Deer Hunting Newbie

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I, at the age of 49 and almost a half, finally went deer hunting.  I've wanted to for a long time, but circumstances, lack of knowledge, and lack of a place to hunt all conspired against me.  Having gotten lots of target practice and sighted in my cheap Tasco 2-9x40 scope on my inexpensive Savage Axis .308 at the range to which Billy Bob belongs, I was ready to try my skill against the giant forest rats that are the bane of my motorcycling existence.

A friend from my church took me hunting this past weekend at his 40-acre farm in Winston, MO.  We were in the tree stand by 5:30 a.m. Friday morning.  My friend Joe said that from his experience, the best circumstances for seeing deer are when the temperature is cold, the wind is calm or light, and the sky is overcast.  Well, the sky turned clear, the wind was blowing so hard (25-35 mph, with gusts to 45 mph), and the temperature eventually warmed up so much that we gave up after half a day, without ever seeing anything. 

We went back Saturday morning.  I took the tree stand, and the other Joe staked out a spot on the ground on the other end of the property.  A ridge runs through the middle of the property, so we couldn't see (or accidentally shoot) each other.  It started out a little warm and clear, but much calmer wind-wise, and I did see three deer that morning. They came from my left about 50 yards away, but my line of sight was blocked by some of the limbs from the tree that the stand was in, and they disappeared over the ridge that runs through the middle of the property before I could get a shot.  I spent the rest of the day in the stand, and the wind finally started to die down as the temperature plummeted that evening.  One certainly learns patience when hunting deer.

Just as it was getting almost too late, I saw what I thought was a deer on the ridge maybe 40 or 50 yards out, but without my glasses in the dim light, I couldn't really tell if it was a deer or not.  The LASIK I had on my right eye gives me great distance vision, but my left eye is uncorrected for reading.  That all works fine when there's plenty of light--the brain seems to know which eyeball is best for the circumstances--but once the lights get low, it all gets confused.  Normally, in those circumstances, I wear glasses that correct the left eye so all is equal.

I brought the rifle up to get a look through the scope from my good right eye, and the deer was gone.  I looked around without the scope, and saw it again, a pretty big doe, now standing only 30 or 40 feet away directly to my left, beside a cedar or juniper shrub.  I raised the rifle again, leaning around a big tree limb, got a good sight picture, and started to squeeze the trigger...but the safety was on.  I took the safety off, but it had moved again, and I couldn't see it anywhere! 

I suspected it had gone behind the bush, so I waiting with my eye on the scope and my finger on the trigger, and sure enough, it came about halfway out past the bush.  I adjusted my grip and it looked right up at me.  I was afraid it was going to bolt so I probably shot a bit prematurely.  I hit it a little too far forward, just ahead of the left front shoulder, and it went down.  I scrambled down the ladder and went over to the bush, and...no deer!  No blood, nothing!  The deer had been on the edge of a slope down into a draw, facing down slope, when I shot it, so I thought it might have fallen down into the draw.  I texted the other Joe and let him know, as I went searching.

He came over and we looked and looked.  By then it was dark, and getting damned cold, so he went and got his truck with a spotlight on it.  I was starting to believe I'd missed and what I thought was the deer falling, was really the deer scrambling down into the ravine, since we couldn't find any blood anywhere.  After despairing that I'd missed a shot of a stationary deer from only 30 feet away, my friend found it about 100 feet away on the other side of the draw, dead, by a fence.  I had hit it with a Hornady SST bullet just ahead of the left leg, and it went through and impacted against (and pretty much demolished) the right shoulder, without exiting. 

We field-dressed it and took it to my house, where I hung it from a tree in my back yard.  From the fuss and fury that my wife directed at me, you'd have thought it was her mother hanging back there!  The other Joe came back yesterday and took it to his house, where he does that kind of thing every year.  Tomorrow night, I'm going over there to help him process it and get some of the meat.  My wife doesn't even want it in the house!  She might have grown up on a farm, but she has become one of those people who think meat grows in little styrofoam packages at a grocery store.  That's okay, plenty of people I know want some venison, including Billy Bob, for whom I'm reserving some steaks.

So that was my first deer, on the second day of my first-ever deer hunting trip. I may go back Sunday.  I've already bought a nice set of knives for field-dressing a deer.  Now I want a meat grinder, sausage stuffer, jerky gun, and dehydrator.  And another deer--but I won't be bringing it home next time.