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My 2014 Deer Hunt

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Joined
Nov 23, 2010
Messages
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Location
On the Mississippi in SE Minnesota
I finished my 2014 deer season today with a nice doe, but as always, I have to bore you guys with a couple of stories from the season. :grin:

Those of you who have read my stories before know I’m a “mature buck” hunter. I also take mature does either on bonus tags, or when it’s near the end of my season. This year most of Minnesota is under a one deer limit since the DNR has seen fit to issue so many licenses in past years as to drastically reduce the herd. So I had decided to hunt for a few of the mature bucks that roam our lease until almost to the end and then, if needed, end the season with one of our hefty does. Anyone who has deer hunted knows that old cagey does are some of the most wary deer and it’s always a privilege to be able to take one with a primitive weapon.

My first story deals with what I call “The Farmer Theory.” Deer, even bigger bucks, in agricultural areas don’t care one bit about farm activity. I was in a tree stand at the edge of a cornfield and brassica plot when the farmer came in to combine the corn. He makes his first round, drives right up the brassica plot spewing diesel fumes all over. On round two, a pickup truck is following him honking his horn for all he was worth trying to get the farmer’s attention. The truck stopped right under my stand honking, waited for the combine to come back which then also stopped under my stand. They talked loudly over the sound of the combine, which I noticed was full and would need to dump. When the combine and truck disappeared around the hill, all was quiet. Not ten minutes had passed and I could hear a steady grunt, grunt, grunt coming up the edge of the corn. Out steps a pretty nice 10 pointer”¦the kind that needs just another year of maturity before being harvested. He continued on his way ten yards from my stand grunting with every step! Pretty cool. If you’re in farm country, don’t let a little farm activity send you scampering from your stand. You never know what might get kicked out of the crop field or might come sauntering along even with equipment nearby!

The 10 pt on the left is the one that walked by me. I had several opportunities at him during bow season too. The one on the right was one of our better bucks and had a live weight of 255 lbs.

Bumpy 092414 4 by fillmorelease

The other five guys in my lease are from the panhandle of Florida and southern Alabama. Good bunch of guys. But, I’m the only traditional weapons hunter in the bunch. I know the discussion of modern guns is off topic, but I want to use this as a comparison only. This year they all had new Savage 20 gauge shotguns (no modern rifles allowed in southern MN due to safety considerations.) Clearly the intent of these guns is to turn a shotgun into a rifle. They each had scopes that would rival things you see on varmit rifles. Savage recommends the “bullet” and the scope is preset with reticles for various long-range shooting. Five of our top bucks quickly fell at ranges of up to 225 yards including one by a gentleman that brought a scoped unmentionable muzzleloader and borrowed his son-in-law’s Savage killing his buck at over 200 yards (the buck on the right above)! It was the first shot he had taken with that gun”¦ever. :shake:

They had come a long way to hunt some big Minnesota bucks and I’m glad they went home with filled tags, but it did make me ponder WHY one “hunts.” :hmm: We participants of the traditional crowd truly have a completely different mindset. I want to take a big mature buck as much as the next guy, but I just have to do it the “hard” way. Shooting one at long distance with such equipment would mean nothing to me.

Now, I should mention that this season has had particularly brutal weather with rain, snow, ice, and temps in the single digits to teens with fairly stiff W-NW winds driving wind chills below zero. My choice of all wool garments, including my new orange capote from Paul at Northwest Traders, paid off as sitting all day was at least tolerable. I give great credit to the Jas Townsend heavy wool pullover shirts I was wearing. The extra long sleeves were absolutely great to keep the wind from blowing up under the cuffs. While not “traditional,” per se, the wool bibs from Johnson Woolen Mills in Vermont over wool pants were also fantastic at keeping the chills at bay. My boots were moose hide mukluks from Steger made in Ely Minnesota. Except for the polypropelene fleece long johns, my attire was almost all made right here in the USA and worth every penny! :applause:

So, I’m now in the middle of the week and the other guys have headed back home. No one had seen the drop-tine buck

