Nate's Tagged out in Michigan

This episode on Michigan Wild is the story for Nate's second archery buck. Nate tagged out in Michigan after killing on November 8th. A crazy encounter and story goes along with the hunt. The buck ended up being Jake, the deer Nate nicked October 10th and was called into range. The story continues after the shot and Nate feels blessed to have gotten this deer. 

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Welcome to the Michigan wild podcast.

We're just here walking around. We're going to go set a tree stand. Don't worry. My dad's weird. He never shot a huge buck. I just shot a fricking big buck.

Oh, you got a. Go get that one, Henry. Right here. Boom! Look at the size of that deer. Welcome to another episode of[00:01:00]

Michigan Wild. November 14th. We got some good stuff to update on. It is the day before. Michigan's firearm opener tomorrow me and Henry are gonna head up tonight, up north, make the trip up there. He's got conferences tonight, so hopefully that goes well for him, which typically it does. He's a pretty good student, but we're gonna do that and then try to get him his first his first deer.

He's been... Pretty pumped about this. He's he shot a gun. 350 Legend. Got it all set up for him. It's an AR platform. I got the nice death grip, tripod thing for the gun to sit in and clamp in. But yeah, I took it to the range and I set it up for him, got on there, but he did everything else, aimed, did all that stuff, and shot a great group at 100 yards. Really proud of him. He's feeling good. He's been practicing when he was 22 and stuff like [00:02:00] that too, yeah, dude, having a gun in the AR platform in a 350 legend with a suppressor on it is, it's very nice for a kid, I couldn't shoot a gun until I was 14.

So by that time I was, I think I was dang near six foot tall. Knock on the door, 180 pounds, maybe, somewhere in there, 160 at least. And I was a big kid, so shooting like my dad's deer rifle was no big deal for me. By that time, I'd been shooting shotguns for quite a while and, loud noises and all that stuff didn't really bother me too much.

Growing up, I used a 22. Quite a bit, but there's a big difference between a 22 to a rifle with the kick and loud noise. Being a younger age, he's, he's seven, he'll be eight in March. Just trying to do my part as a parent to, I want him to enjoy this and have fun.

There's a fine line between doing everything for him and letting him do a lot. I took the approach that I wasn't going to force him into doing any of this, but he he would go. When he wanted to, he'd always go hunting with me, he loved doing that. But then once he started showing interest in wanting to shoot a deer for himself, I would, support him [00:03:00] fully with whatever he wanted to do.

And yeah, this year he was like, yep, I want to go opening day. He didn't want to do the youth season and he's never heard me talk bad about the youth season or, using a crossbow or anything like that. It was just something he's just he wanted to do with a gun. Probably because he knew that, like I shot my first deer with a gun.

My first buck with a gun, that kind of stuff. And, hearing stories from grandpa and all that stuff. So we're pretty pumped for that. There's quite a few deer that are moving through an area. It's there's always the question, Oh, if you're sitting with your kid or you got a big one comes out, are you going to, are you going to let them shoot it or not?

And for me, as a parent, I've been just, very transparent with them. And, he knows what kind of deer I like to shoot, what kind of deer we pass, what's good deer to, to shoot for him. Or, like maybe a a year and a half old deer or two and a half year old, or three and a half, we even have some three and a half year old bucks that are just like wide with no tines, like a deer, any of those kinds of deer, he's got free range.

If he wants to shoot a spike, he wants to shoot a two year old eight point. We don't care as kids, they can. Shoot, shoot their first year can be whatever,[00:04:00] and now the difference is, he's, he might shoot his first one at seven. So I'm not going to let him for 10 years, shoot whatever he wants.

I'm going to try to instill the same principles that we've used on some of these properties. And if he doesn't like that, then he can go get, more spots and find his own places to hunt. That's what I did. I didn't, not because I. I was told I had to, it was just like I knew what my dad and uncle were doing, only shooting, four points on a side, so I was like I want to kill some deer, so I just started, getting permission on their pieces, and then I shot a handful of them, and now, that's morphed into what it is today, so I'm just trying to keep them interested in doing those kind of things, and Hopefully, great shots made and all that.

