Here's the story of my favorite deer hunt I've ever been on. I know it's a bit long, but I hope you enjoy it. It's the tale of how my sister, Summer, killed her biggest buck ever, the second biggest buck we've taken on the farm, and one I had been after for about a year and a half up to then.
I've often heard stories of guys who watch deer for a few years, sometimes spotting them during hunting season when they're younger, then letting them go for three or so years until they become monsters. Don't know where those guys live, though, because it's certainly not west Tennessee. It's been a blessing hunting where I do, surrounded with neighbors content to let the yearlings go, but no one's waiting on those Pike County monster bucks either. That said, if you've got a youngish buck running around that's "decent" by our standards, it's not too much of a stretch to believe he can make it until next year to become truly "great".
November 2014 - There's slim pickin's this season. Not many potential shooters running around, but there's one decent one:
Sitting in a natural ground blind with my crossbow, I watched dismayed as this nice typical 8-point bounded away, having come into view unexpectedly from downwind. I cursed my misfortune, knowing that was likely to be my only opportunity on a shooter buck that season. Turns out I was right, as neither my dad nor I saw that buck, or any shooter buck, that gun season. To my delight, however, post-season trail cam scouting revealed he made it through the season!
August 2015 - He's back, and oh my god, he's better than ever!
Throughout the following summer, it was evident we were in for a phenomenal season. There were a handful of "decent" bucks, but more importantly, there were two absolutely great bucks, including previous season's top dog:
That's him to the right, having grown an extra point, and having brought in what would have been a 10 point.
Excitement was brewing between my dad and I. But more importantly, Summer began to feel the anticipation. She had started hunting a few years prior, but she slowly got out of it. Not much of an early riser, she would always respond with a groggy "I don't feel good" when we would try to wake her up to go out in the morning. She would hear me and dad talk about the deer we saw and finally start going after Thanksgiving, but by then, gun season had been going on a week and muzzleloader season two weeks before that, so the deer would have caught on and sightings would quickly grow scarce. So, she quit going. But with the prospect of several bucks far larger than her only buck, a yearling 6 point, she expressed the desire to go again.
"What do you have to do to see these bucks?" she asked. "Whenever I go, we never see anything."
"You have to get out there early at the start of season," I said simply. "If you really want an opportunity, you need to learn to shoot the muzzleloader and get out there during the rut." Tennessee's muzzleloader season begins in early November and coincides with the peak of the rut. Despite the fact that the prospect of the muzzleloader's recoil frightened her, she accepted. She asked my dad if she could use his muzzleloader that season, and he accepted. Throughout the early fall, I worked with her on shooting the muzzleloader. She learned how to load it, how to clean it, and how to get comfortable with it. A natural shooter, Summer took to it pretty fast, and she quickly started posting groups similar to what she would shoot with the rifle.
Crucially, I made a discovery that vastly improved all of our muzzleloading capabilities. That January was when I began shooting Encore pistols, and I began to really improve that fall. Since my Encore had a Nikon pistol scope with the BDC reticle, I looked up how to match your bullet's trajectory with the BDC circles with Nikon's SpotOn software. Coincidentally, the muzzleloader, also T/C Encore, had a Nikon Omega scope also with a BDC reticle. Considering we often have to expect shots beyond 200 yards where we hunt and muzzleloader trajectories drop off far more quickly than rifles, I decided to map out the muzzleloader's reticle. The next time we shot the muzzleloader, I recorded its muzzle velocity with my chronograph and put the bullet's information into the SpotOn program. A quick test showed the BDC circles were dead on at the ranges they were listed at. We were more than ready for the opening day of muzzleloader season. As we continued getting trail camera pictures of the buck, Summer decided to christen him "Goliath."
October 2015 - Goliath is a regular visitor.
Unlike an unfortunately high number of big bucks we watch every year, Goliath stuck around. He peeled his velvet and despite being somewhat smaller than I thought he would end up becoming, he was still huge. Not only that, he was photogenic as well:
With season fast approaching, and pictures of Goliath greeting me every time I checked my cameras, I began to grow excited that I might be the one to take Goliath. Doing so would complete a trio of huge accomplishments in one magnificent hunt. First, he would be my largest buck to date. Second, more crucially, he would be my first handgun kill. And third, he would be the first buck I had actively been hunting for over multiple seasons. Despite Summer saying she'd be getting out early and shooting the muzzleloader, I had some doubts as to her conviction, and felt like come gun season, I'd be the one lining up the crosshairs on the buck.
Summer's big thing is horses: rodeoing, trail riding, barrel racing, cutting, western pleasure, you name it. She won't miss an event come hell or high water, especially one of the numerous ones in town. On the night before the opening day of muzzleloader season, there was a barrel race at the local arena that wouldn't be over until about midnight. Dad and I joked whether Summer would be able to get up at 5:00 to go hunting after being out late. She was adamant she'd get up, but I told dad I'd wake him up if she didn't.
Before I continue my story, I must explain our primary two hunting locations, the west (or small) food plot, and the east (or big) plot. The west plot is a hair over an acre in size, roughly 35 yards across north-south and 125 yards long, east-west. I always set up a ground blind in the southeast corner, and the above three pictures were taken just 10 yards away. Separated by about 450 yards is the east plot, a 6 acre field about 200 by 150 yards split by a line of trees. The western two thirds is basically junk that gets mowed down, while the eastern portion is a food plot. We have a two-man treestand in the southeast corner, overlooking the food plot completely and capable of seeing about three quarters of the junk plot. I had actually taken more pictures of Goliath in the east plot, including the 2014 picture at the top, but because he was always further away from the camera and never had any great pictures taken of him, I didn't always show them to Summer or dad.
November 7, 2015 - The opening day of muzzleloader season.
