Archery Rollercoaster

[C.S.Davis]

Three years ago I became an archery hunter. Not by choice but because I was starting college and was home only during late December and early January. I was excited to give it a try but wasn’t excited to give up long range coues deer hunting. My first year I used my dad’s old Matthews that was older than I was and was pretty much maxed out at 50 yards and still lacked confidence at that distance. I decided that I needed nice binoculars since I already had a bow despite the circumstances. I was unsuccessful that year but I still learned a lot. Before the next season I purchased a Matthews No Cam and was much more confident with it. I had many opportunities at bucks but could not seal the deal including a situation where I sailed an arrow over a monster deer while hunting alone. That deer still gives me nightmares to this day.

This year I went into with more confidence than I ever had. The first day I went with my dad to our honey hole that has always produced big bucks, coues and muley, in the past. We turned up plenty of deer and although my standards were extremely low because I didn’t want tag soup again, I just wasn’t ready to end my hunt on the first day. The next day I was hunting with my friend Colton (RackTracker) in a different spot. We glassed up a big buck within three minutes of glassing and watched it until it crested over the ridge. We mad our way around the ridge and discovered this deer had picked out the perfect place to bed and my stalk attempt failed when I ended up crawling up the wrong finger to within 10 yards without knowing until the deer had busted.

We regrouped and found a group of four bucks almost immediately. I gave myself a minute and began my next stalk. When I got in range the deer knew that something was up but couldn’t exactly figure it out. I got to 44 yards of a small fork that had me pinned. I drew my bow and settled my pin on the shoulder of the buck that was slightly quartering to me and released the arrow. The arrow was good left and right but I found out the hard way that four yards makes a bigger difference than I had thought and hit low on the deer’s front leg but still high enough to get into the body cavity a bit.

We waited about 90 minutes and I began tracking while Colton glassed. I began getting excited because eventually the blood looked like it was coming out of both sides of the deer. About 150 yards later I realized I had bumped the deer and there was no more blood after the bed. Luckily Colton’s dad who had showed up glassed it and directed me into get another shot. This time I had a 50 yard shot and the arrow hit the shoulder and didn’t get much penetration but by the looks of the blood I knew I had gotten one of its lungs. After trailing till dark we decided to come back in the morning and get back on the trail with better light.

We resumed where we had left off and got to where we the deer looked to have bedded for the night but that’s where the blood trail ended. After looking around for about an hour Colton and I decided to hike up a hill to see if we couldn’t glass up my deer. Before getting to the hill we stumbled upon my deer but something was wrong. We weren’t the first ones to find it. This is what we found…

 

 

I was worried that the coyotes might find it but I didn’t think it would actually happen. Unfortunately I was wrong and I won’t get to enjoy a single ounce of meat of my first deer but I was still excited to tag my first archery deer and I managed to take this cool picture from one of my favorite glassing spots.

 

 

About a week later my dad decided that he wanted to get into the archery game. He told me that he wanted to wait till I got my first archery deer before he bought a bow. That day we went a bought my dad a bow and only had enough time to site it in at 20 yards before losing light.

The next day I went out with Colton in hopes of doubling up on some javelina while my dad sighted his bow in at home. Colton upheld his part of the plan and bagged a javelina while I proceeded to scare the rest of them away. While Colton was packing out his Javelina I stayed back to look for deer and kept in touch with my dad just in case he decided to come out. My dad told me he was sighted in out to 60 yards and wanted to come out. While he was making his way out I glassed up a spike and tried to talk him into going after it knowing he would pass. By then Colton was back and glassed up a small four point and we got my dad on it.

We planned a stalk and off my dad went on his first archery stalk since before I started hunting. He got to about 60 yards but the terrain wasn’t allowing him to see the deer and eventually the deer made him out before my dad could see the deer. It trotted of and met up with three other bucks. I was having a really tough time keeping track of my dad and the deer at the same time and eventually just told my dad to come back. Almost as soon as I told my dad to come back I realized that I could put my dad and the deer in the same point of view in my binoculars. After lining my dad up and realizing that this situation could actually work out, I set my dad up on an opening that the deer were going to walk through. The deer caught his movement and switched directions but made the mistake my dad needed. The first buck walked through an opening 40 yards away and stopped for my dad to get a shot. My dad put a perfect shot on the deer and 15 minutes later had his first archery deer as well only 24 hours after he had bought his new bow. Once again my dad showed me how it’s done. Due to school I didn’t get much time to hunt in January but we can’t wait till next archery season. I owe a big thank you to Colton for hunting with me and helping my dad and I get our deer. Here’s my dad’s buck.

 

 

[RackTracker]

Great write up Cole! Congrats again on you and your dads bucks! I can't wait till December!

[Flatlander]

Is this for real? Your dad bought a bow and the next day sighted it in and shot a deer? Ridiculous.

 

Congrats!

[C.S.Davis]

Great write up Cole! Congrats again on you and your dads bucks! I can't wait till December!

Thanks Colton! Only 320 more days!

[C.S.Davis]

Is this for real? Your dad bought a bow and the next day sighted it in and shot a deer? Ridiculous.

 

Congrats!

Sure is! Treated it like it was his day job

[Big Browns]

Great story! Congrats to both you and your dad!

[CouesPursuit]

Good job, guys. I was happy to see you tagged that buck. You have a long road of great hunting ahead of you it seems!

[olmos1010]

Awesome, congrats to both of you.

[Beaton]

Unbelievable!

[Zeke-BE]

Wow congrats

[goinhuntn]

Cool story, congrats to you & your dad.