But before we transition into the last a couple of weeks of hunting, I do want to have an announcement. I have a shop and it'll be in the show notes, but if you want to support the podcast, I don't have like apparel or anything like that yet. I don't have any partnerships really.

I'm just trying to do this for, six months and see what ends up shaking out and before I approach anyone with that, but I do have a shop and. [00:05:00] It's just, it's something that works really nice for me because it's simple and it can, I don't have to do the legwork for some things, the shop is michiganwild. hollercommerce. com So that's michiganwild. Dot holler h o l e r commerce c o m e r c e dot com All that is just a shop that I have then there's a few things I've highlighted But there's a lot of hunting stuff. There's there's all sorts of stuff. There's hunting fishing anything that you might want for going out here and doing the things you love to do outside.

I, there's saddles on there, there's climbing sticks, there's boots, there's arrow stuff, there's archery things, there's all kinds of, little accessories and doodads too. There's gear ties, there's. There's all those things. So I'm just encouraging anyone who's [00:06:00] listened to this.

If have that thing, you're like, man, I would, I'm, I need this for hunting season right now, or I needed this for next year. You have, or Christmas, Christmas time coming up for people. Just go on there and give it a shot and see if you can find something you like. I've been scrolling through quite a few things.

And there seems to be some like, I think they're very competitively priced what they have, there'll be sales throughout the year and stuff like that. But I just like it because it just gives an opportunity for you guys to go on to something and support, me in that way.

And I don't want to, obviously I'm not doing this to, make a living or anything like that, just to be a hobby, but there's a way I can monetize this to, maybe get a little better equipment or, help me continue doing it because it's fun and it's a hobby and, all that stuff will just go into either producing, better content or just, stuff in the hunting industry.

Like hunting, like my money will stick to that. That's what I want to do for this. If that means I could help other people out. Cool. That would be, ideal, but there's vortex optics on there. There's, knives and [00:07:00] there's, like I have, like there's Arctic shield boot insulators, like those things have been great.

And I was scrolling like, Oh my gosh, they even have those, but yeah, give it a shot. So we like there's, I don't, I haven't even touched the surface on what's on that that shop. So yeah, go give it a look. It's michiganwild. hollercommerce. com. Anything you guys do end up buying on there, helps support the show appreciate that.

Let's go into this story of me being bucked out in Michigan. Yes, I sealed my deal once again, and I am bucked out. And it's quite the story, November 3rd. We, I made the trip down to Illinois and that's, we're, we had our bow camp, I think there was going to be, Oh shoot.

It was going to be me, my dad, Mason, his dad, Sam drew his dad, Ray and his brother, Brent, we're all going to be in bow camp for the week, which we had our lease and then we also, there's just a lot of public land around the area. So we just been always talking how [00:08:00] this is just going to be a, we can have quite a few guys and.

None of us were opposed to, walking some of this public ground that was down there. Leading up to the week of our camp, I will definitely go into some more detail with us with the guys, but it was a pretty tough sledding because our lease, we had a bunch of trail cameras on there and we were still getting pictures of some of our target bucks, but one hadn't daylighted in.

Days, maybe even like pushing on weeks. They were doing the midnight 4 a. m. Kind of a thing 2 a. m. 11 30 at night so and that coupled with south winds and anyone who wanted, you know Anywhere in the Midwest Illinois, Kansas, Missouri, throughout that, you'll, exactly what I'm talking about.

South wind, hot weather, which I've hunted many ruts when it's been hot, but this was different because it was hot for a week straight, maybe eight days and above average with heat. 80 degree weather, all those kinds of things. So it just made it for really [00:09:00] tough, which to me, I wasn't like super like sad about that because.

That just made me feel like I could hunt somewhere in the morning and then I could scout and maybe find a better spot or find somewhere to hunt that night because it gave me that window in the middle of the day where it's 83 degrees. I don't feel like bucks would be running as much or doe, more so does won't be cruising around as much because they're, it's extremely hot.

So I took that approach and because our property that our lease property we had, Southwind is the worst wind to hunt that because of access and the deer travel. Not. Not terrible for the deer per se, but terrible for us to hunt it. We access from the South and there's no other option for access.

