Monster mulie & very bad decisions!!!
General Topic
So I've never spot n stalked mule deer,or hunted them at all actually. I live in md. So i thought id cut my teeth in far west central Nebraska.just my decision and a fun one,,till yesterday. Ive finally found a decent area to hunt after 4or 5 days moving and scouring public lands. 10 miles from nowhere is probably a 100 acre cut corn field that has a canyon which devides it from a large winter wheat field. So you see why ive found the deer! The cut corn has probably 25 adult cattle and 15 very young calves that are feeding in it. After glassing,doing a few drive bys i decide to set up mid way down the west side of the cut corn as usually there are several deer and a few bucks in that area. Keeping in mind im shooting Any! Legal buck in my range. I have a rare east wind which is exactly what is needed to set there. Im about a half mile from my truck which i backed int the field across the dirt/sand road..keep the key word sand in the back of your mind. Got to set up point about 230 pm ,acessed it and chose to snip some cedar limbs and weave them in the sparce fence row making a sweet blind as the deer filter into the corn from the easternmost corner ,feeding westerly, into my lap.sounds good right! I brought ghillie top and head ghillie along with a super small lightweight aluminum fold up stool i scored at a yard sale for a buck. Im set up ,sweet an a smallish 4x4 makes his way.....right to my truck,,wth?. Right past truck at 25 ft.hmmm. I slowly stand to stretch legs andturn to look behind me towards the ww field and see , down from me 2oo yards and about a half mile across the canyon filters up out of the canyon 6 doe,followed up by THE BIGGEST DEER I HAVE EVER SEEN!! Mind you the shiny new vortexes i pickd up in st Louis say so. Now glassed a few studs while here,,but this dude has to be the BIGGEST deer on earth.!
I never bothered to count points,his rack you could easily put a clothes basket sideways in,,drop tine on right side probably 10 inches. Gotta jet.. as youll learn my compund got screwed up so i have to ready up the recurve, should have stuck with it from the beginning... more to come
Love those big mule deer!
Hopefully he makes the “very bad decision “!
You got the hook set!
Looking forward to the rest of the story.
I’m waiting on the part where you get stuck in the sand..........
........ I hope you have a buck loaded up !
I’m like Drycreek, I’m waiting on the stuck in the sand part of the story !!
So i accessed the best couse to put me in position for a shot without blowing them out of there. I figured,go north down the canyon and come back up one of the finger's which all end towards the ww field. Slip off ghillie,move right slowly, lined up with big cedar, moved to it a slipped down into the bottom of the main canyon. A light jog/fast walk down to wherei think the finger canyons lead to the deer and my fame of killing the world's largest mulie. At this point shit is about to go wildly wrong!!! As i round the corner and turn to the left im amazed ar a perfectly 4ft wide sand "sidewalk" snaking up towards 2 canyons that split about 100 yards up. The sandwalk for the lack of better terms is completely covered in deer trax. So i think its going well.. i head up. Getting to where they split.. 90 percent of the trax go left.i thinking ill go right bringing me out to the right of the group with the mulie with elk genetics.canyon left wide open big...canyon right. Very narrow at the start,sand floor probably 6ft wide with straight up walls 50/60 ft,,crazy..it narrows as i look into the temple of doom. I got this,,man its quiet ,i can move fast, ill be signing autographs at the next Great American Outdoors Show!!!! Off i go , by this time its 345 probably, ge darker and narrower as i snake thru it, adventure you want ,,,this is it man!! Then my elbows are rubbing the side walls, i catch a small protruding sidewall of sand and i chunk the size of a 5 gallon bucket falls on my right leg,, damn i said to my self??? Now im saying ,sand. However if you'd tace a cup of baby powder and a cup of sand mixit well ,,thats actually the consistancy of it..not true sand. At that point i looked waaaaay up and thought damn i hope this whole thing doesn't collapse. Now at this point a far more rational man would turn the hell around,,but noooo monster, monster,monster i keep chanting.. i having to pick up tumbleweed that i start running into or stepping over it. I round a sharp turn and the canyon is choked up with tumbleweed and cottonwood branches.
