Many of you have probably already seen the post about the double I was blessed with on Friday. The stand I used for the evening hunt was the first time this year I've hunted it. Saturday was spent butchering the two deer and there's no hunting on Sundays here. So, this morning (Monday), I decided to go back to the same tree since I had chased deer out on the way in and figured they were bedding nearby. (The stand is about 125 yards from my front door.)

Good idea . . .

It was still cool (about 25 degrees) and frosty, but there was a bright full moon and I figured it might not be a good morning - especially since I had just hunted there a couple days earlier and created quite a commotion! It was close to 7:30 and the only thing I'd seen that drew a breath was a fox and a mile's long stream of blackbirds flying overhead. I tried a rattling sequence and grunted a couple times, but didn't expect much.

A few minutes later, I heard a grunt. I looked over to see a nice 8 point buck standing next to another stand I hung earlier this year (harvested a deer out of it the first time I got in it too). He started working his way down the hill towards me and stepped out at 35-40 yards. I can make that shot, but thought he'd likely offer me a better opportunity by the way he was headed. He did . . .

He got on a trail that I used to kill two deer last year and I could see it was looking good. I waited until his head went behind a tree and drew. I then grunted by mouth to stop him. He kept moving. I grunted louder and then very loudly to stop him. He stopped and I hit the release. The arrow hit him perfectly tight behind the should about 1/3 of the way up. He ran 30 yards, stopped and fell over right on the access trail I cut into the stand. The blood trail (which I didn't need since everything happened in sight) was five feet wide and incredible. The arrow centered his lung on one side, his heart and caught the other lung before exitting and burying about 6 inches in the dirt.

I was only the ground by 7:35am.

He's got a similar rack to the 9 point with slightly less mass, but his body is noticeably bigger. He's a nice one!

I sent some pics to some people who computers will post pictures for them, so please feel free to put some on here for me.

Your the Man Dave!!! Pass some of that luck over to me!

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Congrats DaveH !

Here ya go Dave. Save one for me will ya. Congratulations buddy.

Very nice. Congrats.

Pretty buck, congrats.

The rut is really picking up around here. I had not seen either of these bucks prior to getting the shots at them - one was following a doe and the other came in grunting. I had the tarsal glands from Friday morning's doe hung on some bushes on each side of my tree. I hear there is a larger one that's been seen a couple times sneaking into where I have a stand already hung.

Excellent!!

Congrats on a nice buck!