Success on Sept. 15th!!

[bmc]

Hey guys and gals,

Here's my story from my successful opening weekend hunt.

My dad and I walked out to our stands around 4pm on Sunday the 15th, our first hunt of the 2013 bow season. It was a beautiful afternoon, the air was crisp, blue skies with a few clouds, and a light wind blowing out of the NE, perfect for my favorite stand.

I was hunting my favorite stand on the SW side of a 50yd x 40yd "kill style" food plot.

The stand sits in a nice clump of white oak trees, that have a good crop of acorns on them this fall.

I'm about 50 yds from my stand and I see a white tail bounding away to the east. I thought at least the deer didn't blow, so I should be O.K. I climbed up into my stand, hooked up my safety strap, and settled in to see how the hunt would unfold.

Around 6pm, I see a small basket racked 8 ptr coming my way along the edge of the field from the SE corner. He walks into my right shooting lane and I give him a pass, he then walks past me and through my left shooting lane and I pass him again. He then heads south of me down an ATV trail. I've shot a few "basket rackers" like him in the past and am hoping for something bigger, especially since it's early in the season.

I said a little prayer, hoping the "Big Buck Gods" would shine down on me for "appeasing" them by passing on this buck.

Around 7pm, I hear horns clacking together to the north of me, out on the food plot. I do the "bob and weave", trying to see through the foilage. I finally see two bucks pushing each other around. There is also a doe watching the show. The bucks push each other around 5 different times and almost end up in my right shooting lane at 20 yds, but spar just on the left edge, where I can't shoot.

The doe heads right to my tree and feeds on acorns about 8-10 yds away. She then walks through my left shooting lane. I pass on her and look to see both of the bucks headed my way. They both look like 8 ptrs, one wide one and one just a bit narrower, but with a touch more mass on his horns. Being I'm left handed, I had to carefully turn from my right shooting lane to my left shooting lane.

The narrow buck stops under an over hanging branch and works the branch over for a few seconds, he then paws at the scrape. The narrow buck walks through my left shooting lane at 10 yds and I pass on him.

The wide buck walks up to the over hanging branch and really works it over. He then gives the scrape a good work over. He then feeds on some acorns and steps into my left shooting lane at 8-10 yds. I get to full draw and he looks right at me. I settle the pin tight behind his shoulder and squeeze the trigger.

I see my white fletchings disappear right where I was aiming. He does a mule kick and takes off like a rocket w/ his tail tucked tight to his rump. Here is the down view pic from my stand the next morning. My arrow is stuck in the ground in the light spot in the middle of this pic.

I hang up my Hoyt Carbon Matrix and hang onto the tree because I'm shaking so much. Is that a GREAT feeling or what???

After calling my wife and brother, I get out of my tree after 15 minutes and inspect my arrow. It looks really good, the Grim Reaper has done it's job.

Here's a view from the food plot with my arrow in the ground and my tree stand.

I wait for my dad to come out of the woods and I tell him what happened. We follow the blood trail which was difficult because the buck ran through mostly knee to waist high ferns. We really had to look for blood in a few spots and I started doubting how good of a shot I made on this buck.

We follow the blood trail about 100 yds into some real thick popple and my flash light illuminates a brown hump down in a small depression in the ground.

He's down for good! My dad and I let out a couple victory yells and hugged each other. It's times like this that I'm so thankful he put a bow in my had 36 years ago when I was 3 years old.

The buck is a decent 8 ptr, about 17" wide, my biggest MN buck. He's not a Pope and Young candidate, but where we hunt, the Grand Rapids area, he's a trophy in my book. We have a ton of hunting pressure around our area, so bucks getting to that 4.5 years of age have a hard time.

And......here he is.

Thanks for following along and I hope everyone has a GREAT season!

Brian

[hugonian1]

Nice looking buck and great story.

Congrats

[Rippinlip]

Very nice!

Great story and deer, glad you could share it with your dad too.

[Scoot]

WTG bmc! Congrats!!!

[harvey lee]

Congrats, great your Dad could be involved!.

[Bear55]

Great story and pics Brian! Congrats!

[sticknstring]

Congrats Brian - that's a great MN buck!

[mrklean]

congrats great buck

[monstermoose78]

Congrats!!

[nwhunter]

Very cool story! I know exactly what you mean about the shakes.

[CrewJones]

great deer !!!

[HooknHorns]

Wow what an exciting hunt for September. Nice buck to boot.