081414 Bumpy Welded Brow Drop Tine by fillmorelease

and I figured he either left the property or was in the one area we had not hunted, thus no pressure. Surely many smart old does would be hiding in there and during the rut one hunts the does to kill bucks. So I headed for that part of the property in the dark of Wednesday morning to sit a stand that overlooks that area. By 9AM I had only seen one small 8-pt go through, so with fresh but somewhat noisy snow I decided to stealthily move down to a rock outcropping a couple hundred yards away where I could view this area as well as the opposite hillside. I was almost there when I caught some movement in a large thicket 125 yards away. It was the drop-tine buck tending a doe! I sneaked a bit closer but the thicket they were in prevented any shot. I thought I could make another 20 yards and in the process caught a movement of what I thought was something dropping down into a deep dry wash. Before I could react, up pops a good 10 pointer with heavy beams and good long tines. We saw each other at the same time as I was caught in the open and there was no head bobbing, foot stomping, or staring”¦he just turned inside out and ran for all he was worth! It was all over in an instant. Not being able to get any closer to the thicket without being too exposed and getting caught, I held up behind a log and hoped that sometime during the day the buck would move out and present a clear shot. At one point I had him open at 100 yards as he gave a bush a big trashing, but the only clear shot would have been up the hinder and I just did not want to risk that shot, though I have heard many stories of it’s deadly effectiveness. I know it would put me down quickly!!! :shocked2:

I watched the drop-tine breed that doe several times that day and then a new batch of does came in and he quickly pursued them up and out into the picked cornfield at dusk. On the way out that evening he was across the road in a field running does on the neighbor’s place. But, I figured I’d give it another go Thursday morning only this time I’d be above that thicket where I could get a shot as every single doe that went by during the day traveled through it.

As daylight broke the next morning I was well-positioned in my turkey chair under a Cedar tree on a rise above the thicket with the Northwest wind right in my face. A last quarter moon and a sky full of stars provided a breath-freezing atmosphere as temps under a clear sky had fallen into the single digits and wind chills were below zero. A bit after sunrise a doe worked through where I had been holed up the previous day, then a few more. One doe rub-urinated. Here came the drop tine buck, but from a direction that was too far away for me to shoot”¦unless I had been back where I was the day before!!! :( He walked over to where that doe had peed, then took off after her and disappeared. He actually looked gaunt from the strenuous activities of the rut.

I briefly thought about my partners in the lease”¦any of them could have easily killed that buck with the guns they carried. But I felt no remorse for not being able to kill him from such a distance.

There was a nice couple of big deadfalls that crossed each other and would provide a great ground blind right in between the two areas, so I used an hour midday to tidy it up a bit and clear a few nuisance branches, etc. so it would be ready for the next day, then hunted another spot that evening.

A “deer’s-eye” view of the blind. The hillside behind it is where I shot my doe by turning around, kneeling, and using the log as a gun rest.



This closeup shows how my turkey chair is nestled in for fairly comfortable all-day sitting, even in extreme cold.



My blind worked great and I had several does and young bucks go by in the two days I hunted it and they never even looked my way even though they were under 30 yards right in front of me including a few in the very early morning hours today. As luck would have it, when the drop-tine buck took off after that doe it was my last sighting and with this morning being my last morning to hunt I figured if a nice doe presented a shot late in the morning I’d take her. Around 11AM I peeked up over one side and a herd of does and one limping 8 pt were coming through the thicket and would travel a trail behind me directly into my wind stream. I quickly sized up the small 8 pt to see if I should make a mercy killing instead of shooting the big lead doe, but he seemed to generally be OK as he was stepping on all fours, but one just seemed “tender” versus life-threatening. The problem I had was that each time the does would stop, they would all bunch up making an ethical shot impossible as surely I’d hit two or more of them with a pass-thru. They worked past my position and the old lead doe finally got into my wind stream and she immediately stopped, testing the air. She turned the group around and headed back”¦right through my shooting lanes. They all stopped about 35 yards away and this time I had a clear shot to her chest with no other does in the way. I had a nice rest on the log of my blind and rested the Rocky Mountain Hawken’s sight right on center of the lungs. Soon the crack of the rifle and the cloud of smoke shattered the morning silence as the .54 caliber round ball patched with a .015 ox yoke patch powered by 90 grains of 2F KiK was on it’s way. The herd broke into the thicket, but one fewer emerged from the other side. The ball did it’s job quickly passing through the center of both lungs. The doe made it about 40 or 50 yards before collapsing. A heavy mist of pink blood in the snow lead me right to her.



As usual, I did my prayer of thanks and stroked the old girl’s fur for a while contemplating this year”˜s hunt. Her tail was full of cockle burrs and her back was full of those little burrs on a “string” I hate to get on me. I picked them clean so she was respectable in death.

She field dressed at 148 pounds”¦not the biggest our lease has to offer but a very nice mature doe (last year we had a doe dress at 193 pounds!)

Despite not getting a big mature buck this year, I had a great season. I cannot say how many “big” bucks I passed this year in my quest for only one of the biggest our lease had to offer. I also had some really close encounters during bow season with a couple of those big boys that managed to just stay out of range. The thing that hunting mature bucks with traditional equipment provides is lots and lots of time in the woods watching deer do all the things they do everyday. Some people think that those of us that do it are just after a set of antlers. Perhaps that’s the goal for some, but for me it’s the challenge of matching wits with only the smartest, most wary deer in the woods, be that a big mature buck OR those cagey old nanny does!

Best wishes to all of you still on the hunt for a successful and safe season.
 
Thanks for the story of your season. It is very interesting.

PS: Don't invite me to your property if you want to keep the "little" 10 pointers. :grin:
 
Very thorough season summary...sounds like you really enjoyed yourself and that's really what it's all about.
:thumbsup:
 
“The Farmer Theory.”

Some of the largest bucks are taken by farmers/ranchers. They smell like farmer equipment and diesel while their leasers smell like scent killer.

When working with the tractor I have a lot of deer come out of the woods to see what I am doing. I had one doe with twin fawns who would lay at the edge of the woods and watch me disk or mow. Their form of entertainment.

I had one doe who would leave her fawns in the front of my truck when she wandered off and wanted a baby sitter, she knew they were safe.
 
What a neat and thorough story! I read it as if I were sitting right beside you. Thanks for sharing with us. :hatsoff: Dan.
 
Many years ago I was invited to hunt pheasants in the area of Bloomington, IL. There was a big buck mount on the wall of the owner of the farm I was too hunt, and I commented on it. The farmer laughed and said there was quite a story connected with it. He was disking a large field with a huge John Deere dualie and a gang disc, and as he ran along one side where there were some woods, that big buck stepped out and challenged the tractor. The farmer stopped and waited several minutes for the buck to back off, but he didn't Deer season was in, so the man climbed off his rig, kept it between him the buck and made his way through the strip of woods to his pickup, drove 1/2 mile to his house, got a rifle, came back, approached the rig the same way he left it, and the buck was still there breathing fire. He stepped out and shot him, said the deer was there for at least 20 minutes. When they get sex on their mind they are sometimes totally nuts. Aren't we all.

Enjoyed the tale and the pictures very much, thanks.

Spence
 
:hatsoff:
Very well done!
Thank you very much for sharing your season with us, I enjoyed reading your story and your pictures.

You seem to have had a wonderful season, good for you!

Silex
 
I'd like to see the orange capote, if you're able, and don't mind. Thanks for the story!
 
Nice account, well written, nice gun, nice doe...but I've only seen a handful or so of bucks in my life as big, or bigger than that 10 point you passed up to give him another year's growing time!

My hat is off to you! :hatsoff:
(And how did you come by that screen name? Do you ever even see a spike buck where you hunt?!)
 
Spikebuck, I really enjoyed this thread. From the narrative to the pictures, it all blended well to take me along with you. I liked that you included pictures of your ground blind....looks like a great hide!

Congratulations on a great season. I think you and I have very similar outlooks regarding why we do what we do (and how we go about it).

You mention your Rocky Mountain rifle. Will you elaborate on it? It's a good looking rifle!

Best regards, Skychief.
 
Skychief said:
You mention your Rocky Mountain rifle. Will you elaborate on it? It's a good looking rifle!

It is a Pedersoli Rocky Mountain Hawken in .54 I have owned since '05 or '06. Even though I have a number of flinters now and love shooting them, this one always gets pulled out for at least part of a deer season. It's a sweet shooter with both PRB and Hornady GP's, even though it's 1-65 twist. As is the case with a Hawken, it's heavy coming in at a bit over 10#, hence I added a sling. Great offhand gun. The large buck in my avatar was taken at 65 yards "on the move" and I was able to confidently track right along with him until he hit an opening and make the shot. Also took last year's brute with it at 89 yards. I just have tons of confidence when shooting this rifle and it has never failed me.

I had some good pictures of it with a 2012 doe I shot that shows it better than in this year's pictures.

2012 Post with Hawken Pictures
 
Spikebuck, That was a wonderful story and some great photos. That is beautiful wood on your rifle. Spencer's blog reminded me that my grandfather kept a shotgun in the cab of his combine, and for the same reason......Robin :wink:
 
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