How'd You Get Your First Buck?

[Yuma Outdoorsman]

I am sure this topic has come up before but I tried searching it with the search feature and didn't see anything. 

 

I'll start though. I first started putting in for deer when I was 13 years old. That was in 1999. We drew unit 39. I had the opportunity to get a giant but buck fever got me like crazy. The following season, I got drawn for a different desert unit in the 40's and I was just looking for a forkie. I had the chance to shoot one and just flat missed. In hindsight, I am glad I missed but at the time I was so bummed. It is crazy what a 115lb fork n horn mule deer buck can make you feel when you are 14 years old. I was shaking like crazy. Another year and another missed chance. In 2001, we hunted the same unit where I had missed the fork n horn. My dad had tagged out on a buck on Thursday. He was walking a wash on fresh tracks and kicked a buck up. By the time he saw it, the buck was too far to shoot at. He gathered himself and decided he should just stay on the tracks. He quickly realized he had not spooked the buck too bad as the tracks indicated the buck was walking again and he was able to catch up to it 2 miles later and it hopped out and stopped at 75 yards and he dropped it. A nice 3x4 that I unfortunately do not have a photo of. Fast forward to Saturday morning, we cut a set of fresh buck tracks crossing a road about 1.5 miles from a waterhole. It was a single set of tracks and I told my dad to let me out and I think would follow them as best as I could. This is the day I learned how much fun tracking deer in soft desert terrain can be. I get on the tracks and I can remember walking for what seemed like an eternity and it was only 1 mile. The tracks were mostly in open terrain at the start and I was eye balling every single tree in the nearest wash just waiting for the buck to jump out. I got close to the mile 2 mark and the deer tracks started circling trees more and more. I remember following the tracks into greasewood thickets that were atleast 6ft tall and were too thick to even see through. Had the buck been bedded in them, he could've jumped up and I never would've had a chance. This whole time tracking this buck, I was headed west. After about 3 or 4 of those greasewood thickets and 3 miles on these tracks, the buck's tracks turned and start going northeast. These are desert flats I am walking where the nearest hill is probably 4 miles any direction at this point. I took about 4-5 steps following his tracks northwest and I looked up and through some scattered greasewoods 50 yards away is a lone ironwood with enough shade to hide a buck. I remember picking up my gun, which was a .243 and through the scope, I saw a giant rack slowly turn and look at me head on. The adrenaline rush was instant. I put my crosshairs right where I thought his chest was and I am pretty sure I closed my eyes but I pulled the trigger and all I saw was dust and legs kicking. I quickly jacked another shell in and fired another round. Then, boom, another round. I saw after the 3rd shot, I saw that he was still kicking so I moved up to 30 yards and put another round in him to finish him off. I walked up to the deer and remember radioing to my dad that I got him. He asked how big he was and I had no clue. I couldn't even count. I was shaking so much. I had no idea at the time but my little brother and dad were about 1.5 mile away on an open malapai mesa watching me. They had pulled off of a road they found and just got the binos out to watch me. My brother told me they were cracking up watching me walk in circles around the greasewood thickets trying to follow his tracks. They thought I had lost them. They made there way down that malapai and we were able to get some photos on and old disposable camera and get him gutted and loaded up into our old Bronco II. This was the start of what I can only describe as an obsession with desert mule deer. After getting this buck in 2001, I do not think I harvested another buck until 2009 or 2010. You can learn a lot about the desert hunting and not harvesting. I sure did. I now have a pretty good idea of what I am doing after MANY years of failing. We do not kill the trophy quality type bucks that most dream of but we have shot some dandy desert bucks. I have lots of stories of my most recent kills but I still have yet to harvest a buck bigger than my first. I have never had him scored but I would guess him to be around the 165-170 mark. He is a 4x5 with a 1.5" kicker on his left side and is 27 1/2 inches wide.

 

One more thing I want to add is that my dad, brother and I have killed all of our bucks with a .243. They are light to carry when walking and are deadly accurate out to 250 yards. I could not imagine using another rifle for the way we like to hunt. I know a lot of people ask what caliber is best for the kid's starting off and man a .243 is just hard to beat. 

 

The first 2 photos are from 2001. Gotta love them old cameras. The wall photo is the buck at my house. I had some friends surprise me with a shoulder mount and the taxidermist they new was new and he used a doe insert instead of a buck. It does make the rack look bigger though 😂

[Heat]

Started hunting back in the late 80s. Got my first deer in my 20s back in the early 2000s. Got a forkie. Been 10 years now since I killed a buck. That needs to change.

[Yuma Outdoorsman]

40 minutes ago, Heat said:

Started hunting back in the late 80s. Got my first deer in my 20s back in the early 2000s. Got a forkie. Been 10 years now since I killed a buck. That needs to change.

One heck of a fork n horn! Congrats! 

