2005 1st Weekend Deer Season Results

[Captain B.R.K]

Thought I'd start a thread for those that were out this weekend and have stories to share for us.

I didn't make it out, decided not to after already arrowing a deer earlier this year.

Looking forward to hearing your stories.....so post them here

[Gissert]

Pretty quiet where I hunt. I was without my two partners this weekend, so I stayed in the stand the whole time. Next weekend, they'll be here and we'll push if need be.

My wife was shut out at her spot, too. Deer movement was minimal.

Not to worry, We still have second season in Zone 4, plus muzzleloader as well.

[Dave S]

I didn't see anything until late today with the exception of a couple backsides in the trees.

On the other hand, my father-in-law should be in the Outdoor News in the coming weeks with his 23 pointer that he took this weekend. I have yet to see the pics. But it sounds like the rack was about as non-typical as they come.

[hanson]

Nothing worth bragging about.

Our party of 4 has 1 hanging right now, nice little fawn shot by myself. A little ground shrinkage occurred with that one.

I passed on another shot at a little fork hot on the tail of a doe this morning. This afternoon, I bumped another fawn on my way to evening stand. It ran off about 50 yards, turned broadside and looked back. I had the crosshairs on it for about 2 minutes and then it scooted off.

Compared to past years, we saw a lot more deer opening weekend but no big or decent bucks, just yearlings and fawns so far with the exception of that one fork I saw.

2 more weekends left.

[Lunker]

Although it rained all day opener and was a quiet weekend, we saw a lot of deer but our camp was fairly unsuccessful.(Zone 1-168). Out of the five of us, I hung the only deer, a big 9 point that was by far my personal best. 3 of our camp didn't register for doe permits because they thought we were still a management area like last year, and they saw no bucks. And my youngest nephew missed a doe. As a camp we probably saw 25 or so deer while out in stand, which surprised us a lot, but the rut was in full blast. The buck I killed I watched breed a doe about 20 minutes before I shot it(waited a long time to get a clear shot), and I saw a couple of other forks chasing. I will say that it was an experience to be sitting in a deer stand in the steady rain soaked to the bone on opener, but I shot it that morning so I guess it was worth it.

[Outdoors_guy]

Saturday morning was pretty quite. One of the members of my party missed a really nice 8. Seen alot of does and on sunday morning I shot a perfect 10. I have not scored it yet but i am guessing it will be around 150 with very little deductions.

[Hotspotter]

7 deer for 6 guys in 4A. We get two days to hunt, so we have to make the most of it.

1 adult doe and 1 fawn by Sat. morning's end. The aft./night brought two more fawns, another adult doe, and a small buck (unintended, supposedly =).

I filled the last tag (mgmt. tag) on Sunday morning with a broadside 15yd shot below my stand on a big doe. Not that I needed a scope for that shot, but after using it this year for the first time, I will never go back!!!

All of us but 2 passed on small bucks.

8 deer (including a fresh roadkill from last week) were butchered and packaged by 6pm on Sunday night. We even sliced jerky meat for dehydrating, and cut up stew/stir fry meat. We all got some tenderloin and will have that tonight!!!

I still have an all-season buck tag and can purchase an intensive harvest tag if I want to go after a doe. Trying my luck in 3A the remainder of the week, only to go back to zone 4 for 4B. Wife knows not of more hunting....wondering how to break it to her???

Joel

[climbmda]

Deer were really on the move near Princeton this weekend. Bucks in particular were moving all day long. I only saw does on the move in the morning and right at sunset, except those being chased.

Had a problem on Saturday. It was about 10:00 and I had forgotten a bottle and really had to take a leak. I scanned everywhere I could see with the binos before unzipping the blind to get out. Right as I stepped ou, a really nice 8 point stepped out from behing a dense thicket behind me to my left. We were eye to eye at about 20 feet. He stared for a second as I froze, tthen snort wheezed and took off back the way he came.

