1st ML deer

[dustyr]

Got bit by the bug last year, nailed one yesterday morning

I live in a private neighborhood (redneck enclave) that borders one of the many game lands in North Carolina. All I need to do is walk out my front door, cross the culdesack, go thru my friend's yard and I am on game lands (five minutes or less).

I started out on one of his stands he has set up in the "holler" below his house. Was on it before 6am and waited till about 7am before moving on. Decided to go down towards the river to where the corner of the gameland is close to the river. I have a spot between two trees where I can watch the swamp area, a pond and a well travelled deer trail that heads up a rather steep ridge. I don't think I was there much more than 15 minutes when I heard a couple deer coming down a dropoff from some private land about 100 yards to my right. Finally saw two big does running towards the left angling towards the river. Since I had a good idea where they were heading, I brought the CVA up and sighted in on a clear area. The first one just kept going like there was no tomorrow, but I had a hunch the second one was going to hesitate before crossing a small stream. Well, she did . . . I pulled the trigger . . . and saw nothing but smoke. From where I was (about halfway up a small hill), I could not see if I hit her or not. Well, damn . . . only thing to do was to get down on the flat area, reload and see what I might find. Walked out to where I had marked the shot and didn't see anything at first, but just happened to look to my left and there she was not 15 feet away.

Took a lot of work to get her home (1 1/2 hours), but that made it all the more special. Wife asked if I was done hunting for the year . . . told her "no, I still have 5 more left on my tag". She said thatI had better get some more bullets and powder

CVA Hunterbolt Magnum .45 cal, TruGlo fiber optic sights
Shockwave 200 gr spire point with 100 gr Pyrodex RS
Est range 100+ yards (need to go back with GPS to confirm)
Est weight ranges from 160# up to 180#

[cayugad]

nice looking deer.. congratulations. Should be real good eating.

[falcon]

Congrats on the muzzleloader deer.

[oldsmellhound]

Congrats on the nice deer! I have the same rifle, though scoped. The 200 grain shockwaves/SST's shoot really well for me, but I've been using the 200 grain XTP's for hunting so far. Nice shooting too, with open sights.

[Semisane]

Excellent Dustyr! Where did you hit her? What kind of damage? Pass through or recovered bullet? (Sorry about all the questions. I'm a info-hog when it comes to bullet performance.)

[FG]

And with open sights too! Congrats on a fine deer and excellent shooting.

[dustyr]

I had the sights zeroed at 75 yards, so I held a little high . . . too high it turns out. I hit her just below the spine about halfway back. The round hit where the ribs attach to the spine, severed the main artery and exited a little lower on the other side. Pretty impressive perfomance for the Shockwave . . . maybe a little too impressive for my liking. Considering the range at which she was hit and all the bone damage - I think I'll pick up some of the Knight jacketed hollow points when I go to Bass Pro later this week.