We have a family tradition of traveling to my sister, Marilyn's farm in Keren's, Texas, for Thanksgiving or Christmas, and staying a couple days to do a little hunting. My wife, Brenda, and our 3 children that are still at home, really enjoy the break from urban life where we live in Katy, Tx. Marilyn and her husband, Thomas, own or lease a couple hundred acres, and the deer have been re-populating the area fairly well in recent years. Thomas has lived there all his life, and said the deer had all been hunted out during the 40's and 50's.
This was the third year my 17 year old son, David, and I had gone deer hunting together. Each time, we got skunked. Well, at least, he had gotten skunked. He still had to hunt with me because he had not yet taken the hunter education course that is required in Texas for hunters born after 1971. He had shot the 30-30 a few times in earlier years, when we were sighting it in, and he had a good steady aim. I had plugged the hole in the target with a small stick after each shot to make it easy to see where the next shot hit. After I got a pattern in the bullseye, I let him shoot a couple shots. One of his bullseye shots drilled the stick right through the same hole where I had shot before. (Reminded me of a fellow named Robin Hood!)
Two years ago, in 2005, I had managed to nail a nice 6-pointer just as the legal light was leaving the woods on Thanksgiving Day. I had woke up with the dogs barking at the coyotes at about 4:00 that day. As I got out of bed, I suddenly felt nauseous, apparently, from something I ate the previous day. I ended up staying in bed until 1:30 that afternoon, weakened from the experience. I then was able to hold down a banana and a bottle of Gatorade, so, at 3:00 I walked out to the gate, where my wife was watching as the children were feeding range cubes to the cattle. I let her know I was feeling better, but just weak. Then I walked back to the house. There, my sister greeted me with, "Well, get your rifle and go get your buck!". "Yeah, sure", I thought. Then I grabbed my stuff and walked the half mile to the stand across the road.
The field was quiet until I started giving up about 20 minutes after sunset. Then a doe appeared close to the corn feeder, behaving very nervously and looking over her shoulder where she had come from. She nibbled on a couple grains of corn and then disappeared into the woods. I knew this meant a buck was on her tail, so I stayed put, and kept my rifle at the ready. As much as I was studying the area where the doe was looking before she bolted, I don't see how he snuck out there and gave me a nice broadside view! I saw the gleam of the light reflecting from the antlers, so I put the crosshairs on his vital area and squeezed off his last heartbeat. Thomas, Marilyn, Brenda, David, and our two daughters, Jennifer and Amanda, all came in the truck to haul it out when I called on the walkie-talkie. I was so weak, that Jennifer and David had to help me with the field dressing and skinning. Thomas helped a lot with guiding them on how to do all that. He gets his deer every year, so he gets enough practice to do this efficiently. We quartered it and took it home on Saturday, where I finished the butchering, myself.
Well, that was two years ago, and I think my son learned a lot from that experience. My only other deer that he saw - a 5-pointer - was a few years before, and he wasn't that interested in the whole thing back then.
As we were preparing for this year's trip, the weather was not just balmy, but warm. However, the weather forecast said a cold front would be there on Wednesday night! We got there about 3:40 Wednesday afternoon, and David and I walked quietly to an oak tree with cedars growing around it, by about 4:20. Marilyn had said that she thought we might catch a buck crossing the gully to the north of there. So, we decided to hunker down in the cedar trees. We sat there with the cold north wind blowing in our faces and didn't look to the south very much because there wasn't much of a window in the cedars in that direction. Suddenly, we heard a loud stomp behind us. I turned around to see a buck - probably a 6-pointer - not 25 feet from us. Then, he took off into the woods, before David could get turned around to see him. That was all we saw that evening, and we walked back to my sister's house, at least knowing there was a decent buck in the area. We also decided to go to the box stand the next morning, knowing we'd have a better chance there, overlooking the corn feeder. We figured the cold weather would cause the deer to go to the corn.
So, I told David to set his alarm for 4:00am and we went to bed around 9:00. The coyotes were running by a couple times during the night, so the dogs were barking occasionally, but other than that, we all slept well. The alarms went off at 4:00 and David was in the shower in just a couple minutes! Wow, that was the quickest he had gotten up since Christmas morning when he was 6! I had instructed him to use the de-scenting shampoo and body wash for hunters. I took my shower as soon as he was done, and we both got into our hunting clothes that were washed in de-scenting laundry detergent. We downed a cup of coffee and ate a couple homemade cinnamon rolls, sprayed down our boots with de-scenting spray, grabbed our guns and coats and headed for the stand. We got half way down the driveway and stopped to load our weapons and put them back on safety.
