I'll start this off by saying I honestly had no clue a buck of this size lived in the area I was hunting. 5 trail cams running continuously since early summer. Thinking this guy was a transient or near local with a small range. I'll take it. Biggest buck ever shot on our property by a considerable margin. I was never really in to sizing bucks up for score, mostly because I typically hunt for ~100" bucks and filling the freezer. In my unskilled analysis, trying to follow the rules the best I could, I measured him at 136 gross with 6" of deductions. We'll see how he measures up officially by someone who knows what they're doing after drying. Anyway on to the story.
I don't have all my numbers worked out yet on deer sightings and hours on stand. I think this year is higher than average for me, ~0.40 deer per hour versus my normal 0.25 - 0.30. He was my 4th shooter buck of the year and the first to offer a decent shot. I decided to sleep in an extra hour or two on Thursday and let the heavy rain from the front pass. This was a strategic move I often make to maintain enough stamina to hunt 3/4 of a day. I go to my mid-day to dark stand. Can't hunt this stand in early AM as cannot get to it without bumping deer. Still it rained on and off all day. Saw two yearling bucks wandering in the morning, but the woods seemed pretty dead. Went a long span without seeing a deer between 11:15 and 5:00. I was standing at the ready when the craziness started. Off to my right I see a doe break out of the woods on an ears back, tail down, run for her life. No sooner does my brain process that info that I see a buck close on her tail. They are coming right at my stand. I tried to hook my release on the loop as fast as I could. But by the time I reached full draw, the buck had already passed. They were very close. Ran to the left of my stand, ~5 yards away on the down hill side. I didn't try to stop him before I was at full draw. It was over in a split second. My hope was that she would loop him back around. I immediately went to the grunt tube although I've never before pulled a buck away from a hot doe. About 5 minutes go by and I hear/see another deer coming. I'm ready this time for the consolation prize. Trailing the buck/doe, by scent I presume, was another buck, much smaller. I decide to pass. He was borderline legal anyway. Ran directly under my stand this time, between the tree and ladder.
Getting dark now. I let out a grunt every couple minutes. It's crunch time. I'm nearing the end of my vacation and tired and wet and cold. 5 more minutes go by. Feels like 10, but my trail cam confirms it was only 5. All of a sudden another deer breaks from same location. His two fatal mistakes were that he was a shooter and he checked up in the clearing to relocate the hot doe's trail. I draw at about 20 yards. He turns and heads up toward my stand. At 6 yards (I stepped it off) he turned broadside and I let him have it. In hindsight I should have aimed lower. Given the short distance and the fact that I sighted my 20 yard pin 1" high, I hit him ~2" higher than wanted. Broke his back. He gets up on fronts on drags away. Now I can actually see how big a brute he really is. Trying to get another arrow in him would not work from the stand. The only direction he could go was straight down hill. Soon he was too far away and bad angle. 10 minutes pass and I can still see him ~50 yards away. I decide to take a chance with the last minute of shooting light to get close enough to finish. Two steps down the ladder and he hears/sees me and gets moving again. I take my time and get around him. Sparing the rest of the details. The only thing I'll add is that the first shot was probably fatal. I dug 4" of arrow and broadhead from the veins that connect to top of heart.
Giving credit where credit is due. Thank you G5 Montec CS's for being the best penetrating broadhead I've ever used. Any broadhead would have broken his back, but you kept going. You don't leave a wide entrance/exit hole, but that's the trade-off.
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