Despite not getting in bed till about 2:00 AM, Summer got out of bed when I went to wake her up. She was clearly still exhausted, but she wasn't going to miss this morning. Once we were camoed and geared up, we set out into the predawn darkness, her with the muzzleloader, I with the binoculars, rangefinder, and camera. I had since given up on my crossbow, which up to then was my muzzleloader season weapon, and it would be another year before I discovered the Optima muzzleloading pistol. No, I was content to be the spotter, to call out which BDC circle to use, and to film the hunt. Before we got more than a few feet out the door, though, Summer and I got into a minor argument on where to hunt. She wanted to go to the ground blind in the west plot, where I had taken all the photogenic pictures of Goliath. I wanted to take her to the treestand, where I had more often seen Goliath on camera. I eventually won out, although Summer still doubted the decision.
The woods came alive from the moment we were sat down in the stand. Not even a minute after we were ready to hunt, two fawns came into the junk plot and were running around, playing. Soon, we spotted a small yearling 4-point slowly crossing the plot, nibbling at the ground along the way. I told Summer we needed to practice simultaneously getting the crosshairs on the target while I got an accurate range. "186 yards," I whispered. "Use the second circle." Summer did so. Then, we spotted a larger buck from the far corner, a 2.5-year-old 6 point. We watched him approach us.
"He's bigger than my buck," I remember Summer whispering.
"You want him?" I asked
"No," she said resolutely, "I'm going to wait for Goliath, or at least his buddy."
We practiced getting on him again, at least. "146 yards," I said, "First circle."
"Bang," she whispered.
The young buck kept coming, and soon crossed the creek in front of us, coming to within scarcely 15 yards. We sat stone still, trying not to be seen. Despite spooking at something, I don't think he ever detected us, and he soon disappeared into the woods behind us.
Up to that point, once I had ranged the deer, I had filmed them with my camcorder. I had enough footage that, when I spotted a doe that had mysteriously appeared in the middle of the junk plot, I didn't bother filming her. It had been about 30 minutes since we'd seen anything, and Summer's lack of sleep was getting to her. She rested her head on her hand, her elbow on the railing, her eyes closed. I made sure she wasn't asleep 15 feet in the air. When I looked back into the plot, I noticed another deer had appeared in the far corner.
I didn't need to look through my binoculars to see who he was. His massive antlers were a dead giveaway even at that distance.
"Goliath!" I whispered, my heart pounding, voice shaking.
"Chance, don't even mess with me like that," said Summer, not even opening her eyes.
"No. . .," I whispered, grabbing my headphones, "It's Goliath!" Summer looked at me, and she knew I wasn't joking.
As she quickly pulled on her headphones and set up the muzzleloader to look, I grabbed my rangefinder and measured. Despite my shaky hands, I managed to get a good reading.
"221 yards!" I whispered, a bit more loudly than before. "Use the third circle!"
"Oh my god!" she whispered, having finally seen him magnified in the scope.
Goliath had come fully into view, walking along the edge of the woods in the far corner of the plot. Unbeknownst to me at the time, he had triggered the trail camera in the plot:
He paused, quartering away, rubbing his antlers in an overhanging tree limb as he tended a scrape. I heard the hammer click back on the muzzleloader.
"Wait!" I said, fumbling with the camera. "Let me get the camera on!"
"Hurry up, he's going to leave!" she retorted. I quickly got the camera on, zoomed in, and hit record.
"Now!" I said.
Through the viewscreen, I saw Goliath with his head back, smelling at the branch. He turned his head and massive antlers around to look our direction when the deep crack of the muzzleloader broke the early morning silence. A noticeable delay occurred, and Goliath stood looking at us for a fraction of a second. Then, he turned his head back forward. His back legs collapsed, and he fell sideways and kicked out a little.
"You got him!" I said out loud, knowing Summer's view was obscured by white smoke. "You got him, he's down!"
We were overcome with celebration, but we both knew we needed to follow up. I turned off the camera, helped Summer reload the muzzleloader, then we carefully climbed down the ladder. I told her to just leave everything unimportant at the stand, and as we set out down the creek crossing, I turned on a GoPro camera and put it on with its strap mount.
As we ascended into the plot, the doe I had spotted earlier, which had still been standing there between us and Goliath, finally ran off. As we crested the hill, I realized that I had forgotten to pinpoint where exactly Goliath had been, having only been watching him closely through magnified devices with a narrow field-of-view. Scanning the treeline, I saw no sign of him, and began to grow slightly concerned. Had he got up and run off? Soon, though, as I glanced almost to the far corner, I saw white.
"There he is!" I said, leading the way. As we approached, I checked to make sure the buck was dead while Summer stood aside, gun raised just in case. She handed me the muzzleloader and bent down to admire Goliath, and as she picked up his antlers in her hands for the first time, she turned and gave me the absolute best, most excited smile I've ever seen, a moment captured on my GoPro. We recorded a little more footage, but soon we knew we had to get ready to tend to him. We left the plot to go wake dad, get the tractor and trailer, and bring back the camera for some pictures:
Final Thoughts
I've been on quite a few hunts in my admittedly short career, but those 90 minutes in the tree stand were probably my favorite hunt of my hunting career. Even though I really,
really wanted Goliath for myself, especially for the reasons I mentioned above, Summer getting him cemented her love of hunting, and I've now gained a treasured hunting partner for life. We've gone on many hunts together in the subsequent years, and they've all been pretty enjoyable, although I doubt any will ever top the one on November 7, 2015. Two weeks later, I finally managed to drop the hammer on another fantastic buck I had been watching that year, achieving my first handgun kill I had been after for so long. My dad also broke his buck drought, dropping a respectable 8-point out of the stand at nearly the same spot as Summer had killed Goliath.