7 seconds- aka back on the archery train

[casts_by_fly]

Hi gents,

 

I don’t post much here but wanted to share tonight’s success. I’ve had a rough two years with the bow. We moved back to the US in the fall of 2019 and I quickly realized that bird hunting here in NJ isn’t worth setting the alarm for. So I decided to get back into archery.  I got my dads bow out and got to practicing. That year I ended up taking a really nice 7 and had plenty of deer in range. But I also hit another nice 8 that I didn’t find (bad shot, low) and the one I got wasn’t a good shot and I got lucky that I hit the arteries in the liver (it ran 40 yards and died). In the off season I practiced frequently, changed my setup a bit and was in a good place going into the season. Scouting and finding deer has never been a problem, and last year was no different. In October I had a nice 8 under my stand and made a poor shot (too high, wrong pin, non lethal). Later in the season I had a great wide 6 come through the funnel I set up in. Of course I had just lowered my bow to the ground and was climbing down.  I went on to shoot a spike later in the season and put a bad shot on it (low as it moved away from me before it turned broadside and I didn’t notice). Pretty rough four shot sequence on deer.

For this season I wasn’t going to take any chances, no risky shots, nothing (not that any of my shots last year were Hail Marys or outside of my ability). I decided to set up for close range short shots and if I got busted so be it. Last week I had a wide 4 within 25 yards of my stand for 45 minutes and was at 8 yards for a good long while. We have earn a buck here and I hadn’t shot a doe yet.

 

the weather today was conducive to an evening sit. It was really windy all day but calming around 5. I figured the deer would get up eating and I was right. I scouted a funnel back in February that I had never hunted so decided to try it out. I had just sat down into my saddle and hadn’t nocked an arrow yet when I saw a doe sliding through the thicket. I had just hit the opening she was in with a rangefinder and knew she was in range already. I wasn’t ready. The adrenaline hit me quick and I wasn’t taking a 30 yard shot with that heart rate. I thought she’d come down a closer trail and give me a 20 yard shot. Turns out she wanted the next trail over which gave me a 10 yard shot. This was the same shot as I made on the nice 8 last year and screwed up. Just a week ago I practiced that shot from my home stand to make sure it shot how I thought from my saddle (same as from a stand).  I had run through my head the right aiming point and got it right this time. She ran about 20 yards in 7 seconds and fell over. The shot went down through the edge of the shoulder blade and near lung into the top of the heart (maybe clipping the bottom of the offside lung) before lodging in the base of the offside shoulder blade. It didn’t pass through and the entry was high but there was still plenty of blood, not that I needed it since I saw her crash. 
 

it’s good to get back on the train.  I’ve got plenty of tags and now flexibility in where and what hunt so I can take the best opportunity available. Here’s to hoping for a few more. 
 

 

 

[gim]

38 minutes ago, casts_by_fly said:

We have earn a buck here and I hadn’t shot a doe yet.

Now that you’ve tagged a doe for the freezer, you can spend the rest of the season waiting for mr big!

[casts_by_fly]

9 minutes ago, gimruis said:

Now that you’ve tagged a doe for the freezer, you can spend the rest of the season waiting for mr big!

so if you buy a bow license you get fall and winter tags(before Halloween and after New Years).  In between is a permit season.  If you also buy the firearms license you get a tag for the 6-day season. So all in that’s four buck tags. It’s also unlimited does. 

 

I live on a cul de sac surrounded by a wildlife management area, a nature preserve (which I get a hunting permit for) and a golf course. There are tons of yard deer that I don’t shoot because I like them being around. What happens during the rut though is that the bucks start to roam and because of the layout of the neighborhood and all of the houses with backyard fences, the deer are forced to go through front yards to get from the front of the hill to the back. We are the end house so they get funneled right through our property.  
 

All of that put together and I’m heading back for that four point next.  There seems to be something genetic in the bucks in this neighborhood that they lack brow tines. Even if they get them they are less than a stub. I have another 4/6 point that was here the last two years that was on my list. The 7 I shot had small brow tines. So I’m going to make it my personal mission to take that out of the gene pool. 

[gim]

17 minutes ago, casts_by_fly said:

There seems to be something genetic in the bucks in this neighborhood that they lack brow tines.

Weird. Ya thin that gene pool and get some better ones in there.

[Smells like fish]

Congratulations on your deer. Don’t forget that bad shots are often recoverable if weather and coyotes allow. I want to give a liver hit 6-8 hours and a stomach hit 24 hours. Any shot that isn’t known where it hit but isn’t found within a hundred yards I’ll back out 12-24 hours too. 
If you hunt with modern equipment and adequate poundage I have found the wide cut of mechanical heads a big advantage and that’s coming from a man that has killed dozens with Bear Razorheads of the old days as one example.