What is your Best Hunting Story?

[MtPockets]

Thanks to @marksman1941 we have a very entertaining spooky hunt thread.

What about your best, most memorable, hunts- successful kill or not? I had to add that last part because many of my more memorable hunts didnt end with meat on the ground.

 

[memtb]

Great idea! I will get something together, I'm detail oriented…..it'll be long! memtb

 

[memtb]

Maybe not my best…..but, has the most cherished memories

It was the early '60's in Central Louisiana! At that time, at least in that region of Louisiana, Whitetail Deer were near non-existant. The deer, and most everything else, was hunted for subsistence by many locals. The game laws were mostly ignored and mostly not enforced. The wardens, the few there were, were either related to many of those locals (poachers) or themselves were poaching!

Many older adults had never seen a deer, or had ever killed a deer. My grandfather was born and raised there, living his entire life miles, from any town…….raising a family by trapping, farming, having some live stock and cutting timber! He hunted much of his life and had never killed a deer, and had seen very few……most of us couldn't fathom this today!

It was late December'63, I had just turned 11 and had been hunting with family since around 5, killed a few squirrels, rabbits, and coons….dreaming of hunting deer as in the stories I had read about in magazines!

Often several family members would go in several directions around the place, hoping to get a shot at anything that could be found! My grandfather and I went north out of his little 40 acres. We were following an old abandoned logging road for about a 1/2 mile, finding the top of a large oak that was left after the better firewood was taken. The top was at a fork in the road, giving us a blind, with a good view of the old road to the south in some fairly open country…..you could probably see a hundred yards in some places.

It was a pretty cool December 28th morning, you could see your breath, and we had broken some thin ice covering some low spots in route to our blind!

We sat in our blind long enough to get cold, neither of us had clothing to stay warm without staying active. My grandfather built a small, very much welcome, fire….it's smoke, illuminated by the early morning sun breaking through the trees was drifting across in front of us in a westerly direction!

Suddenly my grandfather said "look there boy, there's a deer…..he's big as a yearling"! I guess I was being a kid, not paying attention and had not seen the deer step out into the old road just a ways beyond our fire's smoke!

My grandfather sort of elbowed me ……indicating that I should shoot him.

Continued!

 

[memtb]

While I had done quite a bit of shooting, usually felt pretty confident with my shooting…..I was petrified at the thought of shooting at and missing the first deer that I'd ever seen! I said "Paw Paw, you shoot him"! Though only 55 steps, later stepped-off by my Dad…..it seemed a long shot!

What I didn't know was, my grandfather couldn't clearly the deer, and would have to shoot between two trees. Later we found that from his his angle, 8 of the 9 lead balls from his "double aught" buckshot cut a nice semi-circle in a tree! The deer was facing East at his shot, the deer jumped straight-up into the air, landed in full alert, but didn't yet run……I guess not certain which way to go.

My grandfather was very slow to pump that old Model 12 Win., as he only had one hand…..having lost his lower arm in a sawmill accident when he was only 16 years old! Knowing this, I made a quick shot with my Stevens 22/410 over/under! With my shot, the deer again jumped up, seemingly turning in mid-air, quickly vanished into the woods!

We went to where the deer was standing and started looking for blood. We looked for a bit and couldn't find any blood. My grandfather told me that I'd missed, and that we'd head home. I argued (probably crying) that I couldn't have missed, so to humor me and likely to shut me up we started following the bucks tracks. I'm guess'n that about in about 20 or 25 yards….he found a single, small drop of blood. He yelled to me, "boy here's blood….you did hit him"!

My grandfather followed him using the blood trail that was getting bigger and better, and by tracks left in the mud and water. At one point, there was a very small elevated spot above the water we were wading through. There was a large Beech tree on this little mound, and beneath the Beech was a large pool of blood with a hoof print in the middle!

We continued to trail the deer though the flooded "flats" until we came to another tree top left by timber cutters. My grandfather trailed the deer right into this top, and said, "there's your deer boy"! I jumped and pointed my gun toward the top….fully expecting the deer to come bust'n out. He didn't '….he was dead!

My grandfather pointed me in the direction of his fence line….he would stay with the deer.

Once at the house, I told everyone that we had a deer down….my Dad went with me back into the woods, yelling back and forth with my grandfather until we got to the him and the deer.

We took him to a local butcher to be cut up. While the deer was being cut up….word got around about the kid that had killed a little buck deer. Before long, there were people from all around the area that showed-up to see the deer and the kid that had killed it!

I lost my grandfather about 10 years later, he passed away in his late '80's …..never having killed a deer! memtb

I warned that it would be long!

