For anyone who's been on this subject for a while might remember my trials and tribulations from shooting a deer and not being able to recover it.
Well, this year I had no such problems. :grin:
Opening morning found me sitting in the same stand that I shot the deer from last year. At about 7:40 a button buck climbed out of the stream bed and headed my way. I believe he spotted me as he crested the small ridge that borders the bank of the stream because he was very wary the entire time. He would take a few steps, tense up and flicker he tail, then he'd relax, take a few steps and do the same thing, all the while glancing up at me.
I sat as still as my pounding heart would allow, and decided to wait the situation out. He passed by my stand at about 20 yards when he decided that there was something out of the ordinary and flipped up his tail and bounded off. He made 4 or 5 bounds before he settled down to a walk again, and I took that opportunity to twist around and get set up for a shot. He was in some heavier trees by this time (approximately 60 yards).
I set up a shot for when he stepped from behind a large tree. He cooperated and as his body cleared the trunk of the tree, I lined up for an upper chest shot, right behind the shoulder (I was shooting down from a treestand, and last year I lost the deer because I shot too low in the chest and didn't compensate for the elevation and angle of the tree stand). At the sound of the shot, the deer literal folded up and never moved. I reloaded from the shellholder on the buttstock and watched him through the scope for any further movement (I wasn't going to loose another one).
It wasn't a trophy buck, but I figure once they're wrapped in white paper, they all look the same.
Here's a picture, for anyone who's interested.
