Sweet November

[Ringbill]

Awesome, Did he bust off his G2 on the left side? Beautiful buck

[triggertrav]

Day 5

The next morning everyone had plans to head to the trees again, but with the temperature at 2 below (which is like Antarctica for KS), about half of the guys easily changed their minds (basically the guys over 40, maybe they are smarter?). So that leaves two guys in the trees (my buddy and brother), myself and two others ‘scouting’ from the truck, and the retired UPS guy who never once thought about getting out of his fart sack that morning.

With the cold temps and the open river, there was some great photos ops the frost on the trees as the sun broke the horizon, but unfortunately, I am not skilled enough to get a good shot.

If anything is certain, when it is MN temps in KS, the deer will move. It was right about 8 am when my phone started ringing. It was one of the guys who were willing to test the cold. I figured he had arrowed one or was so cold he needed out. I answer with enthusiasm to hear a shaky voice ‘I just smoked one!’. He had taken a shot on the same deer that came in to him at 25 yards the day before but the deer never presented an opportunity for a clean shot. This time he had a quartering away shot at 40 yards and he drilled his mark.

He was still shaking when I picked him up, either from the rush or the cold, but he had backed out of the set to make sure his deer would lay down undisturbed. By 10 am he is finally warmed up and we are off to see what we can find. It didn't take much tracking and he saw his arrow sticking out above some brush and there his buck laid on the other end of it. Only going about 50 yards from the shot.

Another amazing morning in the woods and shared with a great friend.

From there we repeat the day before, drag, work, celebrate. No other shots that day, but a few close encounters for the others. And the encounter are what makes the time spent worth while.

As far as evenings go, I would like to call out to our amazing wives that not only put up with us during the season, but also are gracious enough to cook for us! Here is a typical meal followed by trading dollars over cards and lots of laughs.

[triggertrav]

Thanks again for the comments fellas! Couple days left to write-up, hoping to finish by the end of the week.

My buck is missing all but about an inch of his G2, just more character.

[triggertrav]

Day 6

The following morning, all troops were rallied and ready for a new day. With my deer on the ground, I would be spending most of my upcoming hunts for a doe but better yet in the tree with my dad. He and I headed to the same tree I had shot my deer 2 days prior. The action was good this morning, but not what I had seen a couple days earlier. No shooters showed themselves, but I think in the few hours that I sat with him we had seen about 8 deer, including these two bachelors cruising around.

[triggertrav]

Day 7

Thursday morning we are back to the woods, my brother wants another crack at the giant, Brian has his eye on a deer he had an encounter the other night and referred to him as limpy, and dad and me headed in to another area to see what we can muster up. But as hunting is supposed to go, we got blanked. Not one deer. Back to camp for lunch and a planning mission. Brother is still sitting tight and I don’t imagine him to come down unless we drag him out or he lets the air out of the stud that he had seen.

This is what we had for views this morning.

For the night set, me and dad make some adjustments to the ladder stand set we did the day before and made it more accommodating to his needs. The deer were a little slower showing up tonight, but eventually they came out to feed. We had deer all over the field, I would guess 20+ total. Plenty of does in range, but Dad was holding out. Right before last light, a good eight came towards us. I tell him he should take this one. As the deer worked his way towards us, I can hear dad’s breathing getting deeper and louder (as mine was doing the same). I hoped for the chance to watch him harvest a deer. The buck was at 19 yards. As I stood just over his shoulder, I watched him draw and he let the arrow fly - I thought it was a perfect hit. But the deer bounds a few steps, stops, looks around, and continues grazing…we look at each other dumbfounded and waiting for the deer to tip but it just wasn’t in the cards. I have no clue what happened, my dad blames his sights, I blame buck fever. In the low light of the evening, the twitch of the deers muscles on the shot made it look like there was impact point in the boiler room. When in reality, i believe he shot about a foot under the deer Either way, another great memory. We sat till dark that night with no other chances and enjoyed the sunset over the trees behind us.

From my brother, I get the text – I swung and missed again on him tonight! Apparently, he coaxed the big boy in on a grunt tube and had him coming right at him, but he got spooked by something. He guesses it was his doe decoy when he came up out of the creek bottom and saw his decoy in close. 0 for 2 on this guy. Time was winding down and my brother knew it, but he was up for another sit in the AM even with rain on the forecast.

My brother had mentioned to me that my deer looked familiar shortly after seeing it. He later started to go thru trail cam pictures from last year and low and behold he was familiar.

October 30, 2013

November 17, 2014

He doesn’t appear to have put on a whole lot of length and actually lost some length on his brows. Definitely some extra mass though. The picture was taken about 2.5 miles from where I shot him this fall.

[bltbowhunter]

I like this story. Can't wait to hear the rest.

[leechlake]

the guys that do these stories are really good at it. I'm a fairly good writer but when I've attempted to do one of these I fall flat on my face. Thanks fellas for the great entertainment.

[huntnfish]

the guys that do these stories are really good at it. I'm a fairly good writer but when I've attempted to do one of these I fall flat on my face. Thanks fellas for the great entertainment.

I agree. It's a lot harder to put something like this together than it seems.

