Hey guys. I know I don't post much. I don't own a bow yet so don't have much to contribute. I'm here daily reading and learning though. Today I feel like I have something to contribute, and I'm bragging for my buddy. I have a buddy I actually met shortly after I joined here. After some PM's back and forth, it turned out he lives about 2 miles from me. We started hanging out some and we've started really concentrating on effectively hunting our farm. About 3 weeks ago we were out scouting the back 40. It's a real thick woods that I admittedly haven't put the time in to scout. We knew there were deer back there but not sure what. While we were back there about the only deer sign we found were some rubs, some fresh and some not. The odd part was that all the rubs we saw in that area were on cedars. We found 3 trees with real fresh rubs, again all cedars. Seemed odd. Neither of us had heard of a deer that seemed to prefer a specific type of tree. The following week he asked if he could hunt and if I wanted to go out with him to help find a stand. We settled on a tree about 150 yards from the back 40. While looking around a bit in that area we again noticed 5-6 more trees with fresh rubs. All cedars. He sat that afternoon but nothing showed itself. That brings us to this weekend. Friday we were talking and decided once the rain moved out Saturday morning it would probably be worth hunting Saturday evening. I was at work but he keeps me updated through email. At 430 he sends me an email that just says "Squirrels." Nothing until 620. I get an email that says "Holy $^&!. Big deer. BIG" At this point it's worth noting that he's a pretty laid back guy and doesn't get too excited. Most of the time when he emails me it's "little 6" or "no shooters" to find out later that they were probably ones I wouldn't have had an issue shooting. So when I get his BIG email I know it's something good. An hour and a half goes by and I don't hear anything so finally email him. He says "you wouldn't believe me if I told you. He's down. Need your help tomorrow." Yesterday morning we go out to find this thing. 2 pass throughs, there's blood everywhere as well as the occasional chunk of lung. Nonetheless we still end up tracking this thing about 150 yards deep into the back 40. As we cross the fence he tells me there were 3 other bucks there when he was tracking it the night before, all 3 easily shooters. I know this is getting long so I'll skip a lot of the details to tell you we found this guy and he's a beast. Easily and by far the biggest deer I've seen in person. And old. Checking his teeth was hard because they were almost all gone. He had his lower front and that was it. Cleaned him out and it took 4 of us an hour to drag him to where we could get to him with a four wheeler. Final details are 19.5" inside spread, 22" outside, 34" neck, and once we got him hung up he was 228 lbs. For no food plots or anything like that, just an old woods buck he's huge in my book. Incidentally he had a bunch of cedar shavings stuck around the base of his antlers. I tried to get a couple pics of it but I'm pretty convinced he really did have a thing for cedars. View attachment 63057 View attachment 63058 View attachment 63059 View attachment 63060 View attachment 63061
Congrats to your buddy. Sounds like a nice buck. I can probably post them for you if you can email them to me. I'll private message you.
Bucks love trashing red cedar trees, I have known people who cut a cedar and made a post and bury the base like a fence post and the bucks will hit it. They also love to browse on white cedar, to the point it is hard to get natural regeneration in boreal forests of Northern Minnesota.
Congrats to your friend, can't wait to see the pics. What are you waiting for? Go get a bow and make some of these stories for yourself! A lot of bucks seem to prefer cedar for some reason. Maybe they enjoy the aromatics or something lol
Thanks guys. Hopefully the pics get posted soon. I'm really hoping for a bow by next season. Had one for a couple months but DL was a little long and it needed sights, rest, etc. Money has been tight enough that i could't justify taking money from the family to set up something that still wouldnt be great. Sold that bow but still regret it. Im going to do all i can to have one by spring. As for cedars, i guess it makes sense but i didnt know it.
Nice clean 10, that's what I am hoping for this year. Have shot everyhing but up to 13 points. One of these years it will happen, missed my only opportunity by 3" so far.
Indeed. We've had a couple cameras around the farm but nothing back there that far. No clue anything like that was around. And to find out there's 3 more running around?!
