It's my 3rd year hunting, and for the 2nd and 3rd days I was lucky this year to go hunt on a friend's 1100 acre cattle farm not far from me for our buck season. The first 2 days was out in the woods and I think the deer were all at the beach - it was 75'! We didn't see anything, but some scrapes and rubs.

For the farm hunt I got setup in a field and luckily the weather changed - it even started snowing (not forcast at all). My buddy likes walking so drove towards my direction. I was sitting on a wood pile and was getting real close to sunset and a doe comes bouncing out of the woods about 30 yards to my left, but being buck season I didn't want to waste my any deer tag. Well, about 15 seconds after that, her boyfriend came bouncing along after her, and I don't think they had any idea I was there... he had something else on his mind! Not a huge deer, but had crazy kickers all over the place - cool looking rack. But, they didn't stop and the only thing I could see through my scope was a bouncing buck butt and no way to get a decent shot.... well, I know I couldn't hit a bouncing buck with a good shot. They bounced their way diagonally down field from me and, by some trees, I couldn't see any more movement. Since it was quickly getting to end of shooting light, I decided to move up my side of the field (the high end of the field) and come around to see if I could find where they were messing around.

Well, as I'm moving around behind a tree, a monster buck came out following their track, but he was waay more cautious. I think the boyfriend was rut crazy and maybe #2 was being territorial? I was hiding behind a tree and he spotted me right away. I tried easing my rifle along the left side of the tree (heart pounding through my bloody chest), and as I moved my head out to look down the scope, I got the deer finger - snot flying loud snort and bolted off straight away from me.

Man - that was exciting! Bummed I didn't get my tag, but glad I didn't take a wild stupid shot either. I'm a very new hunter so I'm not sure if I should have kept my hiney parked in that wood pile or not, but with shooting light coming to a rapid close - what should you do?

I had a chance to bring my old rangefinder out there too and it was really suprising how short a distance 150 yards is in an open field. We even saw a buck in a soy bean field that ranged at 660 yards. According to my buddy if you can see the horns at 660 yards, it has to be a monster. If I get to hunt there more often, I think it might be wise to invest in a centerfire rifle as there are many 200-300 yard fields there and not sure if there would be enough punch out that far with my ML. Anyways, it was great fun and hope to find a nice buck during ML season later in Dec.