A forgettable season to remember
Whitetail Deer
This whitetail season had started off pretty tough. Part of the problem was due to the typical busy life that many of us live. Two kids playing sports, a new job, a serious fire at work, a new job for my wife, commitments at church and side work all was making it difficult to find time to hunt. If all of this wasn’t difficult enough, Kentucky has been hit with its worse EHD outbreak on record, with my location being the 5th worst county (Carter) of record. It has been very bad and the population in this area has really been slammed. Oddly though, there are areas in the county that seem to have not been hit as hard. Other areas have had massive die offs.
The whole month of September passed and I never graced a tree. Elk hunting and 90 degree weather caused me to not hunt for deer. I was however able to get out for a few hunts in early October. To be honest, I had almost zero desire to hunt. The ridiculous hot weather for fall was making it miserable and the thought of shooting a deer in this weather was not appealing. Regardless, I had a good friend coming in from Wyoming. This was more of a visit where we would hunt a few days than it was a trip to hunt. He was in the area due to a trip he had to Indiana so he came down and hunted a few days with me. It was very slow but it really wasn’t about hunting, it was about being with friends. I end up having one nice doe walk right past my stand the first evening we hunted. I put a good shot (it was suspect that night as I had gut material on the arrow) on her and had to leave her until morning to be safe. I was concerned about the heat but this proved to be the correct decision and no meat was lost. It was a fast recovery the next morning.
How I found her:
The shot was good but you can see the entrance hole had some small varmint action on it. The Killzone makes a big hole but something made it a tad bigger.
This stand is a pretty good hike and has no truck or ATV access. I put the old Rack Pack to good use:
Not to criticize but if your worried about the deer population why take a doe?
I will have to update tomorrow....pics won't post through Bowsite.
Hold your horses spike78, I will explain in later posts.
While I had success on one of my only hunts, I soon found out some grim news. I had no idea that EHD was so bad in my county and at this point I feel bad about shooting the doe. Had I known the kill was this extensive and not just “pro shop” or Facebook BS, I would have not shot her.
I had other options as I have a good friend that owns property in an area that had only a few cases of EHD. The deer herd in his county was and is as strong as ever. I plan to focus most of my efforts at his farm going forward.
I was unable to get in a stand for a few weeks. When I did finally squeeze in a couple of hunts I hunted non productive areas in my county and I was looking for a buck I wanted to shoot only. However, I am not yet willing to go into a good spot yet.
As I mentioned, I took on a new position at work and if it wasn’t the kids keeping me out of the woods it was work. I wasn’t able to shake loose to hunt. Finally I took a day off simply just to go through the motions of hunting. It was too warm and the wind was fickle but at least I was in a stand. Still only willing to shoot a buck in my county and it would have to be a nice one.
I was quickly becoming anxious as the days were ticking away, it was still stupid hot and whenever I had a day I could take off, the weather was terrible and whenever there was a decent day, I was unable to take off. This all changed on 10/29/17……..more tomorrow as I’m getting frustrated with pic posting.
The last full week of October was especially busy. I had meetings, inspections and a routine Dr. visit scheduled sporadically enough to make it difficult to take off. I was stuck with rotating some things around to free up a few days the next week. Then I was hoping to work in some vacation time and start some all day sits. I was hoping for Saturday but we had pouring rain and a girls basketball banquet. Sunday, the 29th was looking like it was going to be a very good day. The forecast was cool, low of 39 but the high was only in the low 40s.
Early Sunday morning found me loading my gear into my wife's Grand Caravan and heading 1.5 hours to my friends farm. I forgot to tell you that at this point my truck was in the shop, getting a motor replaced. Of course the particular motor to fit my truck was absurdly expensive. I make it to the farm and hit one of my favorite spots. I always see deer here. Deer bed to the Northwest of my location and then they filter through to the timber to the North and South of me. When they cross the little field to the west, they more often than not take a trail that leads them into field for an unsuspecting 15 yard quartering away shot.
Somewhere around 9 am I heard a buck chasing a doe. I turned around to catch them sneaking through into the timber to my north. The buck was small and I was bored so I decided to hit my grunt call to mess with him. When I did I heard the heavy hoofs of a deer right in my wheelhouse. I turned to see a huge doe standing right where I wanted her. Somehow she tiptoed in there without me hearing or seeing her. No shot as I blew it as she caught me with my panties down.
Around 10:30 I hear leaves barely crunching to the south of me. I could hear a deer easing through the overgrown fence line. I grabbed my bow and was ready. When she stepped out, as they always do when I am hunting a good wind, she had no idea I was there. I drew, aimed and grunted to stop her. She kept walking. I grunted 3 to 4 different times before she finally heard me. When she did she was slightly quartering too me. The arrow was soon on its way and she went barreling out of the field packing her left leg. I could tell the shot was lower than I wanted but I thought it was fine.
After a longer than expected but easy to follow blood trail, I found her. 
More to come........have to get on the road for a work trip.
Thank you.
I got the deer out of the woods and back up to my friend's house. Since I was driving my wife's van I was going have to skin and quarter her and put her in the tote I brought with me for all of my clothes and gear.
I got her processed and took a short trip to a convenient store to grab a bag of ice. It was really cool but I just decided to err on the safe side. I then return to the farm, take a quick nap and soon I am making my way to a new stand I hung in early October.