There's a 5 ft straight up wall to a small flat that has a walk way around the corner and out of sight. Every time i try to dig my boot toe in it just collapses. Painfully i took out my 9 inch bladed buck knife that ive probably spent 2 hours sharpening to scapel like edgeism, and cut into the wall 2 deep steps. Worked great !!Boom headed on to victory.at the 2nd step i placed my z7 flat on the little flat,i grabbed 2 handfulls of grass, threw my knee up and the whole shelf started to move towards me, basically falling ,but stopped, i placed my body weight across and ontop of my bow to have solid surface area. Not a spectacular move according to the bow.worked well ,i pulled up and got to the little edge walkway. Looks like yotes use it alot. I make my way 20 yards as the trail opens up to 12 ft wide. Meanwhile climbing up in elevation,,looks like theres been alot of collapses up towards the end which in turn goes up to another shelf the steps up to what appears to by the flat world..so when im moving up towards the collapses i look down at what looks like catacombs or big hollow voids all thru the sub surface. Id hate to for my leg to go into there..as i move to climd up on the next shelf. The whole dustbowl under me drops me down to above the knee depth.then the side area on both sides drops down enough debris to alm go to my belt line, keep in mind my bow is in my right hand ,now under 2 ft of baby powdersand. Holy crap this jus got serous. Wiggle ,dig, get my ass out,dig out bow, all of the time trying to not cause more collapses. Did i say serious?? I climbed up ,throwing my waste up onto next shelf onlt to find out IM 50 FT UP HANGING OUT OVER NOTHING!!! now with a tight rectum i eased to the right prying for something stable. Grabbing grass like it was my wifes hair on a wild Saturday night.it held.. i got up and had a what could be realistic turnout.did ijust climb onto a island out away from the field edge?? Holy shoot ,,i made it up and onto the flat all the meanwhile looking for the group of deer with the new world record buck it it. Realizing im 80 yards back behind where the deer were. Everything that transpired,believe it or not was extremely quiet, however my big dreams were crushed as they had dissapeared. Wind most likely got me,swirled like crazy in that hell hole. So as darkness coming quickly i hustled toward the truck which attracts deer like a walking dead episode. Heading towards the truck i look across the canyon into the cut corn here comes 4 doe and a buck on a diagonal, you guessed it right towards the Toyota. Perhaps i need a damn truck blind? So i initially think they are going to trot down the road and into the winter wheat field where ole sandy ass it still hustling along. Theres a dead weed ege separating the ww from the canyon,which they cant see thru but i can get up closer and see somewhat. I cant find them, he they are b lining on a trail that comes out 25 yards away,,,REDEMPTION!!! drop down to my knee's, knock arrow, wait wait wait. At 40 yads down the row they start popping out... nice buck 4 th out. Little maaaa.stops broadside,, looks like a sofa.. i got you i thought..40 yard pin solid on the crease...the arrow almost hits his back foot,now im talking hoof bro, not leg,hoof..so im assuming the WWF action of me on top of the bow and the 50 lbs of sand dropping it led to my failure of a redemption shot going awry..im not a hoof shooter but i have been known to make bad decisions while chasing the biggest buck on earth....lol
Dry creek what the hell? Were you glassing me... haaaa
^^^^^^ No......., I had visions of your truck getting stuck and you with no help, I never dreamed of YOU getting stuck. Bummer !
I can empathize a little as I was once duck hunting and stepped into what had to be an underground beaver den. The small area was devoid of vegetation of any kind and that step was a loooong one. I went to my crotch with my right leg, luckily the other was still on hard ground. It’s hell getting that other one out when it’s that deep but visions of angry beavers protecting their home turf gave me the adrenaline needed to lie back and jerk that leg out, roll over and hope the whole damn thing didn’t collapse with me on it. I had heard dirt falling into water when it gave way and thought I’d probably have to crawl the half mile back to my truck with a tourniquet around my knee..........
Sorry you missed your buck, but as you know, crap happens.
Thank goodness you didn’t go in deeper!
Getting buried alive would have sucked!
Not only that, we would not have gotten a story out of you!
Crazy!
I think you're lucky to be alive.
Visions of the guy in Utah that had a boulder drop on his hand in a tight canyon like that and had to cut his own arm off with a pocket knife...
I know we’ve all made bad choices at times while hunting, but...
Very happy to hear the tale from you and not your next of kin.
At least we know why all the deer tracks took the other route. Glad yo got out ok with a heck of a story to boot!
Thx fellas, ive been involved in extreme sports my whole life.. .never gave a thought about dieing .guess im older and care a lil more about that call to my wife...it was fun to have the edge in my face again... wakes your middle adged ass up..
Right there with you.... right ‘till I held #7 1/4 to my heart.
Every kid who grew up in Western Nebraska can tell you a bad story about playing with their friends in a blowout.