So that really made that hard. So we we just, we instantly just started bouncing around. I believe I hunted, so I got there Friday night. I had bought my tags Friday night and then. Through the early morning, whatever that may be, we, I woke up and I didn't plan on [00:10:00] hunting that morning, but I wanted to go scout.

Come to find out I was missing part of my tag. So I had to go with Sam and Brent and get, we had to get our, they had to get their tag. So we got those all squared away. Thankfully got my, I was good to go. So as soon as we got our tags, we just started driving around. And I happened to find this little piece that I really liked.

So we snuck in there, checked it out. Yep, drove and checked a couple other spots out and we had a relatively good game plan evening one. So evening one would be Saturday evening hunted, we all hunted I saw two does that was it? I'm just gonna breeze through my part of this because there is a pretty good story for someone else but I saw two does that evening hunted the next morning in the same general area and happened to do like a hanging out in the dark in a spot I've never been and was surrounded by three scrapes and there was rubs.

I could see the rubs walking in, felt really good about the set, didn't see anything. Ran back and we, like I said, we were doing this, it was hot. It was, I wasn't, had zero intentions of sitting all day anywhere. Run back to the place we were [00:11:00] staying, grab some lunch, and I was hit right back out there.

And that section that we were hunting, I was like, I'm... The way the wind was, I was like, I have the perfect opportunity to scout this entire thing and learn what I can. What I assumed was going on was not going on. So I I did quite the walk that day. And then that evening, I was at, I was perplexed.

Like I was like, man, there's nothing here. I was running low on time. So then I decided to, this is Sunday, so then I decided to... just, scout Sunday night. And I kept doing that and I ended up driving around scouting areas. And I thought that was a good idea just for fighting hunter pressure.

And to see if I can just find deer, because this is, these areas are, they're big areas lots of woods. There's like fields, but there's not it's not like egg, like lots of egg that I'm used to hunting. So there's a lot of, timber that connects, a lot of bottoms and terrain and stuff.

So I believe it was, yeah, Saturday, Sunday night, I happened to stumble upon a couple [00:12:00] of really nice bucks in some areas. So I had a good game plan for, sunday or Monday morning and my goal Monday morning was to just, drive into the spot. There was a good glassing spot. Cause last thing I want to do is bump a buck.

I saw a really nice buck, like a buck I would shoot a 10 point. He was, knock on the door. He was in the one thirties for sure. Just a really nice, well down there, their racks look giant because their bodies are a lot smaller than I'm used to here in Michigan, but I would say pretty confident in the one thirties.

So my game plan was the glass in the morning. I did that, uh, saw like a spike buck or something, a doe. I was like, okay, which was very concerning to me because I was assuming that the deer was holed up in a certain area and if he was still in that general area, I would see him that morning.

Come to find out, I did my, my my glass nothing. So then I ran. Back to another section and I scouted all morning and I'm doing these scouts with my bag on my back with ready to hunt, bow in hand, just in case I found something did that. Then I dove back into the [00:13:00] other area in the early.

Afternoon because I wanted to walk and find a good spot Walked around tore the whole place up and it was just like I think it was just a coincidence He was there either he had chased a doe through there got bumped because all the good stuff was, you know Quite a ways away on private was from my understanding through my scouting So then I'm scrambling and I was like, okay I'm gonna check this other piece out and I ended up I ended up setting up this is Monday afternoon on my, this would be my third sit, so I hunted Saturday.

I had Saturday after Saturday afternoon to hunt all day Sunday, all day Monday. And I only sat three times because, I was just pounding the ground, doing the bootle thing and people always talk about scouting. Had a really good sit. It was a nice little spot. I ended up having a really nice, I'm assuming two year old buck, maybe a little, really a small three and a half year old.

I, like I said, the body sizes are pretty hard down there to get because it's southern Indiana or Illinois. But he came, he worked perfect. Came down the ridge, [00:14:00] right in front of me, 20 yard shot. And at this point in time, I think I had walked, I was knocking on the door of over 10 miles of just scouting with, an 80 degree weather, sweating the entire time.

