Shameless product placement

[Queenbee]

My finger is great thanks for asking:) . I was awesome to watch my hubby in action , I guess i am his good luck charm.. can't wait for my turn

[j.krug]

Congrats on a nice deer and great commercial as well!

[ninepointer]

I have to admit I was a bit uncertain about taking my wife QueenBee as a spectator on her first hunt. She wants to get her hunting license next year, but what if she found sitting in the woods for hours to be excruciatingly boring? What if, by some stroke of luck we actually killed a deer; how would she react? If she decides it just isn’t her thing after all; would it be hard to sell a pink Vixen II?

After a somewhat restless sleep, we got up at 4:30 a.m. on Monday (Canadian Thanksgiving) morning and, with our gear already in the truck, we drove through the darkness to meet up with my friend at the hunting property. QueenBee attempted to doze in the passenger seat and I couldn’t blame her. It was one of those obscene hours of the night when the only people out on the roads are hunters and riff-raff .

Arriving at the property, we walked single file in the pre-dawn darkness into our hunting spot. There an invisible deer greeted us with snort and ran off into the woods. I’ve learned from past experiences to no longer worry about such things; it just means there are deer around.

I pointed my buddy towards my best tree stand, while Queenbee and I headed off to a simple ground blind I had constructed. We long ago decided on a ground blind because QueenBee made it clear that there was no way she would ever go up a tree. I took this as an opportunity to see what it might be like to hunt deer within bow range from the ground.

As we sat waiting for the sun to come up, we listened to a pair the owls hooting back and forth, and we could hear a deer moving around in the woods. My buddy later reported that he too had all sorts of “deery” sounds going on in the darkness around him.

Queenbee had never before tried to sit motionless for hours, so I had already decided not to get my hopes too high. If she at least got to see a deer; our outing would be a huge success. I was certain that if anybody got any shooting, it would be my friend in the tree stand.

To the left of our blind, the bushes were so thick that they offered no visibility for anything coming from that direction. But this was no matter because in this spot the deer always come from the right, so that’s where I had previously cleared shooting lanes.

It was 7:50 a.m. and the woods were nicely fully illuminated when I caught flickers of movement to my left. They looked exactly like the little brown wrens that had been hopping around among the branches since dawn. But as I tried to pick out an actual wren among the brown bits that seemed to be flitting about, I could not make out a bird. Then suddenly my heart jumped when, though a small hole in the branches, I recognized something very familiar; a black nose! A deer’s nose! Then there was part of an antler! Those were no birds and they never were birds!!! QueenBee spotted the deer at the same time (good eye!) and I have to give her credit; she stayed as silent and as motionless as a stone.

What was this deer doing there? He was not supposed to come from the left. Besides, he had walked up along the very same path we had walked on just a short time ago. Deer are not supposed to do that! But none of this seemed to bother the buck as he calmly munched on ground plants while still almost totally obscured by the bushes.

I slowly got my crossbow in shooting position while I had the chance. It was not a moment too soon, because the deer then stepped forward, showing his head and neck, just 12 metres in front of us!!! When he turned his head to stare at us, I thought for sure we were busted. He started bobbing his head up and down and he began to fidget. This was not good . His vitals were still totally hidden, I didn’t have a shot and this deer was about to blast off, most likely back in the direction he came from.

But every once in a rare while, luck tips in the deer hunter’s favour and this was one of those times. The buck started quickly walking forward, exposing his body and preparing to bolt. I already had my cross hairs behind his shoulder and because of the almost point-blank range, I decided to take the shot even though the deer was in motion. Immediately upon the release I knew that I should have held on the shoulder, rather than behind it, to account for a bit of a lead.

The sound of my arrow’s impact told me that I had hit the deer. But where? The buck took off through the woods and out of sight. QueenBee said she saw the shot and assured me that I hit him well. While QueenBee was gleefully congratulating me, I told her that I’d save my celebrations for after we found the deer. Right now we were only half-way done.

I radioed my buddy, who’s tree stand was about 100 metres away. He reported that he had heard the “twang” of my crossbow, the sound of a deer crashing through the woods and then a “thud” followed by silence. This was a good sign. He told me he said he had a pretty good idea of where the deer might have fallen.

After sitting tight for 30 minutes I felt it best to blood trail the deer rather than walk straight to where we thought the deer might be. Besides, I could use all the blood trailing practice I could get. The first sign of blood we found was about 20 metres from where the deer had been hit. From there it was a thin trail of only scattered drops, but the blood was the right colour. We briefly lost the blood trail two or three times and each time QueenBee stayed at the last sign while I cast out in a loop in search of the next blood spot. It was while I was doing one of these loops that I spotting the buck, dead on the ground just 10 metres away. As often happens when tracking, I was so focused on the leaves at my feet that I could have stumbled right over that deer.

In all, the deer had gone about 130 metres from where I had shot him. He had ran in a straight line, but had been heading for the thickest, nastiest kind of cover. Fortunately for us, he expired mere metres away from entering the dirty thicket.

It turns out that I hit the buck farther back and higher than where I had aimed. This of course was because of my failure to fully account for the moving deer. Fortunately my arrow still caught the back of the near lung, part of the liver, grazed the underside of the spine and exited out the high middle of the far lung (a slight quartering-away angle). I’m sure that the high entry/exit wounds didn’t help with the blood trail.

After some quick cell phone photos (I’d left my camera in the truck, Dang!) we tagged and dressed the deer. QueenBee suggested we look for my arrow. No sooner did I finish saying that from a ground angle my arrow would likely be buried under the leaves and lost, QueenBee said, “Here it is.”

While my buddy and I dragged the deer over 600 yards and across two creeks, QueenBee carried our gear for us. We came out of the woods in style!

What an amazing first-time experience for QueenBee! She said it was just like a hunting show, but without the dramatic music and the tense narrator! Then she laughed and said, “I guess I shouldn’t expect every hunt to be like this one.” She knows me well.

[one shot scott]

Great story to go along with the great pictures.
Dont ya know that the excalibur scopes have a built-in leading feature

[lscha]

Congratulations! What a great picture too.

[j.krug]

Great tale of your hunt. Good to hear Queenbee enjoyed the hunt as well!

[DuckHunt]

Great story. Congrats on the buck. Love that ground blind. You can get comfy in there.

DuckHunt

[MADMAX2]

Hey CONGRATS!! nothing like a good story to go with the pics

[Normous]

I nominate this the best 2010 Excalibur hunt success story.

[Boo]

I nominate this the best 2010 Excalibur hunt success story.

Agree Norm, excellent story!

[R.J.]

Congrat's ! ... Beauty Whitetail !

[wabi]

Great account of the hunt!

[Queenbee]

well, my hubby can sure tell a story WOW!!!!. I guess that is close to the truth I think LOL. I remember getting up very early, and walking forever, then sleeping in a small chair, waking up to see a deer, then my hubby shot it. short and sweet . Good job hun.

[one shot scott]

Good for you for getting out there Queenbee! I keep trying to get my wife out there but she admits that she doesnt have the patience. But she is jealous of the wildlife I get to see.

[CDN Taxman]

Congrats to both of you on a great writeup with a great picture.

Mike