 

[otisdog]

While I had done quite a bit of shooting, usually felt pretty confident with my shooting…..I was petrified at the thought of shooting at and missing the first deer that I'd ever seen! I said "Paw Paw, you shoot him"! Though only 55 steps, later stepped-off by my Dad…..it seemed a long shot!

What I didn't know was, my grandfather couldn't clearly the deer, and would have to shoot between two trees. Later we found that from his his angle, 8 of the 9 lead balls from his "double aught" buckshot cut a nice semi-circle in a tree! The deer was facing East at his shot, the deer jumped straight-up into the air, landed in full alert, but didn't yet run……I guess not certain which way to go.

My grandfather was very slow to pump that old Model 12 Win., as he only had one hand…..having lost his lower arm in a sawmill accident when he was only 16 years old! Knowing this, I made8 a quick shot with my Stevens 22/410 over/under! With my shot, the deer again jumped up, seemingly turning in mid-air, quickly vanished into the woods!

We went to where the deer was standing and started looking for blood. We looked for a bit and couldn't find any blood. My grandfather told me that I'd missed, and we'd head home. I argued (probably crying) that I couldn't have missed, so to humor me and likely to shut me up we started following his tracks. I'm guess'n that about in about 20 or 25 yards….he found a single, small drop of blood. He yelled to me, "boy here's blood….you did hit him"!

My grandfather followed him through the blood trail that was getting bigger and better, and by tracks in the mud and water. At one point, there was a very small elevated spot above the water we were wading through. There's was a Beech tree on this little mound , and beneath the Beech was a large pool of blood with a hoof print in the middle!

We continued to trail the deer though the flooded "flats" until we came to another tree top left by timber cutters. My grandfather trailed the deer right into this top, and said, "there's your deer boy"! I jumped and pointed my gun toward the top….fully expecting the deer to come bust'n out. He didn't '….he was dead!

My grandfather pointed me in the direction of his fence line….he would stay with the deer.

Once at the house, I told everyone that we had a deer down….my Dad went with me back into the woods, yelling back and forth with my grandfather until we got to the deer.

We took him to a local butcher to be cut up. While the deer was being cut up….word got around about the kid that had killed a little buck deer. Before long, there were people from all around the area that showed-up to see the deer and the kid that had killed it!

I lost my grandfather about 10 years later, he passed away in his late '80's …..never having killed a deer! memtb

I warned that it would be long!

Great story.

 

[Ol' Red]

I share one. Two buddies and myself had an outfitter fly us out on the Alaska peninsula, north of Illiamna. When flying through the pass, wing flaps down on a DeHaviland Beaver, we still gained about 100 feet of altitude a minute due to high winds. As we were landing on the lake I remember thinking what a smooth landing for floats. When the floats actually did touch the water the shore, which had a four foot cut bank, looked very close. When the pilot said $h!t, I was concerned. He gunned the engine and pulled the stick back hard and skipped up onto the bank. We came to a stop about 35 yards on dry ground. All of us were very quiet for a while ( don't know how long), and I finally said "if I knew we were landing on dry ground I may not have worn my hip waders. The pilot said he needed a few moments to gather his thoughts. I told him I would be a short ways off kissing and hugging the ground. We pushed the plane back into the water and he lifted off into the 70 MPH wind in just about twice the length of the floats. The winds got worse later that day and brought a couple inches of rain. That story can wait. It's a little crazy.

 

[akdad]

I share one. Two buddies and myself had an outfitter fly us out on the Alaska peninsula, north of Illiamna. When flying through the pass, wing flaps down on a DeHaviland Beaver, we still gained about 100 feet of altitude a minute due to high winds. As we were landing on the lake I remember thinking what a smooth landing for floats. When the floats actually did touch the water the shore, which had a four foot cut bank, looked very close. When the pilot said $h!t, I was concerned. He gunned the engine and pulled the stick back hard and skipped up onto the bank. We came to a stop about 35 yards on dry ground. All of us were very quiet for a while ( don't know how long), and I finally said "if I knew we were landing on dry ground I may not have worn my hip waders. The pilot said he needed a few moments to gather his thoughts. I told him I would be a short ways off kissing and hugging the ground. We pushed the plane back into the water and he lifted off into the 70 MPH wind in just about twice the length of the floats. The winds got worse later that day and brought a couple inches of rain. That story can wait. It's a little crazy.

I bet that pilot never told anyone that

 

[Darryle]

My best story started out as a pig hunt and tuned into the deer hunt of my lifetime.

