I've been taking my wife hunting with me for 2 years now to try to get her a shot at a deer. We've had very little luck so far. I see deer when i go by myself but when i take her we dont see them.
We got in our stands early saturday morning. At 7:30 i see movement behind me. It was a small buck, but he came in directly downwind of us and before he came into range he winded us and was gone.
It was quite cold in the morning, and the wind was blowing fairly hard, and my wife was ready to go by 9 am. I told her i wanted to sit until at least 10:30. By 10, she had had enough and said she was going to the house with or without me. I frustratingly said, "OK, Lets go!". She had dropped her quiver earlier in the morning so all she had was the one arrow on her bow. i took her arrow, put it in my quiver and lowered my bow to the ground, took off my safety belt, reached for my pack and caught movement out of the corner of my eye. I could not believe my eyes. Not 10 yards away stood a 6pt eating the percimmons we were hunting over, and there we sat, her bow...NO ARROWS!!! it fed there for a couple of minutes. I tried to raise my bow back up but it caught the movement every time. I cussed that deer till a fly wouldn't light on him
Finally it had enough and took off. A good lesson for her though.
That afternoon we got on stand by 3:00. We watched a small buck pass just out of range. I rattled him back but he circled directly downwind and smelled us.
At 5:00 I heard something in the brush and told my wife to stand up and get ready. Then i saw it, a bruiser of a buck, a huge 8 pt, probably 18" or so inside, 10" tines. I couldn't believe it. he came to about 14 yards and I whispered to my wife to hold her 10 yd pin high. That was my que for her to draw and shoot. She didn't. The buck turned straight toward us and walked behind a big pine tree. I thought, "OK, now she's gonna draw". She didn't. At 5 yards, with the buck looking straight at us she tries to draw her bow. He immediately spots the movement, wheels around and trots off directly away from us. I was sick, just sick. I could have drilled him at 20 yards. It was so hard to stand there and watch that buck and not be able to take the shot. Everybody has been saying that i should have just shot it. But I wanted her to get it, and i had no way of knowing she wasn't going to be able to take the shot. By the time I realized it, it was too late.
But oh well, it was a great lesson for her. Just rookie mistakes, but it just wasn't supposed to be a deer like that. I wanted to break her in on a doe or a small buck, not a buck like that. Hell, i've been bowhunting for 15 years and i've NEVER had an opportunity like that at a deer of such proportion. She keeps saying she's sorry cause she knows i wanted that deer bad, but i keep telling her it wasn't her fault, just to take it as a lesson learned.
Any similar experiences???