I did shoot a slightly smaller 8 mid-morning on Sunday, though. I'm gonna try to get a couple of does next weekend to fill up the freezer.

[Mr. B]

Between the two of us hunting (in area 249) we saw 5 deer Saturday and Sunday. Nothing bagged yet.

I did get to have an interesting stand off with a big doe. I could not decide if I wanted to shot her or not. When I finally decided to pull my bow back she spotted me. I am not sure how long it actually was but it seemed like for ever. Standing with my bow pulled half way back as she stared at me stomping her foot the entire time. I could hardly keep myself from laughing, I just kept thinking I was getting the same look from this doe that I get from my wife when I come home from a trip to Cabelas. The doe finally moved off, without me taking a shot.

[buzzsaw]

Probably saw 30 deer (does and fawns) in the Alfalfa fields late in the day until dark both nights I hunted and the morning hunt in the woods saw 12 deer Saturday morning... one 6 pt, one fork horn and a spike... the rest were does and fawns... Sunday morning only saw three deer.. the same 6 point came through again... I'm only shooting a larger 8 point or higher as I have venison from last years hunt left and we have people in our party that take does.

[Dragonsm]

Our party of 9 put 6 in the tree on Saturday (3 does that had some nice size to them, a fawn, a 4 pointer, and a 5 pointer (4 on one side..broken on the other)

Sunday, we hung 4 more along side of them...button buck, 2 does and a nice size buck where the guys in the group counted 21 points...real weird and atypical rack. #11 was down but made it to the woods and we couldn't find it. We did miss our fair share of them too....guess I need to practice with the slug gun more.

Overall, I think my first year deer hunting was successful!

Steve

[chucker34]

Deer running everywhere before and just after legal shooting time Saturday morning. All does. Then it quieted down. Took a small doe (second bow kill and second deer ever) with my bow just after 10 am from my ground blind clearly marked with lots of criss crossing orange duck tape. Can read more about it if you'd like on the archery kill post. Good luck everyone.

http://www.fishingminnesota.com/forum/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=651281&Main=622426#Post651281

[Uncle Bill]

Our group of 4 shot two deer right away Sat. morning, then did not get another shot the rest of the weekend.

Not much shooting aound us either.

One buck, one doe. 2A-225.

Hope it gets better.

[CodyDawg]

I opened the door to the camper around 5:40 am on opening morning to pure darkness, no wind ( I mean exactly ZERO wind) and a temp of around 30. Jumped on the four wheeler and drove about a third of the way to my stand. Shut it off and realized, it was REALLY dark out there. After getting my gear together, I trudged across the plowed corn field toward my stand. As I approached the woods, I began looking for a big willow bush that marked where I enter the woods. Did I mention how dark it was? Luckily, I also put up those reflective tacks, or I would still be looking for my stand. As I walked my trail to my stand, I realized there was more deer sign than ever in this corner of the 50 acre hardwoods. Oh, this could be a good morning as the corn had just gotten picked this week.

Didnt see a deer for the first half hour of light and of course, I was thinking everyone was seeing deer but me. My stand sucks. Pretty soon a doe stuck her head into the end of one of my shooting lanes and the floodgates opened. I had a doe and two fawns followed by a six pointer sneak along behind me and to my right at about 30 yards. I just watched the age old courtship ritual take place. Actually, in this case it was kinda a one sided deal. The buck was more than willing, but the doe had no interest. Pretty soon along came a buck with only one antler. He would have been a little 6 pointer too, but the left side was broke off. I called him "Half-o-Buck". He joined in the chase for that hot doe for awhile. After about 20 minutes, that dang doe saw me. She got a little nervous but still didnt leave. All of a sudden, a commotion behind me had me slowwwwwly turn to see two little basket racks pushing and shoving each other. It went on for about 2 or 3 minutes and was fun to watch. It was just like you see on the nature channel. For the next hour or so, I had an assortment of little bucks chasing does and fawns all around me. One little forkhorn came in grunting and I thought he might be the one until he showed himself to be a little fella. Half-o-Buck walked within 5 yards of my stand until he smelled my scent from walking in. He didnt like that one bit, but never left the area.

