The Next Season
Just sending along a note and photos of how my second deer season as a member of MAHA went. I want to thank MAHA again for providing such wonderful deer habitat to hunt. As we did last year, myself and uncle Larry did a week of archery hunting before the firearm opener. The hunting was hard and very trying. The weather was extremely warm which slowed deer movement. I passed on a small buck the fourth evening of our hunt and harvested a nice racked eight point buck the next to the last morning of our archery hunt. The mast crop was very abundant this year so I moved a stand in a draw that was covered with oak trees. The move paid off with me arrowing the eight point buck on my second sitting of that stand. The buck moved in fast and was directly under my tree stand when I shot. The buck dropped where I hit him which made recovery very easy. After this it was on to the next location for the opener of the firearms season. Myself and Uncle Larry were joined by his son Kevin and grandson Ian for this
hunt. Again the weather was very warm for this time of year and deer movement
was slow. Kevin was the first to tag an eight point buck on opening morning. I
went and assisted Kevin with dragging his deer out of the woods. After returning
to my property a small draw covered with oak trees caught my eye. I thought
yeah, it worked archery hunting why not now. As I scouted around the draw I saw
numerous buck sign and found a place to sit and cover the draw the best I could
from the ground. Have you ever heard people say they could smell a buck? Well
this draw smelled so strong with rutting buck it was unbelievable.
First SeasonDear John, Let me start by saying thank you to MAHA for providing such wonderful land to hunt. I also want to thank my cousin Kevin and uncle Larry for introducing me to MAHA. The one word that describes my first year of deer hunting with MAHA is "WOW". My hunt this year included a week of archery hunting and week of rifle hunting in [location deleted].
Upon
arriving to [location deleted] I questioned my choice of joining MAHA and doing
this two week hunt. The land and terrain was very much different from the
whitetail hunting I was accustomed to back home in Vermont. But I was soon to discover
these draws and creek bottoms are traveling routes for some of the nicest
whitetail bucks I have seen. Archery hunting was awesome!! The first evening on
stand I had a racked buck 30 yds from my stand with two doe and no clear
We
moved to another county for rifle hunting, a county that just started the four
point restriction and found the hunting there just as good as the county we did
our archery hunting. The first day on stand I saw 3 bucks and 10 doe before
noon. I hunted this stand for three days seeing numerous bucks each day. I saw
two racked bucks with no clear shots. On the fourth day I switched stand
locations for the evening hunt Can't wait until next season, Bob |
John,
Shortly
after 5 pm a beautiful eight point buck appeared ten yards in front of me and I
harvested him. The smell was definitely coming from this buck and he had been
bedded just yards from where I shot him. So our group had two nice eight point
bucks on the opener!! With Ian and my uncle Larry still hunting to fill their
tags I purchased an anterless tag to get back out in the woods. That Tuesday
morning Ian filled his tag with a eight pointer in a rain storm which turned to
snow before we were able to get his deer out. Myself and uncle Larry hunted
until Thursday and on the evening of the last hunt I filled my anterless tag on
a nice doe from about 100 yds away. My six days of firearm hunting was filled
with numerous sightings of racked bucks. One that will always stay in my mind
was an encounter with a beautiful ten point buck, 8 yds away, from the very same
spot I shot my eight pointer!!!
Thanks
for the memories, BOB
shot.
The second evening on stand I arrowed a nice eight point buck at 8yds. I watched
this buck for 40 minutes making his way down the draw to the corn field. This
buck was in no hurry, taking his time, raking brushes with his antlers and
feeding along the way. When he was 8 yds from my stand I had a broadside shot
and decided to harvest this deer. The arrow past clear thru and the buck went
only 12 yds before going down. There was also a nice high racked six point buck
with this buck. I hunted the rest of the week with my uncle trying to fill my
antlerless tag and saw many nice bucks that week.
and saw a nice ten point buck, no shot!! The next
evening I hunted that same area but from the ground where two draws met and shot
a beautiful nine point buck that came in on me chasing a doe. The buck dropped
in his tracks from about 20yds. Another highlight of my trip was finding a 12 pt
rack in the creek bottom in front of my first rifle stand. I was crossing the
creek and looked down at what I thought looked like a antler tine sticking out
of the water. I wish I could have seen the expression on my face when I pulled
that 12 pt rack from the creek, the rack had about a 21 in. inside spread and
was so symmetrical.