The one day, the one spot I stopped at in my truck to quick walk around, I hopped on my truck and I ended up getting a cramp from my butt cheek all the way down to my ankle. Whole leg just locked up and I wish someone was there to see it because I about fell over and, had to stretch it out, but just, yeah, just wasn't really prepared for that.

And it wasn't so much that I'm not used to, walking and doing those kinds of things. It was just the terrain and the dehydration was not drinking enough and sweating like that. But so no, it was when that deer came out, I first saw him. I grabbed my boat instantly. Cause I thought, Oh man, this might be, this might happen.

And then he worked by and he, I just could not make a big enough to justify shooting them. And not because I'm just big buck hunter or anything like that, but just like for me, I have like goals and aspirations. Like I want to shoot, a mature deer. Ideally that's four and a half years old and older, [00:15:00] if a really solid three and a half year old walks by, I'm not too good to shoot him.

But it was like, I just told myself when he was right there, broadside, I was like looking at him, he ended up being a seven point, probably like 90 in the nineties for inches. And I was like, which on a deer like that, his body size looked a lot bigger than that, but I've, as he got closer, I was like, He's not that big, but I was like, I have not walked enough to shoot this deer.

So I let him go by and then that, then the way the area was laid out, I was like, I felt like it was a better morning spot anyways, I took a break and left my stuff in the tree, which I very rarely do, and went right back in there Tuesday morning. So Tuesday morning I I was, hunting and I ended up seeing a doe, maybe two does, and I saw a little, like a super spike, spike with like brow tines so he's a four pointer.

So it was a great morning, but I was just, I'm looking at the maps and I had a couple other areas, that I was like, I need to check this spot out. And then I just kept looking at the extended [00:16:00] forecast. And for me. It was gonna be 80s until like Thursday when the cold front was coming through, but I had to be home.

Thursday, because I had to leave for a wedding on a state. I had to leave Friday for the wedding. So I'm like looking at extended forecast man, like I'm finding all these spots. I feel like could be good, but like we're limited because the deer aren't moving, they're not having a full day of movement.

So out there, there's a lot of space. So you have a disadvantage unless you just know it really well and get set up right on top of something, which that was really hard to do because it was so loud. The leaves, super dry, no rain. The notion of sneaking up on a deer in a bedding area or like a pocket of deer was something that just didn't really check any of the boxes for me to feel confident in.

And I have to feel confident if I'm going to set up in a tree. So that's why I did a lot of scouting. So fast forward, got through the, had some lunch, me and Brent hopped in the truck and we went and scouted another piece that looked really good. It was far off the road. And, we, I think that Tuesday stuff started clicking [00:17:00] like midday because I'd walked, so many different properties by this point in time, I was like thinking there'd be at the bottom or, trying to find sign, all these other things.

And that property stuff started clicking because we were able to walk. wE walked for, it was like just over a mile into a spot, so I would always like do loops, like I would, where I'd walk in, I would not walk back out the same. So if I had to walk in a mile and I'd walk out a mile, I did two miles of scouting just to try to like, and I was smart with wind direction and all that.

But on the way back out, I was like, okay, starting to make sense. Like I get what they're doing and we found some good sign. But still wasn't a property that I was like, yep, I need to grab my bone and go back in there. So I dropped him off and then it was like, okay, I'm running low on time.

Where I dropped him off was pretty close to our lease. I was like, you know what, I'm going to get there. I'm going to go hunt our lease and, pull our cams because, I didn't know if I was going to be back. So I want to pull my couple cameras while I was there. So my thought was go set up by one of the cams that died and had some good daylight pictures, three, four [00:18:00] weeks before of those.

And I was like, I'll just scout myself my way in long walk all uphill. Just sweating, just dying, but got to that spot. And it was just like a ghost town. There was no fresh sign anywhere. And I'm talking just tracks, I don't need to see giant fresh rubs or big scrapes. I was just looking for deer tracks and this was an area that I should be able to see deer tracks, nothing.

So I got that camera pole and I was like, okay, I'll just bail off on the side of this other ridge, catch a drainage coming through with a south wind and the other spot, I was anticipating the wind acting a little different than it did. And as I got up there, dropped milkweed, I was like, yep, this is no good.