About 7:30 am, I heard one shot from my dad's stand. When you hear one shot from dad, that pretty much means a dead deer. Turns out, he got jipped a little. A big 8 was chasing a doe and she cut through a natural little lane. He got ready and a few minutes later a buck started going through. He verified it had horns and pulled the trigger. Turns out he shot a 6. Oh well.

Anyhow, back to my stand, I had the original 6 pointer and his doe and two fawns out in front of me about 30-40 yards. Half-o-Buck was about 15 yards to my left, wishing he was buck enough to steal that doe. There had been a couple of does behind me and to my right, but they disappeared. Pretty soon, I heard something behind me and to my right again, and figured it was those does. Because it was so hard to twist around and look, I just waited as I didnt want any of the deer, especially Half-o-Buck to see me. Pretty soon, I couldn't stand it anymore and started to slowwwly twist around. Just when I could see what was there, I spy a big buck working over a tree 35 yards behind me. I would have loved to have a heard monitor on me, cuz my heartrate went to 867 beats per minute.

He worked over a tree, then he decided to make a scrape. All the while, my excitement level is through the roof. The problem is, I can't move to take a shot. Finally, Half-o-Buck and the others are looking away and I quietly stand and turn around. That solved one problem, but there is too much brush between me and the big buck for a shot. He starts walking towards Half-o-Buck which is bringing him behind my tree. Because Half-o-Buck is on the other side of my shooting lane, this will mean the big buck will have to cross it in about 25 yards! However, I will have to move to the other side of the tree and Half-o-Buck is just too close and is now facing me! I think to myself, how will I explain having a big buck 30 yards away and not even shoot!

He ambled along for about 15 yards, pretty much like he was king of the woods until he stopped with a nice little 8" clearing over his vitals. Holy cow, I can thread that needle and decided right then and there not to tempt fate by waiting for a better shot. According to my estimates, he was 35 yards away and it took the slug 0.0552631 seconds to get there. He flinched and turned toward me and ran back the way he came...kind of. He stopped broadside 25 yards away after running for about 20 yards. Slug No. 2 was on its.....what the heck?? After over 10,000 rounds without a jam, my Beretta finally jammed. I couldnt believe the timing. The empty was hanging out, so all I had to do was toss it aside and we were in business again. Slug No. 2 was on its way and he hunched up and took off through the really thick saplings. Slug No. 3 tried to find a hole, (no jam, starting on another 10,000 round string....)but it couldn't bust through all that brush. I wouldn't have shot, but I knew I had a couple in him. After about 50 yards, I saw a bunch of saplings shake, so I was pretty sure he went down. My stand doesn't suck anymore.

He has 11 points, but the biggest one on his left side is busted off a couple of inches from the beam. His other tines are around 9-10 inches long. His beams are 22 inches long with good mass. The spread is 17.25 inches inside. His left side antler is awesome and if he had a carbon copy on the right side, would probably score into the 150s (I didn’t get much of a chance to measure). The right side isn't as pretty, but isn't too bad. Too bad about the G2 being broke. He weighed 205 lbs after field dressing. I will get an antler mount done.

All in all, a great hunt with a few minutes of pure excitement/stress/nervousness/anticipation and of course critical decision making. Deciding when to take the shot or waiting for a better one was really tough. I will have pics in the next day or so.

For the weekend, we hung 6 for 9 guys with some of us passing on the small bucks. 5 of the 6 were bucks, mine, a medium 10 pointer, a 7, Dad's 6 and a 4.

[ChuckN]

I never saw a deer. Sat in the stand all day Saturday.

Sunday, same thing, but tried to hike, sneak and scout in the afternoon. Saw no deer, but found an enormous amount of sign.

