I logged back on this morning and opened up the Bowhunting Forum (my usual Monday morning routine) and read the many posts. Thanks guys for the support. I wasn' t fishing for compliments or validation, as I honestly believe most of the true hunters I' ve read about on this board would have done the same exact thing, but looking to feel a little better by venting to some people who could appreciate my situation. I duck and goose hunted Saturday with an older Uncle who may only get out 2 or 3 times a year .. and though he didn' t even get a shot off, boy did he glow the whole ride home. Sunday I picked up my Dad and we hunted New Hampshire together in the morning. We sat for the morning and didn' t see a deer, we did see a nice Bull Moose and my Dad saw a Fisher cat at about 10 yards chasing snowshoe hares through the pines and junipers for about 20 minutes. Back at the truck packing up our gear to head home around noon, 2 guys who were parked next to us came out of the woods and asked about what we saw that morning and my Dad told them about the Fisher cat chasing a couple of snoeshoe hares, he described as if it was a 12 pointer chasing 15 does around. 1 of the guys asked my Father did he shoot the Fisher cat, and my Father looked at the guy like he had 3 heads and replied their season isn' t open till December 1st. The guy' s exact words were " I would have shot it." I felt real good inside becasue I KNOW my Father would never have even thought for a second about shooting that Fisher cat, even though he has said 1000 times he' d love to have a tanned Fisher hide some day, because the season wasn' t open.

I called the guy I went to Iowa with because I have to pick up my climbing treestand and some other gear we had shipped back for us and it is at his house. I asked him if he had been out, and he told me he had shot 2 more deer. 1 a nice buck last Saturday and 1 doe on Saturday 2 days ago. He didn' t recover either of them ... and I wish to God I was making this crap up. He told me he' s hanging his bow up for the year, because he' s jinxed he said. I' ve watched this guy shoot 300' s in dozens of indoor matches, win multiple 3-d contests .. and he has killed MANY deer, the Iowa deer being his 50th. He eventually came clean with me .. he shot at both of those deer when it was to so dark he couldn' t be 100% sure of the shot. He swore up in down they were so close he " thought I could pull it off" .

I guess I should be happy he didn' t call me to help find them, but I am also sad to know I may have been able to find them to not let them just rot. I agree with many of the posts on this thread .. hunting has the uncanny ability to bring out the best in some people as well as the absolute worst in others.