michiganwhitetailRLM
02-10-2007, 07:02 PM
It's been 5 months since i've visited the BOC. It's nice to see some familiar faces and names. I have seen more bucks this year than any other hunting season but none of them compared to the deer i set my pins on the morning of November 14th. I was hunting heavily pressured public land. The chase phase of the rut was in full swing. Almost everyday i could hear grunting bucks chasing does but it was always too dark to legally shoot. The morning of November 14th was actually a rough one at first. I had to wear my old steel toe hunting boots and my feet were numb by 9:30 a.m. I got up to walk around and do some still hunting. 65 yards from where I was sitting on the ground i bumped 2 does. I followed in the direction they ran for about 30 yards and was stopped dead in my tracks by a cluster of huge scrapes. I bent down to check how fresh the biggest one was and was startled by a nice buck grunting. I looked in the direction of the noise and seen a monster 10 point standing in the thckets 40 yards away. I immediately dropped to my knees and pulled out my bleat can and tilted it 1 time. The buck came crashing at me so fast that I barely had time to raise my bow. As he came to a screeching hault, at around 20 yards, i drew back my 65 pound martin jaguar as he stood there and stared at me, he wouldn't turn broadside, in fact, he wouldn't move at all. I couldn't hold my bow any longer and released the carbon arrow into his chest, right next to his shoulder. I would like to say that deer is mounted on my wall but unfortunately, a hunter that i met in the woods and myself, couldn't find the deer after following the blood trial for nearly 5 miles. The buck took us through some of the deepest swamps and thickest thorns that i have ever seen. I am confident that i made every attempt to retrieve what was probably a trophy of a lifetime. What truely breaks my heart is that this public land dream crusher was probably found by a hunter the next day since it was the opener of firearm season. I am currently looking into training my blue heeler pup to track wounded game