3 bucks harvested for 5 guys. 2- 9 pointers and 1 spiker.

I'm not finished with this yet....

[lawdog]

I only hunted Saturday morning this past weekend but only saw two does. My brother and bro-in-law hunted all weekend and still didn't see much. Most of the guys I talked to didn't see much. Hope activity picks up before next weekend when I'll hit it hard!

[almostthere!]

Saturday, two guys were creating a war-zone about 200 yards to my right, through alot of saplings. One guy would shoot two shots then half a minute later, the other guy would shoot two shots. This went on for the length of the entire day, minus the lunch break. If they were shooting deer, there must have been at least 100 deer between the two.

Sunday, I moved further out to cover a gully. Finally, got into some deer. I'm a meat hunter, so I wasn't too picky on the sex of the deer (mostly prefer to shoot bambies). Saw four deer in a group: dropped three and had a dry fire on the fourth (ran out of bullets).

Shot a small buck from about 100 yards away. Turned out there were some small twigs between the deer and me. The bullet was deflected low and took out a ton of white hair and meat splattered all over the area. I gave it a good hour then followed the trail for over 300 yards until the blood trail ran out. I only hope the hit was low enough for the deer to recover; somehow I think this is not the case here. I was using a 180 grain, Barnes triple Shock bullet in 300 Win Mag. First deer lost.

[eye's111]

We had four guys in our group and saw 29 deer. We ended up with three large does 160-175 pounds, and a 175 pound 7 pointer. Sat. morning I had a large buck come by my stand about 350 yards away. An hour later a girl hunting the woods over from me nabbed the buck of a lifetime. The buck was a non-typical 18 pointer. The deer was amazing.

[Mark Christianson]

We got 1 for 4.

Dad got a decent buck, but I gave him heck for not following our "rules" for buck harvest.

I passed on one doe and 3 different fawns. Looking back I wish I had taken one of them I guess. Another guy in the group passed on a 7 pt and had other deer moving past him, but at a quick rate of speed. Too risky to take shots and risk wounding.

All in all, we saw a good number of deer on Saturday and held off in hopes of getting a nice buck or two.

Sunday was deadsville.

Our neighbors shot at 6 or 7 different deer on Saturday, and to the best of our knowledge they only got 2 does. I wonder how many they managed to stick a bullet into, only to lose them? Cripes. Everything they shot at was several shots. Unbelieveable. I am really tired of the clowns around us.

[Dan Thiem]

Our group is me and two other Dads and our sons. Great group! We ended up with a nice ten and eight pointer. I put the picture of my ten pointer on the photo contest. Not a real good photo, but still a nice deer!

I was overlooking a huge field of C.R.P. and it's borderd by mature harwoods. Ideal location. I only heard about a dozen shots all day on Saturday.

I saw 15 different deer on Saturday of which only three were bucks. I saw 9 deer on Sunday of which only one was a buck.

I think the low light conditions we had helped for deer movement because none of the deer that came by my stand were nervous. They calmly milled around browsing. Sure makes it hard to sit still for so long. One little move and POOF they'd be gone. Very intense.

What a great weekend!

[Mr Special]

Had a weird and fustration saturday morning the 1st couple hrs. Due to the uncle and best bud got to the stand later then I wanted.

6:15am Finally in the stand and ready.

6:35am Legal shooting time, shots are going off all around me, especially in the next ravine over.

7:05am I see 2 nice bucks chasing a doe, 60ydrs south of me and super thick. No Shot.

7:10am I see them again, same thing

7:15am Again and moving off our land. I'm my stand should be closer to the thicket.

7:35am Shots from the uncle's stand

8:11am A doe comes in behind me at 15yrds. Aim at her a fews time. But it's opener morning and I know there's buck around.

8:25am I hear grunts from over the ravine. I'm thinking someone is grunting the morning away.

