From 15 feet up a tree on an otherwise quiet Sunday evening late in October, I fired off a series of text messages to family. First one went to Logan at 6:17 p.m.
“Smoked
one,” I said.
“Actually?”
my youngest responded.
A
couple of minutes later at 6:19, still shaking with adrenaline, I let Michele
know I might be late this night.
“I
just shot one,” I said.
“Really?”
my wife replied.
Within
the next 10 minutes I sent a flurry of text messages to Tyler, my Dadd, Brent
and the landowners. All of them responded respectfully but all replied with a
hint of disbelief. It seems my biggest supporters each harbored some underlying
doubt about my abilities as a Bow Hunter.
*************************************************************************************
Unceremoniously,
the Rush City football team had fallen out of the playoffs the day before.
Logan woke, nursing a sprained ankle and aside from a trip to “just look” at
puppies, Sunday started like any other nondescript fall day. The sun was
shining. Logan’s ankle was swollen, and the puppies were puppies. When we
returned home early that afternoon, Logan and Cady went their merry way;
Michele made her Cambridge rounds, and I went to the woods. I was eager to have
some alone time in the autumn sun to soak in the idea of adding a dog to our
family again. I knew just the place. Fancy camouflage and archery equipment
paired nicely with the solitude of the Crandall Ranch.
On
my way in through the cut bean field I noticed that there had been significantly
more activity since my last hunt. Fresh tracks of the cloven-footed were
scattered much more prominently than they had been previously. I stumbled on
two fresh scrapes right underneath licking branches that looked like they were straight
from the manual. The sign was all there. Deer were on the move.
As I
reached my stand, I hoped that my trail camera would confirm what I learned in
the field above. Unfortunately, the SD card only captured a few pictures of one
buck. At 4:25 that afternoon I sent Logan the picture of the small deer and
together we wondered where they all had gone. I settled in for a peaceful
evening hunt and let my mind wander as I fought the urge to play on my phone. Truthfully,
I didn’t expect much.
A couple
of hours passed in the stand without interruption. As most hunters will attest,
a day can go from nondescript to awfully exciting in a few quick seconds. With
fading light, I sensed movement on my left. I shifted my eyes just in time to
spot a deer walking in from the east. He was right on the main trail and would pass
directly in front of our ladder stand. I had yet to really get a solid look but
without hesitation, I reached over my left shoulder to grab my bow. The deer
steadily walked towards me. It was at that point I recognized it as a much
bigger buck than the one I had seen on the card reader a few hours earlier. I
didn’t have time to stand because this dude was going about his business
purposefully. I shifted my legs to the right and tucked them under me while I
hooked up my wrist release and readied my bow. When the deer momentarily paused
behind the last remaining tree that separated us, I lifted my bow and pulled
back on the string. There was a moment of trepidation when I hit an unrehearsed
pause while drawing the much heavier bow than I had remembered practicing with
for so long. I doubled down with concentration and finished the draw cycle into
the back wall. At that moment, the deer lifted its head to look my way. The
tree perfectly covered my movement. I saw an antler sticking out from each side
behind the tree. As the buck took a few more steps, I acknowledged that he was
closer than anticipated and repeated in my head to “Stay Down” – “Aim Low” -
“Stay Down”. At full draw, I mounted the string. The peep sight was filled with
fur and vitals. I tried to stop the deer with a challenging password, but he
paid no heed. Instinctively, I fired.
I
was rewarded with the sound of impact. In an instant the buck bolted up the
hillside; mule kicked once at the crest and spun a 180 and headed back down the
hill in my direction. Still feeling the effects of a complete pass-through
shot, the buck took a hard left, spun out into a downed tree from the 2019
storm, and that is where he took his last Earthly breath. He expired not more
than 50 yards to the west.
Looking
back to where he stood when I released, I spotted the flashing blue Lumenok of my
blood covered arrow stuck in the ground. The pulse of the signaling light
matched the beat of my heart. Confident in my shot, I took out my phone to tell
the world.
Logan
and his sprained ankle left Pine City to muster up the four-wheeler at Morris’
house. He picked up Max on the way. By the time those two met me in the woods,
the night had fallen, and the deer had been gutted. Michele asked me to take it
easy on Logan, so he was relegated to the flashlights and backpacks while Max
and I took care of the heavy lifting. Although we didn’t have far to drag the big,
bodied trophy, the climb up the hill proved to be a big enough challenge to
leave us both gasping for air. Before long, pictures hit the text message
strings of those that momentarily doubted me, and congratulations soon followed.
The
rest of the evening slowed down as we shared the excitement of the hunt with Bev
and Coach Mollberg, along with Cady and the rest of her family and eventually we
wound back up out at Cort’s Big Game Processing for another nighttime drop off
in the freezer.
We went into Rifle Season with a ¼ beef, a
big Bear and a big Buck in the freezer. The score was heavily in favor or our
Krew. Having the freezer full allowed us to be more discriminant from the
stands in Bemidji. We each saw some deer and let them all walk. A fork and a 6
pointer gave Tim and Logan plenty of time to evaluate and eventually pass up
the shots. Aaron and Logan both had a look at a trophy 10 pointer on Saturday evening,
but he offered no clean shot and therefor they both held back. We feasted on
steaks and chops and sausages that left some in a meat coma but still somehow
wanting more. It was another great hunt with Tom, Tim, Aaron, Tyler, Logan and me
spending quality time in a tree but even better time sitting in a circle in the
garage telling each other how much we know about life. For the first time since
our hunt reconvened at Aaron’s, no more deer fell on Opening Weekend.
It's
been a wonderful Fall hunting season.
Really.
