Some of you who read the other thread I started 'considering the switch' will know that I recently picked up my first crossbow. Grabbed an excalibur equinox on friday morning and after an hour of practice and hitting bullseye's from 10 to 50 yards I headed afield on a nice blue bird afternoon.
My neighbor has a farm in 81a that I just got permission to a couple months ago, my buddies Dad is with me and set up on the other side of the corn field in a tree stand. The property is ~45 acres of thick bush, and swamp, and about a 3rd of it is cut corn right now. I settle into some tall grass on the field edge at about 14:45. At 16:31 I spot 4 does skylined on the rolling terrain. Good sign, a few minutes later and at about 100 yards, two more deer with really nice racks. They seem content feeding where they are, so I figure I have nothing to lose by grunting a few times. I let a couple grunts out and watch as they sheepishly raise their heads but go back to feeding. They are to my left and I'm watching them closely I grunt a couple more times after a few minutes, and get the same reaction. Except this time I turn my head in front of me and there are two bucks standing right in front of me at about 30 yards. This is where things get interesting.
The waist wide fallen grass from me walking into where I was sitting is a perfect shooting lane and to my right (the direction they are heading) is another shooting lane where the tall grass ends, and there's a window to shoot before the dogwoods obstruct the view again. So while I was grunting at the deer 100 yards away these two strolled in without my noticing until they were right there in my shooting lane. One buck, had one side broken off and he was standing dead center of my shooting lane, the other buck I could only see his hind at first and when I got a better look, I was stunned. I've never seen anything like it. Really big, tall, symmetrical, bone white, as my buddies Dad put it as he watched through his bino's a once in a life time deer. I had to act fast, because he was moving through my second shooting window. There was a rock in the field I ranged earlier that was 37 yards. I grab my rangefinder to see where he is at and it's all fogged up! NO! I quickly wipe it up and put it back to my eye and still can't see a thing. Put the rangefinder down and can see that he's just a little bit behind that rock at 37 yards. So I settle the 40 yard chevron on the pumper and pull the trigger, only to watch the lumenok sail under his belly! He took two bounds, and I'm trying to convince myself that maybe it was a low pass through, and I'm thinking ok this is where you fall over, this is where you fall over... come on! I load another bolt, and for the next 10 minutes until legal shooting was over he played with my emotions. I would grunt and shake the grass, and he would start coming back but never got closer than probably 60 yards and facing me. At one point he was about to slip into the woods and I grunted pretty aggressively and before he turned back around he started raking at tree making a bunch of racket, that was really cool to see. Never experienced anything like that. Ultimately in the end he walked along the field edge to about the middle point of the corn field and started heading back from the direction they initially came. Then after I pack up and pop out of my little grass blind there's another buck standing on the field edge to my left.
All in all it was an amazing hunt; I've never seen that many deer in one sit, 4 does and 3-5 different bucks. Since I started hunting in 2016 I haven't seen that many bucks total! I've shot two and seen one other. Between bow and controlled I typically spend close to 100 hours a season afield and as I stated before the sightings are few and far between. As I was limping back to my truck, because I got a calf cramp loading the second bolt haha, my buddies dad starts laughing to himself, and I'm say "what?" he says "Man that was a lifetime deer, that's going to haunt you forever" lol. He watched the whole thing unfold. The next morning I woke up to a text from him that said "how were the nightmares" lol. I reluctantly went back saturday and with the snow and the wind, didn't see anything at all other than a set of fresh tracks that were 20 yards in front of the truck.
Given the parameters of the public ground I typically hunt shooting something 'nice' is not a likely scenario, and honestly hasn't even been a dream of mine. I enjoy cooking and sharing my harvest, and am happy with whatever I get. With that said, having one like this slip through my fingers still stings. A lot. haha.