8:30am Grunts is getting louder. Up over the hill comes a nice doe. She starts coming down my scent trail towards me.

8:31am At the top of the hill, with the sun against his back is the grunter."picture prefect" I can count at least ten points. He follows her down the trail, grunting every few steps. The does pasts by within 10yrds and so does he. But when he stop there was some brush, 2trees offering a very low precentage shot. So I let him on his way following her. All of a sudden he detours from her and goes to my scent wick. Lifts up his nose to the wick, offering a 50yrd shot. Click the trigger and that was the last thing he smelled. When I finally clammed down to go see him. He's a typical 10, but has 4 addictional 1.5"-2" points to make him a 14. DNR estimated him to be 225-250 dress.

The uncle shot a nice 8pt and doe that he was following. 3shots two very nice deer not bad.

I was very blessed this season and harvested a fork and doe sunday while working a drive.

Sunday night the tree has a total of 5. My 14,4,uncle's 8, his doe and my doe. More then enough meat for the 3 of us.

Great weekend, great times and now the wait for next year 4A. Not to mention I now own the biggest buck title for our group.

Good luck to everyone still hunting

[Sergeant Slabber]

I hunt with a party of 9 in Hawley. We had 7 of 9 deer by noon on Saturday. Needless to say we filled all the tags. 4 bucks and 5 doe. The biggest was a 10 point and all the rest were decent deer as well. Not much shooting around us so I guess we lucked out!

[Quackaddict9]

I didnt see alot deer this weekend but but I only saw bucks, no does.. a 7 pt, 6 pt and button buck, saw the same 3 each day, was fun to see them come close to my stands but now the other family who owes the land with my family.. They shoot anything they see, well usually at any bucks they see... and now whats making me mad is that I am going up to the farm this weekend on Agassiz and someone will sit in my stand and shoot that little 7/6 pt that comes through at 7-7:30 am... I'm not too happy about it, I did not pass em' up for them to shoot it, I passed em up so they can grow.. they dont care so I cant do anything about it . Their oldest son (23) shot a small 6 pointer on opening morning. My dad/Brother passed up on some does and small bucks. Well I'll wait and see what happens, I just hope the little ones dont come through, and I am still chasing a big one or a doe, will see if that happens this week from Fri-Sun... Good Luck to you all, heard some big bucks being shot including some on this forum. Thanks and keep the reports coming... dont forget pics! we all love em'

[Bubbadust]

Very slow for us in 343, 3A. I saw 1 fawn Saturday morning and my brother saw 4 does/fawns Saturday morning, but none offered a shot. My father shot a fawn Saturday afternoon. I saw one more fawn Sunday morning, but had no shot as it was running full speed behind some trees. My brother and dad each missed one Sunday afternoon. Overall, we saw 8 deer and none of them were bucks.

Unfortunately, that will probably be it for me this year. 2 full days on stand with no shots offered.

[james_walleye]

I saw an absolute pig saturday morning at 9:00 am and i guessed wrong on where he would go. He ran too the creekline i was on but he came in about 200 yards away and 5 minutes later i heard 3 shots and i think someone got him. In all i saw 15 deer, 3 bucks. I passed on does thinking it wouldnt be a problem too get one sunday. The problem came saturday night when i got sicker than heck and didnt get out sunday. My uncle sat in my spot and first thing sunday morning a dandy 2 year old 7 pointer missing a brow tine came limping across the field too him. It had a back leg blown apart. And after shooting him he discovered it had also been shot with an arrow at sometime this year. He found the broadhead when he cut him up. I spent some time this afternoon browsing through the HSOforum of a local sportshops photos from this weekend and i was blown away at the number of big deer that were shot down here and registered in SE MN. Its truly awesome too look at. I hope im not doing anything against the rules here but if you guys want too see some awesome deer go look up Magnum Sports HSOforum out of Chatfield. Some huge deer shot this weekend and also by bowhunters this season.