And all day I was looking at the weather in Michigan and had a game plan that like if I don't find something good here, I'm like bailing and I'm going back home Wednesday, leave early and then hunt because we had I'll get into that a little bit, but there's a couple of things that were lying up that I was like really pumped about or like curious when I felt like it could be good.

So anyways, dumped over this other side of the ridge to overlook [00:19:00] a kind of this long bottom. That connected to some other terrain features and property. There was a couple of your typical like benches or, and there was a scrapes in there and stuff like that. And as soon as I reach over, I look and I can see dog running and the dog's running the whole cover.

Cause it's big woods, setting, you can see a good way through it. It's not like super thick, you got mature trees. When you get down into the woods. At ground level, you can see a pretty good ways. And I can just see this black dog just running all over.

And I was like, Oh my gosh, going right under the neighbors, going back under ours, going back and forth, like up and down, I was like, either he jumped some deer and he's running them or he's just like checking out the place. So I sneaked down to my trail camera and I'm like, okay, I grabbed my second cam that I had.

And I was like, okay, maybe I'll just set up somewhere here. Just maybe who knows, whatever the deer will still come through. Right at so the property, or at least we've, we know that it doesn't hold the deer. It's more of a travel area for them to cruise through. We don't have the cover like some of the neighboring [00:20:00] properties do.

So we're hunting that way where we're like we're anticipating deer to filter through. We have the ag and get to us. As soon as I'm like standing there putting the camera in my bag, the neighbors just start firing a chainsaw up and I was like, Oh my gosh, they're right where we've got deer heading to and coming from on the camera.

So I was like obviously deer are used to like human activities, like I'm not scared of that, but it's like one of those things where there's a lot of things going against us. Super warm not the greatest wind for them to move. Dog had just ran through that whole area. And now we got chainsaw and going.

So there was like, for me, like I said, I had to be super confident for me to go sit a tree, no matter where I am, because to me, it's I'd rather scout or, find something new that I feel confident in than just go sit a tree to sit a tree. So then I bailed. I was like, yeah, I'm out of here.

I'm going to I'm going to, I'm not hunting here tonight. So made the long trip back to the truck and By the time I got to the truck and did, I did a little scouting [00:21:00] on the way out, and actually found like a pretty nice, like fresh scrape, like the freshest scrape I probably found like the whole trip, which come to find out that was hit like the day before, but in the, in at night.

So I got back to the truck and was like, you know what? I sat in the truck for a little bit. I had to take my clothes off because I was just soaked through them. I probably had by this time, by the time I was back to the truck, I probably had 45 minutes of light left. So my evening was done, which I was like at this point in time, like I feel very good about the hunts, like tough conditions, places we've never been before, some really good intel, scouted.

And now I know, like I. I put a lot of stuff in the memory bank that if I ever hunt that kind of terrain, I know what to look for, like I've hunted, hilly stuff and those kinds of things, but not quite to this extent. So learned a lot was really good. Like I thought deer would be in the bottoms cause there's some really big bottoms, but.

They may, I think they more so crossed through them and then they were using like, the terrain a certain way. Cause it was like, it wasn't like super steep. Some of these [00:22:00] areas that we were hunting, it was more gradual. So they just learning how they like to go through cover, how they like to skirt like cedar thickets how they like to skirt through CRP tall grass, found that kind of stuff pines, how they like to use a pine feature.

Like these pines were, like a wasteland. But the deer still like traverse through them. So there's a lot of those things that I learned, but so as I sat in my truck, I was just like really dissecting the next couple of days in Michigan. It was, November 7th was Tuesday, and on November 8th in Michigan the warm front was not really happening.

It was like 40s, maybe touching 50 during the day, but it was like cool mornings, and then, but we had rain coming, and was there for Wednesday with an east wind. Now, east wind, for me in the past is... Can be a really good wind for me to see a really big deer. I haven't killed very many, deer on an east wind, but I've seen some really good bucks on east wind.

And it's one of those wins where you either see [00:23:00] him or you don't see nothing. Lucky for me, I have these food plots that I planted and I have a second food plot and we've talked about these in the past, I had missed Mr. Krabs in the food plot. And then five days later, I nicked Jake in the same food plot.

And then I have seen. I know some nice bucks in the other food plot, but like really hard to hunt because the way the corn is this year and deer had multiple, it used to be like one source of direction they would go into this plot, but because corn was up, they were using the corn a little differently and looping on their way.

So I was I was limited and the kind of was like, I'm just going to hunt that with a gun. Cause I can, get the range, but then with the East wind that gave me the opportunity to be able to bow hunt that. So I like saw that and I was like, dude, I think I'm making the call.

I'm pulling out early. I'm gonna wake up super early Wednesday morning and I'm gonna just jet there. And I think I had one trail cam picture in the middle of the night of Jake. Knowing he was still alive, I've had, I've probably had five or six pictures of him since I hit him.

And you could see a little tuff on his back where I grazed him. [00:24:00] Or I thought I grazed him. And cause I, I didn't know, I didn't obviously didn't know exactly what I did, but like you could see he was hit really high and it did not look bad at all. So I woke up at 3am Wednesday morning, got the truck loaded up and off I went.

And I made the trip back home. So I got home and got home, took care of a couple things, got ready and it was raining, spinning, those East wind days, the weather man's always wrong. It says, Oh, it's not going to rain. Oh, it's going to clear out. It clears out then just keeps coming back and just hangs out.

So I'm looking at the radar and I was like, okay, I think I have a window. I think it's going to be done raining by the time I'm set up in my tree. And then I should have a really good set. But I forgot to look at the wind speed. So there's a couple of things going on. Like I was pumped and I was excited, but I know load the truck up, go and, do this long, out of the way, walk in and get into a tree that I had scouted and figured that would be a really good tree to go in.

So [00:25:00] they're really big trees, so it's hard. So I've made one crucial mistake. I didn't swap my saddle platform out from the tree stand. Cause I have that lightweight beast gear tree stand and I had told myself that I need to make sure I use a tree stand in this tree because the way it was leaning and the way the trees were, that like a stand is just a better option than opposed to the saddle where the limbs were and stuff like that.

So halfway up the tree, I am, quickly realizing that this is going to be very difficult with a saddle, like for me to be hidden and for me to be able to, pull off a really good shot. Anyways, I committed to it, I got set up, and as I'm setting up, dude, I am getting pounded by driving rain.

It's not it's not pouring, but it's really close to pouring, and it's windy, and I'm just getting smoked. I got set up, and... Was in the tree and I had my extra layers on and I was saturated and I was like, man, this is not good. It's blowing way harder than I thought. So then that [00:26:00] kind of ruled out one area that I felt like the deer would skirt through because I was like, they ain't going to come up that edge because the wind is going to be just pounding them.

They're probably going to be another 80 to 100 yards over, stay in the thick stuff a little easier and then stage up before they commit. at This point in time, like I was. I was hunting bucks, like it's the, it's November 8th, like this, there's a couple of deer in the area that would shoot, but I was more doing it like as a hunt to see deer and see if I can pull this spot off in the east wind, because that's what I always thought I was always like, man, in early October, if I get an east wind, like one of those fronts, I'm hunting that, that tree.

So I get set up, it's 3 o'clock, and I've been just, I think I was set up by 2. 30, 2. 20, probably somewhere in there, and I was just getting pelted, and I told myself, I was like, man, if I like, pull, it was raining so hard, like you're trying to pull your phone up and look, and I was like, dude, it doesn't show much on the radar, but it just keeps forming on me.

So I was like, man, if it does one of those little those rains, those dry rains one more time, I need to [00:27:00] bail because I'm not, I ain't going to make this for three hours. Like I was, I didn't have my rain jacket. I had enough gear, but I was so wet from getting set up and cause you know, get sweaty setting up and I wasn't wearing my rain stuff when I was set up.

But so my base layers, everything were just soaked. I was like, if it does again, I'm going to get down. I'm just going to go swing back over and I'm going to hunt my gum blind, which I've, it's a gum blind slash bow spot. Early season, deer do traverse, near it. But it's a few hundred yards away from my food plots.

