NY Bowhunter

Well bowseason is over and the orange people have invaded the woods. What a tough year for me. I was my worst enemy this year. Can' t quite figure out who the person that possesed my body in the woods is. I was a bumbling fool out there. Between that and some usual should have would have could have stuff it was a skunk year for me.
buck #1: coming down a logging trail about 15 yards away< I stand up from my chair (box stand) and forget that my grunt is laying on my lap. It falls to the platform and down the tree not missing a single twig. bye bye buck.

buck #2: Same logging trail no grunt on my lap. He walks right under my stand and heads away quartering. I let him get out to 15 yards and go to draw. I get about 3/4 draw and something in my shoulder pops and I yelled. bye bye buck. (no clue what happened....I couldn' t move it that night, but the next day it was fine. I wacked 15 arrows at my 3d to make sure it was ok)

buck #3: I stalked a monster 12 pt. for a little over 3 hours. Get on him perfect to within 30 yards and closing. I wanted to move 2 more steps before I stood and took the shot. Crack the only twig I touched after 3 hours and about 1/2 mile of walking. bye bye buck.

buck #4 and #5: Busted in my ground blind I made in the middle of a hedge. (10 yards) One movement, one scented me.

buck #6: I set my buddy up in that box stand on the logging road because I thought it was cursed by the devil himself. He stuck a nice 8 pt.

buck #7: This is no joke! Had a nice 8 pt. at 20 yards and got to full draw but couldn' t take the shot due to a severe case of hiccups. My pin was bobbing up and down about 6 feet over him then to at the ground beneath him.

buck #8: Didn' t feel like carrying the lopper to my treestand again after noticing some limbs I should get rid of to make one more little shooting lane. Sure enough, he must have been up in my stand cause he stood right behind them for about 10 minutes before heading away and not giving me a shot. (dunce)

buck #9: Finally did it right!!!!! 20 yards perfect broadside wide open shot standing still. Got up and to full draw. Pin right on the money. Hung my bow back and sat and watched the little 3 pointer meander in front of me for an hour.

buck #10: Never saw him.

would you believe I really am a good hunter? lol. Oh well it was fun as always just being out. Not overly excited about being skunked, but live and learn. The joys of bowhunting.

NorthernMN

It is kind of hard to pull that out of your post!

Sometimes bad luck is the only luck we get. I am sure next year will be better. Hang in there.

badshotbob

Sorry, but that is funny. Really funny.

You know what NY? At least you were seeing deer. Two seasons ago, I hunted hard every weekend from Oct 1 through Jan 1 and saw two deer.

I feel for you brother. It' s a shame you didn' t get your deer and I' m sorry to hear that. Sounds to me like you' ve taken away a good attitude about it though. Next year, you will laugh even harder. Memories that can' t be replaced - all part of hunting.

hunter25

You' re killing me!!! Sounds like some things that have happened to me this year. I got one on opening day, but that was it. Everything from twigs to " nature calling" to men on 4 wheelers. Hilarious!!

I also feel that I' m a decent hunter...just not my year I guess. Have some days left to hunt here (IL) though.

Good luck next year!

Scar955

I agree with BadShot! At least you are seeing deer.

I don' t get a lot of time to hunt (new job, new wife, etc), so when I do get a day, I try to stay on stand all day. I went out a couple of Saturday' s ago. It was pretty cold...for me anyway. It never got above 35 degrees. I stayed on stand for about 4 hours before getting down. I was hunting on property my wife' s cousin had permission to hunt on.
Since he lives just down the road, I decided to go warm up at his place. When I get there, he asked me if I had walked around at all. When I told him no, he said I was probably going to be mad. He goes out to his garage and gets the head of one of the biggest bucks I' ve ever seen. It was a huge 9pt that the main beams were as big as my forearm (not that my forearm is that big, but you get the idea!)

He said he shot it the night before while coon hunting. I’m not sure what I was most upset about: it wasn’t legal to coon hunt yet; shooting a deer in the head in the middle of the night; or cutting the back straps out and leaving the rest of the body 30 yards from my stand.

Needless to say when I went back on stand I really didn’t think I would see another deer for months. Normally when I walk back to my stand during the early afternoon I will take two steps then look all around; take two more…you get the idea. Well, since I wasn’t expecting to see anything I was just moseying on up to my stand. You guessed it, walking directly by my stand on the trail I’m set up on was a nice doe. BUSTED and she was gone!!!!

Before everybody jumps on my case for my wife’s cousin being a law-breaking moron, please realize my hands are bit tied. Besides the fact they are family (even if by marriage), if I don’t hunt there, there are few choices where I live. I would rather hunt there than not at all.

Sorry for the length of the post!

TheBuckeyeOutdoorsman

NYBowhunter I can relate. I have seen a total 15 different bucks this year. Of those, I would say that 2 were definate shooters and 1 was borderline. I passed on some shots and when I finally get shots at the shooters I blew it. The first I missed due to a branch(so I shouldn' t have taken the shot to begin with) and the 2nd I hit in the shoulder blade and didn' t recover. This has been a tough year on me too. I' ll give it one or two more days and then I will pretty much be done bow hunting except maybe go to the state park and harvest a doe.

TBO

voz

I love this post!!! I have hunted a dozen days and haven' t sen a deer yet....so I' d trade places with you in a heart beat. I' ve had a few blunders this year also.....

I called in a trophy one morning....a trophy cow.....guess she wanted to see what was bleating from inside the ground blind....stuck her face right in the window and blew her nasty breath at me until I finally moved.....

I was sitting on a tripod stand one morning trying to rattle in a buck......same story for me, no buck......stood up to stretch my back......antlers sure make alot of noise bouncing off metal....

Dispite your misfortunes, I' m glad you had a good year anyway.....also glad I' m not the only one..

monsterbuckland

there' s still late archery week! maybe you can finally close the season!

JZarr

I' m in the same boat. I got ONE shot opportunity at a decent buck all year and I missed! The rest of them were just out of bow range and wouldn' t come any closer to save my life. I had 1 1/2 year old bucks and button bucks under and around my stand almost every time out, but the big boys were smart to me.

NC_archer

i hear you man....i went the past 3 years without evening having a shot on a deer until 3 weeks ago when i bagged a 6 with my bow. it felt great...but you are seeing way better deer than me. gotta be grateful for that at the very least. i' d say you had a succesful season in my opinion. now break out that rifle and put the wood to ' em!