I'm new to the forum and thought I would share some information about myself and my story about my first bow kill this archery season. I've been hunting with my dad, uncles and grandparents since I've been 12 years old (I'm currently 28), but for the past 4 years I finally got into archery and since my first year archery hunting I have been hooked! I've seen a lot of very cool things while hunting archery that I never really got to see when I was strictly hunting during regular rifle season. I've got to see buck sparring, fighting, making rubs on trees, making scrapes, chasing doe, grunting while on a hot doe and so much more. It wasn't too easy for me to get started in bow hunting, my family although many of them are experienced hunters, none of them have been that involved with archery hunting. So as a starter I had little clue in what I was really getting myself into and there was a lot of trial and error involved before things finally fell together and I harvested my first deer with a bow on my own private land. This year it finally fell together. I've always been one that had a hard time shooting doe and I've shot plenty of smaller buck and some decent buck with rifle. So even as a beginner in archery I set my goal high to where I was only going to shoot a 3 1/2 year old buck or older. In the process I passed up many legal, but not mature buck. I've had doe dead to rights on many occasions (even with a doe tag) and stuck to my guns and patiently waited for that one mature deer to finally give me a opportunity. Saturday, Oct. 25th is when things finally came together. I had only been out hunting archery 2 days prior to this day during this season, but the amount of doe and buck I had seen in those 2 days was at a all time high since I have been archery hunting on my 150 acres of private land. I had seen several small buck (which I had about every sing one of them dead to rights) and 2 shooters that evaded me by not coming into bow range. Well that Saturdaythings finally fell together and started off much like the first two days I went out. I was hunting right off the corner of a field next to a big old oak tree that was dropping acorns like crazy. There were tons of buck rubs, scrapes and the deer were really working that area hard pre-rut. Well first thing that morning I wanted to get up in my climber stand at least 30 min. before sun up because I knew the deer were moving through that area early in day. First thing I seen was 2 medium sized doe that stuck around for a bit eating acorns before a small 4 point came into the the corner of the woods from the field and chased the doe off. I then saw a wide 8 point work a scrape from about 60 yards from me, I tried to grunt, bleat, rattle I threw everything I had at this buck and it never even looked my way as I hopelessly watched this buck go out of site as I had seen it do the 1 other time already that season. About 45 minutes after watching that buck disappear into the woods I heard a rustle behind me. When I turn around my breath was taken away when I saw a nice 10 point tearing this small oak tree up from about 40 yards away, but not in one of my shooting lanes. I watched this buck tear away at this tree for 5 minutes before it started make it path toward the big oak tree to feed on some acorns. This buck was as close as 15 yards from me but would never stay still long enough or stay in a opening long enough for me to get a shot. By this time I had the worse case of knee knocking I've ever had, I couldn't get my darn leg to stop bouncing up in down, no matter how hard I tried. The deer eventually started feeding in a V line directly away from me and once again I thought this buck was going evade me and live to see another day once again. That's was until I had a group of doe and yearlings come in and catch his attention and turned him around. He finally stepped out into one of my shoot lanes from about 35 yards away and I made a great shot on him before he ran about 50 yards and dropped. What a hunt and what a trophy, I couldn't help but call my dad on my phone even though I could barely get a word out, but I had enough nerve left to tell him there was a BBD!. Here's some photos of the this nice 10 point (actually a 9 point because his one brow was snapped off) I shot with my Hoyt CRX! Hope you enjoyed my story (those that actually read it lol), it was the best hunt of my life and will forever be a day I remember.
Love the story! Welcome to the site, and congrats on a great buck! He`s gonna look great hanging on your wall!
Thanks for the replies. I wish I would have heard about this forum years ago, I might have been able to gather some tips and advice to increase my chances in the past. I hunt on a good chunk of land and have another good chunk of land in the family (300 acres) I haven't hunted much yet (mainly due to it being my grandparents old land and as far as I'm concerned they allowed too many people to hunt there and the couple times I did hunt there during rifle season I was counting more orange walking through the woods than I did deer and that caused more frustration than it's worth), but that has produced some nice buck in the past couple years as well. You can really tell the difference in the quality of the buck running around since they started the Pennsylvania horn restrictions. I feel I'm doing the right thing sticking to only shooting mature buck, but next year I'm going to force myself to gun for a big mature doe for herd management. Now that my grandparents have signed the big property over to my uncle and father, there will be some changes done that will make that a much more desirable place to hunt in the following seasons.
