HuntingNet.com Forums - Making Her Daddy Proud!!!

Well, my 10 year old daughter waited until the last few minutes of the last day of PA Rifle Season, but she got the job done. Hailey spent a couple afternoons in a ground blind with me last year in Archery Season and few more this year. She's seen plenty of deer from the stand, but we've not been able to get one to cooperate. She actually had this same buck come in during the last week of Archery this year, but he stayed out at about 45 yards in some thick brush and never gave us a shot.

Well, Saturday afternoon, he tried the same move, only he didn't realize that she was carrying daddy's Marlin 30-30 this time. He came in with a group of doe that seemed to be sneaking away from some other hunters, but they made the mistake of stopping in the brush at 45 yards and presenting my sharp-shooter with a nearly perfect broadside (slightly quartering toward us) shot and she made a perfect shot. you can see the exit hole in the one photo. He piled up about 20 feet from where she shot him and Hailey didn't start shaking until he was down. Then she couldn't stop.

She actually tried to start climbing out of our 2-person ladder stand before I got the safety harness off the tree. She couldn't wait to get her hands on this deer.

This was truly an afternoon that neither of us will ever forget. I was lucky enough to get some video of the experience, although, grabbing the camera was the last thought in my mind when we saw the deer coming, so we didn't film the shot.

I've still got my buck tag, and a couple of doe tags left as I haven't had a very successful year hunting on my own, but I'd trade years worth of tags for the afternoon we had again and again. I'm just not sure how I'm going to be able to get her younger brother and sister to understand that they may not get this lucky with their first deer. She sure has set the bar high. :biggrin: