipped
a toothpick sized branch and my arrow had deflected. I dug my
$13+ broadhead out of the tree and crawled back up in stand.
Saturday evening I was not able to hunt because of a wedding.
My cousin Tom, who is an avid bowhunter, decided to get hitched
in October…..what was he thinking? Mark and Matt made it
up early enough that afternoon to hunt that evening. Mark headed
to the bowl, a hardwoods thicket where he had seen several last
year. Matt brought his climber and hunted a Maple thicket on a
creek bottom on the other side of Bono’s. Matt had an encounter
with a pope and younger that he will never forget.
Sunday morning we awoke to cloudy skies and slightly warmer temps….still
in the 30’s though. Matt wanted to hunt the Maples again
in hopes of seeing his big boy and Mark wanted to head back to
the bowl. I decided to hunt the stand on Bono’s that I had
hunted the previous morning. Matt and I were in our stands real
early, which I like to do even though it generally doesn’t
happen that way. It was a still morning, no wind, and for the
first hour, no deer…..the squirrels weren’t even out.
At ~7 I went through a series of grunts on the Primos Buck Roar.
Finally about 7:30 I heard a deer working its way towards me,
but was behind me. The tree the ladder stand is in is a thick
forked tree and you cannot see behind you. Finally the deer stepped
in my view to the right….it was a forky. I watched him for
10 minutes or so then heard another deer walking in behind me
but to my left. I couldn’t take my eyes off the forky because
he was looking my direction. The forky turned enough so that I
could peek over my left shoulder and there stood a shooter buck.
My first view of him, all I could see was rack and my heart began
to race. The forky turned and worked his way behind me out of
sight so now I could focus on this big 9 pointer…..the biggest
buck I have ever had that close. For the longest time he was so
close that I could not shoot even if I had the opportunity. He
worked in front of me for about 5 minutes or so. He would look
up at me then go back to munching on grass. We played this game
for what seemed like forever. Finally he got out in front of me
nearly in the same tracks as the doe I missed the morning before.
He was quartering away at a steep angle. I put the pin on his
back rib, grunted at him to get him to stop, and then squeezed
the trigger. I buried all but 6 inches of the arrow in his boiler
room. He kicked like a mule and ran down the draw. I could see
him most of the way, but right before he got out of sight he stopped.
He stood there looked around, and then continued on. I was in
complete disbelief, because I knew I had drilled him. I turned
back to see if the forky was still to my right, and there stood
a nice 8 pointer. I sat in the tree another 10 minutes, seemed
like 7 hours, before I got down. I went over to where he was standing
and just a few drops of blood. I walked up to the truck to get
Mark and the 4-wheeler. After a couple hours Mark and I was back
at my stand and I was explaining everything to Mark. Mark was
looking for blood and I headed to the last spot I saw him. I crossed
the creek and when walking up the bank there he was. He didn’t
go 80 yards. All I could see was rack. I was jumping around like
a kid in a candy store…..I had just harvested a pope and
younger with my Hoyt Trykon……first deer with that
bow. Picture time!
It
was an awesome hunt that I will never forget. The final score
came in at 142 Gross, and 132 Net. Matt had found the shed off
this deer earlier this year in turkey season. Matt found the side
with the forked G2.
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