I had a very exciting weekend starting out Friday evening, but ended with some bad luck like what Dick experienced unfortunately. After work Friday afternoon, I hunted behind my house and saw the first sign of some rut activity. Two does and a fawn were being chased by what looked like a 6 point. Later saw a spike, none of them got within range. Saturday morning I hunted over at a Keiths farm, I passed up about a 12 yard shot at a 4 point. I've been seeing some larger bucks, and decided to hold off on him since I've already got a couple in the freezer. Got into the woods kind of late Saturday evening, but went behind my house and used a climber instead of getting in my lock-on stand. Had some excitement early on with our cat chasing a dozen or so turkeys in my back yard, they sure can make some racket. Then saw a couple of does just off my property, they never came into range. The next deer I saw was a 8 point buck about 50 yards in front of me. I watched him make a scrape, pee in it and mess around with the low hanging branch above the scrape. He then walked with his tail extended directly under my lock-on stand and into my food plot. He ate oats for a while, and I saw him get alert and then ran and chased some deer out of the plot that I hadn't seen. These deer ran up into my back yard, I could see them walking around in the yard. Then the buck came back and really started putting on a show. He horned and fought a small diameter tree that had partially broke off at the base and was laying on the ground. He at one point had the branches of the tree in his antlers and reared up on his hind legs snorting and twisting his head. I had never seen anything quite like it in real life. He then made a couple of more scrapes, I could see him digging up buck oats and rape and flinging it behind him while making the scrape. He then passed back under my lock-on and headed up toward me through the woods. He came out on the trail that I have winter wheat on, and started eating about 12 yards away. There was several branches in the way, and I had to watch him for several minutes. I could hear his teeth grinding he was so close. It was getting fairly dark, but I could still easily make out his full body. He turned and took a couple of steps giving me a broadside open shot. I took the shot but was unable to see my arrow in flight or where I hit. I was concentrating on a behind the shoulder shot. He took off down toward my lockon and beyond into the bottom and across a spring. I waited about 15 minutes before getting down, and then took my stand off the tree and up into my yard before looking for blood. I found my arrow broken off about 10 yards or so down his trail. I only had 3-4" of penetration...
I was pretty sure then that I had hit him in the shoulder, and hadn't gotten but little penetration.
I couldn't find any blood at all on the ground, and tracked him about 100 yards by his tracks into the bottom. I decided to back off of him and come back later. After about 1-1/2 hours I went looking again, making a long sweep in the direction he had run, and never did find any blood at all other then the one small spot on the end of my broken arrow. I looked all through the bottom and up into a thicket that night, and went back looking Sunday morning. I never found any blood at all even from trying to follow his tracks as far as I could and closely examining the ground. I hated to lose him, but I know it happens. Hopefully he will survive the shot...