[Viper]

My first buck was an Indiana WT...3x2 (western count) when I was 16. Used a Bear Bearcat 40# recurve with Bear wood shaft arrow/Bear razor broadhead, from a tree stand, built with 2x4's.

[trphyhntr]

12 years old South Dakota. 200 yards with a lever action 30-30 

[PRDATR]

Mid 30's just north of Saguaro Lake off Cottonwood Creek. Drove in off of Four Peaks Rd down to where an old ranch used to be and slept in the bed of my truck. Got up in the morning and walked the wash toward the lake and about 200 yards in I came around a bend and there stood two spikes sparing. As I reached for my Contender they stopped and looked at me so I pulled up my 06 and shot one at about 75'.

They both ran over the bank of the wash and disappeared. I followed and found blood and tracked it a short way and it came back across the wash twice and about 50 yards down the wash it died. I had some rope in my pack so I dragged it over to a Palo Verde and was able to  get it somewhat upright enough to gut it. I managed to throw him up across my shoulders and hiked back to the truck and with my free hand dropped the tailgate on the old  72 2WD Chevy Truck and plopped him down in the bed. A hour later I was home and while the wife was at work I butchered it up on the kitchen table. This was maybe 1984 or 85. I had bought the rifle new at Walk-In Auto in Tempe for $269. It was a Winchester Featherweight and kicked like a mule and gave it to one of my brothers a few years later complete with Tasco scope. The Contender had a 10" octagon 44 barrel with a 1.5X Thompson Scope I bought from a friend for $100. It was an early production model with a mid 13K serial number.  Later I put a 14" 223 barrel on it and Dave Van Horn tightened up the frame with an aftermarket pin. You could cover the groups with a dime. H322 was the most accurate powder and at the time was $4.99 from Pistol Parlour in Mesa and marked as Mil Surplus. The contender was sold around 1989 or 90 to fund an XP-100.

[bigorange]

1988…14 yrs old in a tree stand on my uncle’s farm in TN. Basket 6-pointer (forkie here LoL) with a 20ga slug. 

[Bill@roofer]

In 1976 area 8 . I was 15 and sitting on Ike's tank near Williams Az. Last morning of a 13 day hunt. Sitting by myself and 6 muley bucks all came in at the same time. I shoot the biggest one at 35 yards with a 270 Winchester. I paid 95 dollar's for from the jewel box in Phoenix.. He went in the 160 range.. 

[Titanium700]

1985, Western NY

i was 16 at the time, first year I could hunt big game. 
was walking back to the truck for lunch from hunting all morning. 
as I walked dead center through a farmers cut hay field a small 4pt (eastern count) whitetail starting into the field with me. 
he was as surprised as I was, was hunting with a single shot shotgun. 
shot him at 65 yds, bunch of guys on the road near dads truck were all chatting with him when they heard the shot, they all came running to see what I shot and they grabbed my prize and drug him to the truck for me. 
that left a lasting impression on comradery amongst fellow hunters. 
I’ll never forget it. 
and I still have the dinky rack. Lol

[AZAV8ER]

1973 almost on the US/Mexico border south of Ruby AZ. My Dad and Uncle and my Uncles ranching partner had been hunting this area for decades past. 1972 at 50 years old my Dad shot his last buck, I caught up with him in time to help carry it back to camp. 1973 the next year and my second year hunting I was on a flat ridge top watching, mainly keeping an eye on a saddle I expected game to come through. Sure enough a couple does and a small buck came through the saddle and traversed the ridge under me, I could not get a good shot so I backed off the ridge to set an ambush at the point of the ridge. The little buck came around the point maybe 40 yards in front of me and the Sierra 150 grain Spitzer, out of a 1903 Springfield from before WWII topped with a Lyman scope made before I was born, smacked him on the shoulder and DRT.

 

[AzDiamondHeat]

1993

highway 260 heading up the rim

Ford Taurus SHO

[Tj_G91]

2001 and 36a for myself. It was a forky and I was instantly hooked on mule deer. The following year same tag I bagged my first 4 point and that’s when the obsession of trying to shoot the most mature buck I can find kicked in. Remember it just like it was yesterday. Great topic and awesome pics. Nothing beats the older photos in my eyes

[muley224]

Also Western NY outside of Rochester. { Bristol Mountains} Ithaca Model 37 pump. About a 6 in. spike. Good eating !

[muley224]

1 hour ago, muley224 said:

Also Western NY outside of Rochester. { Bristol Mountains} Ithaca Model 37 pump. About a 6 in. spike. Good eating !

1977

[Huntnfish]

Missed a 100" coues buck down by Patagonia when I was 10 yrs. old in 1974. I was shaking like a leaf. My dad didn't show it, but I know he was kind of bummed. Ended up killing a little forkie. Man those were the good old days.