My boyfriend took me to his lease in SC last week in hopes of gettin' a buck in velvet. By the time season starts here in FL they are usually hard horned so I jumped at the chance.
I knew that I'd probably go home empty handed but at least I'd be in the woods and we'd be creating some wonderful memories together.
On Sunday afternoon 8-24 he put me in a box stand off the power line. It had been raining and things were extremely slow. I spent the first couple hours amusing myself by watching squirrels, crows, and lizards...lol.
Finally I had 2 deer come out about 200yds away. I grabbed the binoculars and watched them come to about 100yds. I was having a blast. I took the binoculars down and saw this shooter buck about 40-50yds out standing broadside. I was in total disbelief. I was into watching the other two deer that I was paying attention to anything else. I about freaked out. I instantly started to shake uncontrollably. I'm a freak like that...lol.
He took a couple steps forward so I grunted to get him to stop. At that point I put my sights on him and slowly pulled the trigger. I saw him jump and bound into the woods. I knew I had hit him. My entire body started to convulse. I usually shake but nothing like this. I couldn't stop. I couldn't even hold the radio button down to talk....lol. My bf, Jim was about a mile away if that so he knew I had shot something. He told me to stay put until he got to me. I tried to listen but I couldn't stay there. It was getting dark so I wanted to check for blood as soon as possible. Once I got to where I thought he was I looked for blood and didn't see any. I started to go into panic mode but I found a hoof print on the edge of the woods that appeared to be where he landed right after being hit so I was still hopeful. Jim showed up and gave me his Gerber flashlight which has the option of seeing blood better at night. I was able to find 3 drops right there near the hoof print. You would have thought that I had the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.
He then started to walk in the woods and found my buck about 60yds in crumpled on the forest floor. I made it to him in record time. I was THRILLED. At first I thought he was bigger than he was but I couldn't have been happier. I had a nice deer and meat in the freezer.
We brought him back to camp to get a few things before heading to the cleaning station. There was a lil boy there that came out with his dad and his dad's friend. He had never seen a deer before...actually the friend had never seen a deer either. They got to touch it and take pics. Wyatt, the lil boy, fell asleep talking about the deer and woke up talking about the deer. He was so excited. The look on his face was priceless.That was almost as exciting as getting the deer. Hopefully he'll remember it for some time to come.
After we cleaned him we came back to the camp where the guys had a nice campfire going. I broke out the shots of wild turkey (101 of course) and we all hung around and chit chatted. I never got to do that growing up so I absolutely loved it.
I'm planning on getting him mounted because he's the first buck I've killed in velvet, the first buck I've killed out of state, and the first critter I've killed using a rifle. I'll post pics when he's back home.
BTW, he weighed 155lbs....my biggest body deer to date....remember I live in Florida...lol.