So of course at 10 minutes later, boom, smoked by rain. I'm like, yep, I'm bailing. So it's three o'clock when I decided I'm bailing. So get everything down. Hook my bow up to my bow rope and my like, hands are like numb. That's they were cold. I'm pretty tough. Like I work outside and stuff, but they're cold.

So I hooked my bow up to my bow rope up and I have a twist tie on the gear tie that I twisted on through and I was like, yep, I'm good. And I was hurrying because like when I committed to it, I was like, I [00:28:00] got to get out of this tree. It's a hard tree to get into. It's going to take me a little bit.

So I turn and start lowering my bow down. One, I usually do it one handed. And let it slide through my hands. It slides and then like a piece of the like bow rope, had looped and caught on my pinky. So it's goes from sliding to instant stop. Instantly stopped. And then my bow pops off and boom smokes.

One of my climate sticks and then smokes a tree ranch and then sitting upright, like it's on a bow stand. And I was like, Oh, and I saw it happen. And I saw my back bar smoke, the climbing stick. And then I saw my riser where I hold the bow, hit the tree branch. And it felt, I was like, man, that felt good.

If you were to have your bow fall, that was like, perfect. So I was like any big dummy, you should have double check that gear tie because like I did it without looking because you know as you're getting ready You're like making sure nothing's coming in like putting your bow downs like in the morning, huh?

If it's daylight and you're getting you know, taking your boat setting your bow down on the ground That's like the most like anxiety I get like [00:29:00] I'm now completely out of the game Like if something comes in so I did it without looking so mental No, I'll never do that again and then having a hook on my hand, you know I think that was like just the double negative on that deal, but So bow falls down.

I was like, oh man, but still commit to the cause. I get everything packed up and I look at my bow And I'm like, yep, I can see my back bar was bent way up. You know on the pivot So I put that back down and then my you can see in the riser where my hand goes where it hit the branch So I like look everything over everything looks great.

The cam wasn't even buried in the ground or nothing It was like Hovering there like in the branch some of the branches of the brush So turn my head close my eyes pull a bow back nothing happens. I'm like sweet. We're good to go. We're still in the game So make the trip back to the back towards my truck into the gun blind and do the big loop You know making sure I wasn't walking anywhere that deer could cross, I that was my thing.

So get all set up, crank the heater, start drying all my stuff out and just sit for the night. [00:30:00] And I think I was back hunting in the blind by 3 30. So that whole thing, I didn't, I felt really good. I think it was dark at six or real close to six. So I still had, two hours plus of, good hunting left.

And I figured it would get dark a little sooner because it was so overcast and raining. But, I get set up in the blind, I start pulling my radar up okay, I have about, 45 minutes to 50 minutes of this BS rain. And then, it should clear up for a few hours. And there was, like, a big system coming from the north, uh, and heading our way.

I was like, you know what, I might get some really good movement from that 445 to 545 that hour. Shirt off, sitting there, and I see the first group of does. Or actually, yeah, I saw, yeah, three or four does they pop out and of course they go to the exact way I figured, I figured when I was sitting there with how the wind was being so windy that like I was going to catch deer, weren't going to work to the food plot I was sitting on until like last light.

And the last thing I want to do is be stuck in a tree when it's raining and all that stuff and being miserable [00:31:00] and I didn't really want to bust deer out of there. 430 I think it was, maybe 435, 440, something like that, first group of does pop out and they go right to my other food plot that I've been, I had those other opportunities and are just mowing down on it.

So I'm like, sweet, this is perfect. I looked at the time, I was like, yep, 435, just a good thing to know. anD then. Then another doe pops out, and you can tell she was just not having it. She didn't like something. She kept looking behind her, and all of a sudden, the other does that were in the food pot, they tails up, they run off.

I'm like, okay, something's pestering her. Probably a year and a half old buck. Typically, when I see does act like that, there's a young buck, messing with them. Yep, sure enough, out pops this beautiful two and a half year old eight point. And it's possible that we have his shed from last year, Henry found, I think it's the shed, shed Henry found, but not sure, but he pops out and he starts doing buck things.

