Number One
Nov 19, 2009 18:59:20 GMT -5
Post by tslc on Nov 19, 2009 18:59:20 GMT -5
From the first evening I saw this buck back in August and even now I have had several sleepless nights and may have more, let’s hope not. I now know a small part of what some others have had to go through that have shot great bucks.
This quest for a great buck really started about 5 years ago, when I put a stand in this spot. If I were to keep track of all the bucks seen at this spot over the years, 2/3’s of them would use a couple of trails that were about 50 to 100 yards away. Even this year I thought of moving the stand, but I didn’t like having to cross the trails I was watching to go to that spot. I had noticed over the years that the biggest bucks would either come by my stand or if they were to use the distance trails many time in a few minutes to several hours later they would come back on the trails I was watching.
This year in August I saw what I thought was the biggest velvet buck in this county, I have ever seen. The sighting was at least a mile of open ground from the fore mentioned stand sight. I got permission for youth season and passage through for bow season on the field we had seen him in and some others in the area. It was to no avail several trails cameras and glassing all the fields around, he was never spotted again. I had cameras out in 2 of the 3 better looking bordering section and was not getting pictures of him with those cameras either.
In late October I wanted to pull a camera located in the timber of the fore mentioned stand. I usually start hunting the 1st of November and hunt every day until I get one or until the end of November. But I thought I’ll grab my bow get the camera and hunt that stand one time for the year because I had gotten pictures of no good bucks and did not think I would hunt out of it this year. I grab the camera and viewed what looked like some poor pictures of a decent buck. I hunted that night but saw nothing. When I got home and looked at the pictures I found that I had 4 obstructed pictures of the buck, “Number One” as we called him, for obvious reasons.
That was all I need to commit to hunting this buck every time the wind was right during the 20 plus days I had available to hunt at this stand in November. When the wind was not right I would hunt another spectacular drop tine buck located about an hour away, that would gross as good as this one, but would net 10” less that I have hunted for several years but have never seen, but have several daytime pictures of in October and November in the past.
The evening of the sixth day of hunting for this buck…it happened. From the first few seconds of hearing footsteps through the leaves to seeing him take one last look in the distance and walk over the crest of a hill favoring his left leg lasted about 20 minutes. What happened in that 20 minutes was so surreal, it was like an episode twilight zone or weird dream. So many things happened I do not think I can write them down and have it make sense. I may try to write them down, for myself just so I do not forget.
He is a tremendous whitetail and will always be my buck of a lifetime. Gross 190’s and nets in the 180’s ….TSLC
This quest for a great buck really started about 5 years ago, when I put a stand in this spot. If I were to keep track of all the bucks seen at this spot over the years, 2/3’s of them would use a couple of trails that were about 50 to 100 yards away. Even this year I thought of moving the stand, but I didn’t like having to cross the trails I was watching to go to that spot. I had noticed over the years that the biggest bucks would either come by my stand or if they were to use the distance trails many time in a few minutes to several hours later they would come back on the trails I was watching.
This year in August I saw what I thought was the biggest velvet buck in this county, I have ever seen. The sighting was at least a mile of open ground from the fore mentioned stand sight. I got permission for youth season and passage through for bow season on the field we had seen him in and some others in the area. It was to no avail several trails cameras and glassing all the fields around, he was never spotted again. I had cameras out in 2 of the 3 better looking bordering section and was not getting pictures of him with those cameras either.
In late October I wanted to pull a camera located in the timber of the fore mentioned stand. I usually start hunting the 1st of November and hunt every day until I get one or until the end of November. But I thought I’ll grab my bow get the camera and hunt that stand one time for the year because I had gotten pictures of no good bucks and did not think I would hunt out of it this year. I grab the camera and viewed what looked like some poor pictures of a decent buck. I hunted that night but saw nothing. When I got home and looked at the pictures I found that I had 4 obstructed pictures of the buck, “Number One” as we called him, for obvious reasons.
That was all I need to commit to hunting this buck every time the wind was right during the 20 plus days I had available to hunt at this stand in November. When the wind was not right I would hunt another spectacular drop tine buck located about an hour away, that would gross as good as this one, but would net 10” less that I have hunted for several years but have never seen, but have several daytime pictures of in October and November in the past.
The evening of the sixth day of hunting for this buck…it happened. From the first few seconds of hearing footsteps through the leaves to seeing him take one last look in the distance and walk over the crest of a hill favoring his left leg lasted about 20 minutes. What happened in that 20 minutes was so surreal, it was like an episode twilight zone or weird dream. So many things happened I do not think I can write them down and have it make sense. I may try to write them down, for myself just so I do not forget.
He is a tremendous whitetail and will always be my buck of a lifetime. Gross 190’s and nets in the 180’s ….TSLC