We walked quietly down to the end of the long driveway, then stalked across the county road and quietly climbed over the metal gate. That was the easy part of being quiet. This year was a very good year for acorns, so the ground was covered with them. Every step produced a crunch or two. We would take a step or two and then stop. We finally made it to the stand about 45 minutes before first light. It was about 39 degrees with the wind blowing about 10 to 15 mph from the north. We were glad we were in the protection of the stand. We both half-dozed and watched until first light, then we started scouring every bush and tree we could see, trying to see what we could only hope was there. Finally, about 6:40, David was tiring some, so he handed me his 30-30 and hunkered down, whispering to me to let him know if I saw anything. This was no time to discuss with him that he might could see the buck first or that he might see the buck in a spot where I couldn't see. Any such talking would be too much noise, although it would be somewhat covered by the wind. So, I chose to just let him be still and quiet (something he had a hard time doing the last few years!).
Well, that apparently was a wise decision. At about 7:13, I saw a nice buck about 50 yards in front of us, coming out of the woods from the east. I nudged David, and whispered, "There he is"! Meanwhile, I was noticing that the rack was wider than the buck's ears, although I couldn't make out the distinct points enough to count them, I knew it was a larger rack than my 6-pointer from 2005 or the deer we saw the previous evening. I had David's 30-30 in my hands when I saw the buck, and I could have taken him, myself, but I had promised David that I would let him get the first buck, then I could go out on my own and get mine. I was really glad the buck had come out of the woods where he did, and not 100 yards to the south, or he could have caught our scent like the buck last night. He walked about 10 steps out of the woods, giving us a good, broadside shot, but David wasn't ready, yet!
Just as David got the scope on the buck, he turn away from us and walked to the corn feeder, another 50 yards to the north. I whispered to David, "Be patient and wait for a good shot - it looks like he\'s heading for the corn. We'll have time while he's there." I reminded him to breathe and when he's ready, to take a deep breath and let it half way out, and then to squeeze, not pull, the trigger. The buck continued toward the feeder, and zig-zagged a couple times on the way, but there were a couple small trees in the way, so David held his own and waited. Finally, the buck made it to the corn feeder.
Thomas sets up the corn feeders in August to get the deer accustomed to them, but he also has cows in that spread, so he sets up a triangle barbed wire fence around the feeder to keep the cows from knocking over the feeder. Then, about two weeks before opening day, he moves the cows to another pasture that will not be hunted.
Mr. Buck wasn't in there very long, and had only taken a couple bites, when he presented the perfect shot, so I told David to take him. My heart was beating rapidly as I waited what seemed to be a minute, but I know it wasn't two seconds. Then, BANG!! The buck dropped right there! Wow, my son has taken his first buck! He really did it! I asked him where he had the crosshairs. He said he had it right behind the front shoulders. He was going for the heart shot.
I had told him before the hunt, that we should wait in the stand a couple
minutes after shooting, just to make sure he's dead. This is especially
important if the deer runs off wounded. He might run a quarter mile or
more before dying if he knows he is being pursued, but he'll lay down
as soon as possible and get stiff if we give him some time. So, we sat
there in the stand, knowing that the shot was heard back at the house.
It took me about 3 minutes to find my cell phone and get it turned on,
I was shaking so much! I called my sister and told her that David got a
nice buck and they needed to bring the truck to get him back to the house.
They were still in bed, drinking coffee!
So, David and I went over to the buck to check it out. When we counted the points, there were eight! (My best buck so far was a 6-pointer!) We could see where the bullet went in, right where David said he was aiming. Then we flipped the buck over to see the exit wound. There wasn't any. When we got the buck back to the house and field dressed him, we found out why. The bullet had entered close to the top of the ribcage and then lodged in the backbone. That explained why he dropped so suddenly with a "heart shot".
While waiting for them to come with the truck, we took a couple pictures with my cell phone. Then we waited some more. When they finally came, we understood why. They had all gotten bundled up and rode over in the truck to see! (Just like two years ago!)
David took a more active part with field dressing his deer than he did
with mine two years earlier, but I did have to step in and help out a little.
It was bitter cold standing in the wind, which had picked up to about 20
mph by that time, and he didn't feel like standing out there much longer,
and to be honest, neither did I. My son had gotten his deer and had done
a good part of the field dressing, and watched me do the rest. Next deer,
he can do more or all of it. After all, he did grow up in the city!