Fall of 2001, after everything that had happened that year, I was stuck back home working because foreign travel was severely restricted and I was due to head to Halifax for the fall and winter. I had no plans on hunting that fall because I was on a long deployment in San Diego, Yuma and International Falls. So faced with the long fall season approaching, I built a hasty box blind big enough for 2-3 people to hunt pigs out of in the pecan orchard on my property. I had bow hunted out of a treestand with no luck, rifle hunted with no luck seeing a deer I was willing to shoot. I gave up deer and started focusing on pigs. Fast forward to December 14th, like every few days, I stopped by Winn Dixie and gathered up all of the rotting fruit, vegetables and bread products. Drove home grabbed my 450 Marlin H&R and made some calls to verify the guys were coming to hunt pigs. I drove down to the river bottom and poured out a bag of sweet feed, all the rotting stuff and a half a bag of corn, picked up the plastic and other packaging and drove out to park and wait. That process took 10-15 minutes tops before I was walking back to the stand to sit and wait. We had some ringtail cats that liked to come out and feed and play before the bigger animals came to feed. As I walked up I noticed at least a dozen does and yearlings feeding around the area oblivious to my less than stealthy approach, but what really got my attention was the cedar tree on top of the tank dam shaking and swaying back and forth. This guy comes strolling off the bank and has his nose to the air sniffing around the does. It took me a half second to realize that I was only going to get one crack at this and I was in a less than desirable position. Backpack in my left hand Handi in the other, I cracked it open and slipped in a 350gr flat point, took careful aim and fired. Buck trots about 15yds west where I didn't have a view of his body, but it was obvious that I had missed. I crouched and crab walked to a pecan tree, sat down the backpack, came up slowly, loaded another round. The buck took forever, 10-15 seconds to make it back over to the doe he had eyes on, he was lined up in the footpath we beat out from the blind to the bait pile took careful aim again, fired and the woods exploded with chaos. Deer I hadn't seen bolted into the hay pasture to the east, but I didn't see the buck. I walked over to investigate, but no buck, my cousin calls and asked me what I had shot and I said apparently nothing, he's saying he heard the thwack a 1/2 mile down the road as he was loading up to come down to the blind. I searched for blood, bone or hair trying to figure it out, then I start a grid search making to the broom weeds on the edge of the clearing and tripped and fell forward into the weeds and on top of this guy. He had lurched forward maybe 6-8yds and was completely concealed in the weeds.

He's not the biggest buck I ever shot, but he's one I will never forget.

14 points and 144 5/8"

 

[akdad]

one of my favorites is my first deer but it wasn't very impressive as far as the hunt but I learned how good a great hunter can be. I was hunting for first time for deer if been out a few night's by myself waiting for deer to come out had no luck My uncle who loved to hunt and kept checking on my status and after a few days he said I'll be over to help and we will get you a buck.
He drove over night before and camped in his camper like he always did he said we would go to a place he knew in the morning.
I was up long before light and waited and waited and waited. Finally he came into house and had a cup of coffee with my mom and chatted it's already been light for a bit I'm dying to go
So we jump in his rig and drive to a spot he goes up to a house and asks to park his rig near their driveway and visits again
Finally we are headed up a hill walking and he's still just chatting I'm so confused at this point I don't understand anything.I thought we were going to do some hunting.
We get towards top of hill and he stops and says go here about 100yds a buck will jump up in front of you run to your right and stop. Shoot him and we will go home.
So I did. That's exactly what happened
We were home with the buck by 9:30am.
I learned a lot.
He was an utterly amazing hunter!

 

[Muddyboots]

My son is 40, when he was 12 in first bow season, I placed a hang on stand maybe 8' off ground in natural tree tripod. It was in an island of trees maybe 100' in diameter prob 200+ yards in middle of a large field. I had scouted this a ton and every night a small social group of deer would come out of swamp and walk right along the island edge. My son looked at me like I was crazy! Sit in middle of field? Maybe but felt nobody ever attacked this way. Explained how deer pattern hunters too. So son was in body harness and helped him climb up into stand and lock onto tree. He hung bow in hook. I left and setup on edge of woods. Nervous beyond belief he was in treestand but he was mature and felt he can be safe. Which he was. So like clockwork, deer come out and work their way to island. Doe walks 12 yds from tree. I have binos on him but somehow did not see him draw and shoot. But classic bronco kick and she takes off running back toward swamp. In microsecond my son is bellowing I shot her! I shot her! I am yelling QUIET!!!! But also so dang nervous!!! I walk, half run to him so he doesn't do something coming down. He asked me if I heard him? Heck, EVERYONE within a mile heard you!! Explained how noise can cause deer to run farther.

