2009 Kansas Deer HuntI wanted to use a levergun this year, The Marlin 44 with the red dot sight was tempting, but the stainless guide gun got the nod.
Using a 45/70 meant that I wasn't going to be sitting on big open fields where I might see deer a long way off. Instead I picked the thickest cover on the property.
First day, I hadn't hunted here in 5 years, but hunted here every year of the 15 or so seasons before that. My spot that I picked didn't look so hot in the daylight. It was so grown up that I couldn't see more than 30-40 feet in any direction. Then I spooked three deer while looking for a better spot and watched their white tails flagging off into the brush.
I found a better spot, I set up on one of the main funnels into the thicket. I had a shooting lane about 20 yards wide, some fairly open brush directly across from me, and trail behind me led into a big pasture. I made myself a kind of a ground blind inside a cedar tree, got setup with a comfortable chair and waited.
I saw two does that night, maybe the same one twice, I let them walk hoping a buck would be trailing behind. Went back the next morning and got settled about 6:45 (shooting time was 7:18). About 7:30 a coyote came by, spotted me in all my blaze orange glory and lit the afterburners to get out of there. He came in from the one direction that had a clear view of my in my little "blind" and got very close before he spotted me, within 20 yards.
About 8:00 I saw some movement through the heavy brush about 100 yards out, I could see that it was a deer, but couldn't see any horns. I watched that spot for a long time and decided that the deer had gone on, just then I saw more movement. This time it passed through a small opening and I could see horns, couldn't tell how big but I got ready to shoot.
When I finally got a good look, I could see that it was a nice buck, but I still didn't have a good look at him, and not much time either before he would get out of sight. There was still brush between us, but I picked out the lightest of it and when he passed behind it, I put the crosshairs on the point of his shoulder and fired. He made a big jump with a front leg swinging, and I heard a big crash off to my left.
The brush turned out to be just a few feet in front of him, and I don't think I hit any of it anyway. I looked around for blood but never found a drop. So I decided to see if that crash I heard was him going down. It was, I found him about 30 yards into the thicket, where he had crashed into a thorn bush.
I hope to have a few more pics later, but here he is in the truck.
The ammo was the Hornady FTX load. The remains of the bullet were under the hide on the off side. I haven't weighed it yet, but it certainly doesn't weigh anywhere near 325 grains. It did the job on his lungs though, they were literally pulp. Nothing recognizable of his lungs at all.
Here are pics of the bullet core that was recovered from the deer.
You can see the entrance hole in one of the first pics I posted, right on the point of the shoulder. The deer was about halfway quartering toward me, and the bullet was found under the hide over the ribs, about 2 inches forward from where the hide was cut for the cape. Looks like it retained just over 50% of the original 325 grains. I did not see any jacket fragments, but they are undoubtedly in there somewhere.
I was finally able to get the rest of the pics ... You can see how gray he was in the face. The "skinned" patch on his side is a mystery, the hair was on the thorn tree he crashed into so my guess is that he crashed into that tree just right to "skin" that patch of hair.