I will update later as work allows.
I made my way to the new treestand early on the afternoon of the 29th. I was looking forward to this hunt as I expected to see some deer. Deer feed in this field but it is also used as a travel route.
I quickly settled in for the evening hunt. The wind was pretty crappy and seemed to be blowing in just about any and every direction.
This is a pretty cool area and one where my daughter shot her first deer last fall. It is neat in that it is a "faux" peninsula in that it is surrounded by water on 3 sides. To the north is a river, to the east is a small creek and to the south is a small stream that is dry for portions of the year. The only bad part about this area is if you have a deer die in or across any of these waterways it turns in a chore to say the least. The banks are straight up and down and you will sink up to your knee in mud trying to cross. Any deer extraction from these areas looks more like an elk extraction than your typical eastern deer drag.
Probably the coolest part of this area is the fact that the old buffalo trails go right through this area. The buffalo in the frontier days used this area as a travel corridor to get to Blue Licks. It was a natural spring/mineral lick where people like Daniel Boone and Simon Kenton regularly hunted and made salt.
Spike78, respectfully speaking, shooting does does not always lower the deer population. Managed properly, it can actually help improve it. We have a fairly liberal doe harvest here, and the deer pop. is very healthy. We also have a ton of coyotes, and we still have a good fawn recruitment this year with lots of twins and a couple with triplets. Keeping deer overlopulation down and numbers in check often helps the health quality and productivity of the remaining deer improve.
Congrats on the venison Bowfreak !
I didn't mean to let this drag along but I am just now getting in.
The evening of the 29th started out uneventful. The wind was crazy. I attached a piece of thread I pulled out of one of my gloves to my stabilizer and watched it move all over the place. The wind was swirling so bad it was going to be pretty much impossible to not spook any deer that comes in out of the country. Mostly all that was going on were people who were riding ATVs off in the distance. I could hear them yelling and screaming and hammering the throttles on their machines. At about 6 pm I think they actually spooked a deer off the neighboring property. I saw him cross the field to the north of me and make his way right to me. He was a pretty 8 pointer, young and not something I wanted to shoot. I took time to snap a few pictures and video and enjoyed the encounter. He fed around a while and then tore out of the field all of a sudden after he caught a sniff of me from the swirling winds. I questioned at this point if I shouldn't just pull the plug.
Here is a picture of the young guy:
It was only about 15-20 minutes later when I heard a noise that I quickly determined was a spike ripping out a big brassica looking weed out of the field. He was feeding at around 25 yards to my left. I noticed he was watching something to my right and I glanced that way to see a doe in the field in that direction. In a few minutes I see a buck pop out of the tree line and into the field where the doe is feeding. A quick glance led me to believe he was the same young buck from earlier. I soon found out that was not the case as the buck turned and came my way. I scrambled to stand and get my bow as I had previously been resigned to watching. Once I realized this buck was a definite shooter I got into position.
It was happening. It was actually a little hard to believe but I got into position on the edge of a field without any of the 3 deer seeing or smelling me. I had gutted a deer and quartered it earlier and I had more blood on me than Nevagante from Narcos so I was not "scent free" by any means. As I came to draw on the quartering away buck I was eerily calm. As I splashed my pin into place I started looking past it and concentrating on the spot I planned to hit. I started building pressure on the release and specifically pulling harder into the stops than what I normally do. Before I had time to let any negativity creep into my head, the shot broke crisply and my arrow slammed into the deer exactly where I expected it to hit. The buck tore out of the field and I immediately saw a very large bloody entrance wound on his side as he tried to escape. He barely made it out of the field when I hear an explosion of branches and brush followed by the concluding sound of a Gold Tip Pro snapping followed by silence.
I waited a short time and then made my way to the buck. I was excited when I got to him and I dragged him down into the field and laid my bow on him and snapped this pic.
Dang man! I'd be excited too!!!!! Congrats!
Here are a few more pics I snapped.
I continue to be extremely impressed with the killing power of the NAP Killzone. 
A couple of rack closeups.
This shows the entrance. The broadhead stopped on the opposite shoulder blade and was still in great shape.
...and the hero shot
Congrats, and great story telling. Bowriter, that is the kind of story I think many of us miss. Great feeling, I bet you are still on a cloud. Enjoy it!
Congrats again, Mark...great story, buddy!
Great job with the story and the deer, Mark! Congrats all around!
Congrats Mark! I love the hero shot and you did great man. Well deserved and I really enjoyed this story. Thanks for sharing:)
Congrats on a fine whitetail season Bowfreak.
Congratulations, Mark! Great shot as well.
Great story and pics... beauty!
It was a lot of fun and at least softened the blow I got from the auto mechanic when he changed out the motor in my truck. Lol!
Neat title! I was kinda expecting it to start "it was the best of times, it was the worst of times..." =D
Thanks for the story, pretty cool. Never know how a season will play out. Only takes a second sometimes. Only way to know is to show up and do it. Dandy buck. Congrats!
Mark, What brand of Predator camo is that?
Day One insulated bibs and non-insulated jacket. I love this stuff.
Excellent hunting Mark...our daily lives,jobs,truck motor replacements..lol ..make it tough to get out there..way to get it done! Fine buck!
