HuntingNet.com Forums - Iowa buck shot on 11-1-06

On November 1st, 2006, I was fortunate enough to take this 13 point whitetail. Here is the story.

I went out to my stand about 5 am. About 50 yards from the timber I could hear the deer start to run into the center. I was situated and waiting for a half hour. At 5:30 the deer came back from the center and were all around me. It was to dark to see anything, so I remained still and enjoyed the sounds. I could hear 2 bucks grunting in the distance. I forgot to mention that the morning was completely still, and you could hear every movement. Just before daylight all the deer moved back to the center of the timber. I found myself listening to the turkeys that were gobbling on the roost. At first light, about 6 am, I began to rake the tree with my rattling antlers. With the first rake I heard the deer start to move out of the timber. I continued on, and went into a rattling and grunting sequence that lasted about 90 seconds. Nothing. I waited 20 minutes and went throught the sequence again. Nothing. I was thinking that I may have messed up, but had faith that bucks would be moving all day. After about 10 more minutes, 5 turkeys flew down and exited the timber. About 7:00, I hit the horns again. 10 minutes later I caught movement. After looking through my binoculars, I could see it was a shooter buck raking the trees. He began to walk the fenceline which is about 60 yards from my stand. He goes 30 yards or so, I wait for him to get behind a tree, and I grunt. He stops and looks in my direction, and keeps going. I am afraid he is not going to come my way. The next tree that he gets behind I doe bleet at him. He stops and looks, and then crosses the fence. He is walking straight toward me. There is a tree about five yards from me that he walks behind the whole way. I come to full draw when I think he is directly behind the tree. He steps out from behind the tree and takes about 3 steps. I get ready to grunt at him to stop him when he looks up at me. It is too late though, as I let the arrow fly and see it enter right above the shoulder. The arrow is sticking out of him about 6 or 7 inches. I knew he was going down, but because of the angle I figured it would take him awhile. He goes back to where he came from, and I get out of the area. I waited an hour and came back with my brother-in-law. There was no blood trail, but he went to the exact place we figured he would. I punctured one lung and his liver. He went a total of 200 yards. I am truly grateful for this deer, and am looking forward to stuffing him. He will be a nice addition to my wall.