Glad to hear of another good East Texan season
My father, My uncle, and I all had a great year this year. I went out one day, with my ol' Marlin 30-30 (Most accurate gun I have, there's just something about a Marlin) and sat up in a tree stand one day around 8:00 in the morning. I've given up on hunting from 5:00 to 8 or 9 in the morning, there's just no point in it. Most of the deer around here are just waking up around the time I'm getting off my stand!
Well, fourty minutes later, a 9 point starts walking through the bush about 45 yards away. I raised my gun and shot without thinking, nearly instinct-like. The gun has open iron sites, I wouldn't put a scope on it for the world. Well, the deer stumbled two steps, then fell over. I jumped down (all 8 feet, haha.) and went over to check him. He was kicking for another five or so minutes, but when we opened him up, I saw that I had taken out both his lungs and his heart.
The day after, my uncle killed a 10 point, same tract of land.
A week after that, my father killed the biggest 8 point I'd ever seen around here, it was the alpha of these parts to be sure. Interesting story, the day before he killed it I decided to take my S&W 625 revolver out with some +P bullet and try to bag me something with it. Well, an hour and a half into sitting in my tree stand I hear something to my right. Can't see anything, lots of brush to my right. Well, five more minutes and It doesn't come out, so I decide to get off the stand and go home, I was hungry. I came out on the road/trail about 100 yards out of the woods, and I saw horns in the clear cut (Our lease is used by the paper company for timber, so every few years it looks like a bomb went off. No trees in the main section of the lease, just brush and debris. It's better now, it's been four years since they've done it.).
I decided to track it, or at least try and sneak up within 40 yards to get a shot off. I had my head down, walking along the trail that was right next to the clearcut. I tried looking for a shot, but I couldn't get one. The deer couldn't smell me, I was downwind. I knew exactly where it was going: To the hill with the oat patch we planted previous to the season. So, I took another trail and was going to cut it off.
Sadly, the deer had the same agenda.
I turned the corner, and the thing was standing there, looking at me. It blew at me, shook its head, and turned to run off into the woods. By this time, this part of the trail was wooded on each side, so I had no way of getting a clean shot.
As I was walking out, my dad was pulling into the gate, ready too hunt till noon. I told him to hunt the hill stand, and he'll kill a big one.
Sure enough, a day later he takes care of the 8 point.