Great story so far, Trav! Can't wait to hear the rest

[triggertrav]

Day 8

Again, 4:30 the alarms sound. By now we figured out the timer on the coffee pot, so that is ready for us as soon as we are up. Same schedule as every-other day, coffee, weather, plans, weather, etc. As we discuss the plans for the day and with the rain coming, spirits are tired and ready to call the trip –except brother. He is determined to get that buck that has got by him twice. So he will head to the woods solo and we will pick him up on the way out of town.

Brian and I are with my brother on our way to drop him off for the morning. Plenty of time and not raining yet. We have a few deer stands that we need to pull at first light so we are going to be out anyhow. We are about a mile from the drop off point for my brother and he starts going nuts. “There he is! Way up there! SPEED UP!” Brian and I didn’t see anything and we thought he was starting to hallucinate over this deer. But to keep him from jumping out of the truck in excitement Brian steps on it. He continues to tell us where he seen this deer cross, which was at least a half mile down the road. As we pull up to where he thought he saw the buck, ‘There he is’. For a brief second this pig stood in the ditch, turns, and heads south, same general direction my brother will be spending his last morning. We still are not certain how he saw this deer that far in front of us, but he is up to 3 sightings of this giant. Needless to say, even on the last morning his spirits were high.

After dropping him off, we drove around sipping coffee waiting to get light, it started to sprinkle. Which didn’t bother us much, but we were sure hoping my brother could get it done early.

As we pulled into the field that my dad would have sat in had he hunted, there stood a real good buck and a doe in front of the stand in the dim dawn light and the lights from the truck. Go figure, right? But either way we progressed in to pull the set. I climbed up the ladder stand and was taking down the hang-on as I heard the crashing of some serious bone. And it wasn’t that far away. I am guessing the buck we saw with the doe ran in to another potential suitor and they wanted to make sure who was the king of the doe. As I continue taking down the stands, the fight continued, but it is too dark to see into the woods still at this point. The thrashing ends and we get everything loaded. I wanted to sit in the truck for a bit for it to lighten up then go check out the area. I couldn’t believe that we would pull in with the truck, talk in normal voices and as we are taking down a stand, a fight breaks out within 100 yards.

Eventually it is light enough to head in. About 50 yards in is a depression area. And it stunk, like big old buck. You could still smell them, as if you were holding the leg of one for your buddy as he gets ready to field dress it. Powerful buck stink, but no sign of deer. We scouted the area for a bit, but found nothing and heard some running thru the trees. We missed it, but were close.

Back to camp to start to load up. Now it is raining. We all left my brother alone this morning – no textintg to check up on him and disrupt his hunt. We figured he would let us know when things went down. But the action was slow.

We ended up picking him up at about 11 and he was wet and ready. He had deer on him, but not the deer he was looking for. There were many hours put in the trees that week or so by the five of us. And we all had opportunities for good deer and all of us had a true Kansas stud deer in range but not the clean shot that was needed to attempt it. A guy will also always remember the ones that got away.

Here are a few of the pics we took at camp with me and my buddies deer.

[triggertrav]

The closing.

There are many reasons we (hunters) do trips like this. Get away from home. Get the chance at a buck of a lifetime. Relax/escape daily grind. Provide organic - free-range food for the family . To me - best part of these trips are spending time with people that matter. So many things happen every day in everyone’s lives, but just getting the chance to step back, take some deep breathes of God’s woods and enjoy it with the greatest people you know. With or without any harvested animals THIS trip will be at the top of the list.

Brother, Dad, Me

Until next year.

(you are suppose to end on a sunset pic, right?)

Thanks for following along.

triggertrav

[PropsterII]

Awesome. Sure wish you had a pic of the mega stud from early on

[MUSKY18]

That was just an awesome write up!! Thanks for sharing that. What part of Kansas were you hunting?

Kansas is definitely a bucket list hunt!!!

[paceman]

Great story and pictures! Thanks for taking us with you!

[DonBo]

Great write up. Thanks again for taking us with and congrats on the great deer.

[sticknstring]

Awesome recap! Congrats to you and your buddies on some great bucks! Taking the wives along to cook - even better! Mine would demand the best stand and make me cook!

[triggertrav]

thanks fellas.

we were in eastern KS a little ways out of topeka.

and we didn't bring the wives - they cooked for us and sent frozen meals with us. You might as well stay home if you have to bring your bride, right?

[ANYFISH2]

Thank you TT, awesome write up of your hunt. It sure is nice to come along with you guys on your trips. Love these stories.

[sticknstring]

Quote:

and we didn't bring the wives - they cooked for us and sent frozen meals with us. You might as well stay home if you have to bring your bride, right? laugh

Ha - I was wondering how that worked! I agree - just don't tell my wife!

[Wes Ellis]

Thank You for sharing! Awesome story!

[certified jumbo]

Solid.

[rkhinrichs]

congrats!

[nbadger23]

Great story Trigger, thanks for taking us along! Were you taking the videos with your phone or a video camera?

[triggertrav]

i videoed with my phone and had a small video camera with. But i need more practice with the camera, to busy watching the deer instead of the view finder.

[drewbop]

Great story, thanks for sharing!

[BLACKJACK]

Great story, thanks for sharing!

+11111111!!!!!!!

Thanks for taking the time to write it up!!