Shawn Carlock
Sponsor
Well it has been an interesting year of hunting so far. My son was the first to tag out on deer with a 4x4 buck and I was just getting going on looking for a big deer and the rut rolling on when my daughter who thought she would not have any time to hunt this year said she had 1 day she could go hunting, the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. So on Monday I bought her a tag and looked at the weather. The weather forecast was crap as far as a long range hunter is concerned, rain and fog. When you have only one day to spend with your daughter hunting you go no matter what the conditions are. Knowing that the creek area we like to hunt deer in is almost always fogged in in the mornings even in good weather we seldom try to hunt it in the mornings and have made it an almost exclusively evening spot. So despite the rain we loaded up our LR gear and headed out. The weather forecast for once was spot on, rain and more rain. We trudged through the rain to the spot I take the kids deer hunting and the same spot my son got his buck from a week earlier. I was prepared for the rain and had brought rain coats for everything, spotting scope, rifle, binoculars and backpacks. I did of course for get one for my daughter Shay, dad of the year points for sure. Shay was a trooper and had good hunting gear some it was pretty good for a while. I started to set up the spotting scope right away only to discover that since I had not brought a video camera / cam cradle because of the rain I also didn't have a spotting scope to tripod adapter with me either. Seems it was still on the Cam Cradle, of course I have 4 or 5 of them but wasn't smart enough to keep one permanently in my pack. I got out a small roll of duck tape I keep for various things ( you can fix or build anything with this stuff right?) and lashed the scope to the tripod. The hike to our spot is only a little over a mile so I take most comforts I want. I brought a pair of light weight stools so we didn't have to sit in the wet ground and this turned out to be a hunt saver. There was fog but I could still range through it with the G7 I had brought, so while the weather was down we were not out. While I was "McGivering" the spotting scope Shay got the 7 WSM in place with the bipod out, the Red Tac rear bag and the 180 gr. Berger hand loads that her brother had loaded for it. We had about 3.5 hours until it would be too dark to shoot. I hoped that with only 1 day to hunt that the weather would give us a break before dark. It had been raining pretty good for over two days and if it would just let off for that hour before dark I knew we would be covered up in deer activity. Things went pretty well until the 2 hour mark when the dad of year points started to cash in from now getting the kids their own hunting rain gear. Shay was starting to make a little noise about being wet as the rain had now soaked through all of her Under Armor hunting gear. I told her this was her hunt and there was no sense in being miserable so when she was "done" to let me know and we would hit the road get warm and get dinner. I added that if the rain would just stop for 15-20 minutes during the last hour of light (that was only 20-30 minutes away) the deer would start popping out everywhere and I was pretty sure she would get a shot at a buck. She decided to stay a little longer until she was truly "done". A strange thing happened about 10 minutes after this discussion, the rain stopped. Another 10 minutes after that the deer started coming out of the timber / brush patches into the open. We were watching 4 different groups of does looking for a trolling buck when I could see Shay was ready to throw in the towel. I spotted a doe we hadn't seen and started looking all around it with the spotting scope when I spotted a 4x4 buck in the brush near it. Now all issues of being wet and or cold were now nonexistent and Shay jumped behind the 7 WSM. With the PA set, I used the G7 to call out 11.75 moa and 1.0 moa right wind. With those settings dialed in Shay firmed up the rear bag and settled in on the deer. I was still on the spotting scope (duct tape and all) when she let me know she was "on it". Just like we had practice a hundred time I waited for good presentation gave a last minute wind check and said, "Send It". Two or three seconds passed as she applied even pressure on the Jewell trigger and the rifle cracked. I watched the trace of the 180 gr. Berger go above the deer's back and drop right into the front shoulder. On impact I saw the water fly and the shock wave ripple through the deer's body before hitting the ground. As soon as it hit the steep ground it started to roll down the hill, white belly, white belly, white belly and then out of sight behind some trees. I called out the hit, that wasn't necessary because the 7 WSM in a heave rifle has little to no recoil and Shay was able to spot her own shot and witness the same thing I had. Hugs and high five's all around we gathered up our gear and hiked back down to the ATV. After a brisk ride back to the truck we loaded up and drove to our hike in to recover drop off spot. We ditched everything but meat gear, pistol and camera. Both having Ebberlystock packs makes changing from hunting to packing quite simple and comfortable. We hike in using head lamps in the dark and found the spot where we were pretty sure the buck was at the shot. Now I knew exactly where the buck was probably lying but didn't want to rob Shay of the opportunity of tracking down her deer. She located the blood trail despite the wet ground and tracked it right down to him. We went through the process of boning it out and removing the head for a euro mount. Splitting a deer between the two of us was nice given how steep the ground is. By the time we got back to the truck I was down to a T-shirt and Shay had long since being concerned with being wet or cold. I have been thousands of hours hunting in my life but the best hours have come from taking younger family hunting and showing them the ropes. Be sure you do not miss out on the chance to introduce someone to our way of life.
