PATIENCE IS REWARDED
A hobby becomes a passion
The Hunt
So, I’ve said all that to say this, on Wednesday November 22nd, I harvested my first deer! It was a chilly afternoon and the wind wasn’t exactly in my favor, but as I said before, the dedication to the craft lead me to the deer blind that night. Now, I was able to sit in a spot that Coop typically likes to occupy. We call it “the tar paper shack”. Obviously, it’s an old shack mainly constructed of a few old pallets and, as you guessed, some tar paper. This has been Coops spot since he was a kid, but tonight, he offered it up to me.
So I snuck back to my spot and settled in for the night hunt. Nothing much was really happening and the wind was picking up and I thought for sure deer would be picking up my scent, even though I’m pretty careful about keeping my scent down. All of a sudden there was movement in front of me. Two doe had decided to make an appearance with just about 5 minutes of good light left. I brought up my muzzleloader and got the biggest one in my scope.
The moment of truth
I watched these two mess around in the brush in front of me for a few minutes. With light running out, I realized that if I was going to take a shot it needed to be sooner rather than later. Seconds later my doe stepped out of the brush and into a small clearing. I focused on where I wanted to place my shot and squeezed the trigger…BOOM!!She took off like crazy! The thought came into my mind that maybe I had missed her. Coop and Paul came over a few minutes later and we walked down to where I thought contact was made. Sure enough, we found a good blood trail that lead us right to her. She traveled about 40 yards in total.
Lessons that only can be learned in the Great Outdoors
Thanks again to Coop and Paul for teaching me how to be a real hunter and not just a guy that says he’s a hunter. I look forward to our trips to the woods and to many more memorable experiences together in the future! Stay safe everyone and happy hunting!
-Bart