No worries, he waited for me before starting to climb down. We waited 1/2 hour since it appeared to be good shot. I picked up trail right away and she actually made it over 200 yds to swamp. Got into really thick crap. Hands knees. Trail petered out. Nasty briars and thorns. Decided to leave her over night since in low 30's. Picked up in daylight and only 30-40 yds. Son drove Easton 1816 with 85gr Thunderhead diagonally full length of deer and exited. With Browning Midas at 45#! Not the shot angle we discussed but actually perfectly placed. Amazing that arrow went full length of deer and exited. Hit right behind front shoulder and exited out left hindquarter.

There is nothing more satisfying than your child or even spouse kill their first deer. I will NEVER forget him bellowing "I shot her"!

 

[Ol' Red]

@Muddyboots I want to hear about that buck that you drowned a couple years back and had to have your son help you drag him out.

 

[Muddyboots]

Haha! In Mid November last couple days of bow in 2019, my right shoulder was trashed. Could hardly pull 60lb, pain was unbearable. I had complete reconstructive surgery planned first week of December. I told son maybe 2-3 shots left in shoulder at best. My son told me to use his hang on stand. This is on a farm in Indiana since "I can't get into trouble there."! I climbed into it on edge of bedding area off ag field of cut beans. This field had hedgerows in both sides with cut over between to next large field. It was 17 degrees and was in stand hour before daylight! Several shooters on camera. About 2 hours plus past daylight, NADA! Normal for transient ag fields traffic. But then a really nice buck chases 3 does right up under my tree. I can't move a muscle!!!! They move off into bedding area and no shot! Bummed! Then for whatever reason, snap and here comes buck! Stops at 12 yds, started to draw and could hardly pull bow back! Pain was horrible! Got bow back and the normal process of settling pin, relax, squeeze shot off went out window. Pin hit his kill zone, arrow gone! Perfect double lung! Takes off running toward cut between fields! I am saying YEAH! Run toward truck! THEN, oh , buck hits cut and turns left off culvert and does perfect 10 flip into deep drainage ditch! Prob 10' deep! First I released some interesting expletives then it was pure laughter. All I could think was son's statement : "can't get into trouble there".!

Hurt like dickens to pull bow back at 60 lbs. My hat was soaking wet from pain sweat! Draw back was incredibly painful. Really don't know how I pulled bow back other I use really good form which transfer load to back delta muscle group. My phone literally buzzes seconds after shot. Son calling to see if I saw anything. He asked if I saw big 9. Yes. Any shot? Yes. Did you hit him? Yes. Good hit? Yes. Kill him? Yes. Did you see where he went? Yes. In field? No. In bedding area? No. Silence. Where the heck is he? Drainage ditch. Silence. Then laughter! Serious? Yes. Need me? Heck yes! Being polite here!

So son takes time off job as plant mgr to come over to help. I went down into ditch to place rope on it then couldn't get out since walls were slippery clay. Laughter again!! Son had to pull me up first. Which prob tougher than pulling deer up! He told me he will NEVER tell me again I can't get into trouble there!!!

BTW, 2 weeks later, had all 4 rotator tendons reattached due to bone cyst displacement, bicep tendon reattached, torn labrum repaired, bone cysts filled and bone spurs. Other than that, felt fine.... No wonder pain was so bad! Funny how a buck can erase what you should not be able to do to possible.!

 

[MtPockets]

That story can wait. It's a little crazy.

???Crazier than that first story????

 

[Ol' Red]

???Crazier than that first story????

OK after Muddy's deer drowning story, I will finish my caribou trip on the peninsula. After the plane departed the wind picked up a little more. We had a wall tent for cooking and drying gear. When we set up the pup tents for sleeping, we could not keep them weighted down. We set the pup tents inside the wall tent. Then the side of the wall tent started to lift up from the wind. We found some discarded jaw bones and cut slits in the bottom of the tent and used the jaws as extra tent stakes. Then we put rocks on the jaw bones for extra security. Now the rain starts and the wind is still pulling the stakes out of the ground. About four in the afternoon we started hauling all of the rocks we could find and piling them on the stakes and the side of the tent to hold it down. The sun set during our construction job and the wind and rain continued. I remember running with large rocks and slipped and landed on my back in the mud with a 20 pound rock on my chest. As I lay there laughing one of my buddies runs past and ask if I was OK. Soon we were all laughing and I think it insanity slipping in. At four A.M. we finished the rock pile and went into the tent to rest. The pilot flew over in the morning. We motioned him that all was good, he dipped the wing and flew away. He returned about five hours later and landed to check on us. He said you guys looked OK this morning, but he had to pick up two camps that lost all of their gear. four people were taken to the hospital with hypothermia. The winds were sustained at 60 to 65 MPH and 105 MPH gusts had been recorded.
That was the first night of a five night and six day hunt that will never be forgotten. We shot four nice bulls and four cows over the next couple days.