Boy do I remember my first deer!! I was 19 years old and borrowed a 30-30 Winchester to camp out with guys from work on paper company land in Adams county Wisconsin. The whole week before we left I was sick with the Asian flu and was I sick. I was still sick when we drove up from Ripon, Wisconsin. We camped out in a tent and that year it was -20º F. the first night. We slept with all our hunting clothes on, in the sleeping bags, camp stove and lanterns all lit to try to keep warm. The tent was right on a deer trail and there was steam coming through the wall of the tent from a deer sniffing me, LOL. Next morning I felt great. That cold knocked the flu right out of me. But I was really tired from not getting any sleep all night. (Excited on my first hunt and so cold we couldn't sleep well).

I saw literally hundreds of deer that first morning but no bucks. I left my stand (just sitting on a log) and walked a ways and there was this babbling brook with a grass bank on one side and tamerack on the other. I sat down and reclined on that nice grass bank and in minutes was sound asleep. I woke up to the sound of what appeared to be another hunter crunching through the tamerack so sat up. The biggest whitetail buck I've ever seen in my life (and to this day) appeared 40 yards broadside to me just on the other side of the brook. I emptied that 30-30 into the buck and he never even flinched. Just trotted up the hill like I never touched him. There was a nice blood trail so I slowly followed it up the hill about 100 yards where the deer laid dead and the friend that brought me deer hunting (and talked me into it) had his tag on the deer. He claimed the deer had been there overnight even though this was opening day. Well, it was the oldest buck you ever saw, huge and the rack was easily a 150 class buck or better. In any case, I now use a .300 win mag for whitetail hunting and no one tags my deer anymore. I could have made a big issue but at that time I really didn't realize what a trophy buck that thing was.

And (probably from guilt) he gave me some of the meat and it was so smelly and bad it was un-edible. I wished I would have bought a camera back then and taken pictures of the deer. I could still rightfully claim it was my first buck.