Hunt report

[draconis]

Saturday marked the opening of another deer hunting season, and my father, my brother-in-law (younger sister's husband) and I headed into the woods shortly before dawn. Things were fairly quiet where I was, and about 9:30 I decided to stalk my way down to the end of the ridge I was on, then work my way back towards the house.

So of course, as soon as I started to move, I saw 3 doe back behind me. ::G::

I watched them for several minutes as they worked their way across a valley and over the next ridge, feeling rather frustrated by the fact that they were staying in thick enough cover that I could never get a clean shot. Since I could still hear them, I stayed where I was, in hopes that they'd turn and come back my way.

About 10 minutes later, I managed to spot one of them, a decent-sized doe, in a thicket down the slope from me. There was still too much in the way for me to get a shot, but I kept an eye on her, and eventually saw her step behind a large tree at the edge of that thicket. I knew I'd have a clean shot if she stepped out from behind the tree, so I set up my shot and waited.

Sure enough, a moment later I saw her come out from behind the tree, and I fired... only to find that there was more than one deer in that thicket, and the one that had come out from behind the tree wasn't the one I'd been watching! I was a bit disappointed, since the one I took was definitely the smaller of the two. However, it was a clean shot, and I certainly won't complain about that.

I started making my way back towards the house, no longer in "stalking" mode since I already had a kill... and I walked up on a nice buck, who promptly bolted... ::G::

My father and I both had successful hunts that morning. My brother-in-law claims he didn't see anything, but Dad and I are both fairly certain that we heard him shoot, more than once. And unfortunately, brother-in-law is the sort that will have a problem over the fact that of the three of us who went out that morning, he's the only one who didn't bring home meat.

Oh, well... if he starts anything, I'll deal with it then.

We'll be going back down there this weekend, and my nephew will be in from NC. My father and I have been debating letting him hunt solo this time, after doing an "evaluation hunt" with either him or me so we can make sure he's being safe and remembers what to do/not to do. My main concern at this point is what will happen if he goes solo and takes a shot, but it's not a clean kill -- he doesn't know how to track very well yet.

Eh. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Comments

[kickair8p.livejournal.com]

Yay! No bologna for the Dragon-folk!

BTW, You're an oriental Dragon, right? Green, like in your icon, or some other color? With or without wings?

Why? Oh, uhm, no reason! ::attempts innocent look::





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