Opening Day, PA Rifle Season, November 30, 2009
Here's the story - unimpressive, but True!
It was raining, 42° and generally miserable. I got into my ladder stand around 6:45 AM which overlooked the side hill of a saddle where the deer always cross from the oaks on one side to the thick brush on the other side. Over the years, family members and I have taken over 20 deer in this general area which we call "above the camper below the Old Cherry Tree" (the Old Cherry Tree is about 7 or 8 Feet in Diameter - you can't miss it!). At about 8:45 AM I was getting quite cold and wet and miserable, so I decided to climb down from my stand and walk up the 4-wheeler path up towards the "Old Cherry Tree". I had just gone around some grapevines and raspberry thicket and saw 2 does milling around under an oak tree that borders a brush thicket that runs up the hill about 40 or so yards. I scoped them out to see if the little one might be a button buck - I didn't have a doe tag this year, so they were safe. A few seconds later the 11-point came busting out of the brush and ran up the hill skirting the brush, I found his chest and fired, he didn't act like he was hit and crossed the 4-wheeler path and turned around looking back where he came from and was broadside and uphill from me - I found his chest and fired again - he vanished from my scope. I still hadn't gotten a good look at the horns, but I knew he met the 4-point on one side restriction. I thought for sure that I had missed him, but being a good sportsman, I always follow my shots and went up the hill to look for him. After looking around for about 10 minutes, I saw an antler sticking up over a log on the ground and there he was! Then I saw the rack and started high-fiving myself (since I was alone in the woods!). Then the work began and I was no longer cold. I had to drag him the 200 yards down hill to the camper and load him into the truck by myself, but I didn't care the adreneline was still pumping like mad and the deer only weighed about 120 lb or so. To say the least, I was the talk of the hollow that first week for killing the "Double Drop-Tine Buck" that all the neighbors had on their trail cams. He wasn't on my trail cam, but there were 2 nice 10's and 2 nice 8's and a couple of 6's that didn't have brow tines on it - so I knew there wer some good one's there.
I green scored him using the on-line form on the B&C website and it calculated it at 149 4/8. He is at the taxidermists already and should be ready to pick up next June.
Here's the Pictures:
Here's one I shot on Thursday (with my camera!) on a neighbor's farm.