He's, he starts trotting over to the does that were the food plot and checked them out. And then they ran off and then the other dog came out and he's like hanging out with her. [00:32:00] And I look and out pops out Jake, and Jake's the buck I hit. Beautiful, four and a half year old buck.

No, from trail cam history. Had him last year. Didn't hunt him last year because I knew he was three and a half and didn't want to be tempted with it. Just a beautiful, cool deer with some, non typical stuff going on. Trashy, something I've never really had before. And out he steps. And he's 280, 300 yards away, something like that.

Boom. And I was like, no way there he is. And he looks impressive. I was like, this is the first time I've seen like a really good look at him, like in the wide open, all our times, like the time I shot at him, low light, tall grass. He was in the time he came out with Mr. Krabs. When I missed him, he was the same thing.

Stayed in the brush, tall grass, never really got a great look. And I was like, Ooh, he's impressive. And he instantly. Starts trotting across that field towards that other two year old eight point and he bristles up and I was like, oh, he's aggressive So he runs that eight point off and then checks those [00:33:00] does and he's in the food plot lip curling You know like on you know the videos is just like the coolest thing ever and I'm sitting back like man, he's fired up and it's 4.

45, like I got lots of time and I think by the time, I first thought it was probably 4. 45, by the time I made it, the food plot ran the buck off, we're close to 5 o'clock. The A point runs off, and he's going back, and he's looping through the field, like he was like getting out of there, like he was going to go to the next section.

As he got about 80 yards closer, so he was probably around that 200 yard mark, I ripped a doe bleat and then I ripped a few grunts just because it was windy. Like just because I wanted to see how he would act and how, Jake would act and Jake's the deer that Henry named. If you listen to some of the Rob's episodes, something that me and Henry doing, he named a deer last year Jeff.

So I was like, what should we name this deer this year? He's Jake, dad, that looks like a Jake. And I was like, all right, perfect. We're doing it. So Jake's in the food plot, lip curling, nudging does. And other deer starting to trickle out of the corn and like another year and a half old buck and another doe or [00:34:00] two.

But as this eight points make his way, I rip a doe bleat and a couple of little grunts. He comes running and he gets, he runs towards me and about 50 yards and cuts into the woods. I noticed that Jake was watching him try and was very intrigued with what was going on. As soon as that two year old 8 point hit the woods, I ripped huge grunt, like the loudest grunt I've ever done.

Just, brrraaah, and then brrraaah, and he came, he turned his head and looked at me and he came trotting. I've never seen a mature deer do this and he was pissed. So I'm like, Oh my gosh, I'm going to shoot this deer. So boat grabbed the bow, get ready. I'm standing up my blind. I have, the vertical windows narrow, but tall.

I'd put in there and. I'm ready and I'm ranging these spots. There's a tree. There's a deadfall tree. That's in the woods That's 25 yard shot and my assumption was he was gonna be He was gonna hang up before that and cut in and I was gonna have a 30 yard shot So i'm all prepped myself for this.

As he's [00:35:00] trotting he's getting he's like coming like At a good clip. I'm like, dude he's clear in that he's going to be right here in front of me. And I literally have 15 yards from like my blind to the tree that's down and this little gap between a fence or on the woods that connects these two fields.

I'm like he's going to come right there. So my, I'm instantly sight to 20 yards, stand back. I pull my bow back and he's 25 yards and he's coming and quartering to he turns and starts making that turn. And he feels first of all, when he's coming at me, he's, his frame's great, like his tines tip in, he's heavy, he's got inline points on his G3s, like he is just everything you could want just like the whole time alright, calm yourself down, you're good, you got this, you're gonna kill this deer, talking myself through it, cause I'm kinda like the guy that I usually do pretty good if I have time, I can talk myself mentally into it I also can, snapshot and, make things happen, but I really like giving myself the opportunity to make it happen.

So he's coming and he turns he clears that [00:36:00] deadfall and starts working in front of me And he's quartering two, but as soon as he started like getting broadside I was like I got to take this because he's moving so fast if he gets any closer to make a noise He's gonna bolt so as he's trying I just And he just stops straight legs and looks over at me and as soon as he's doing that, I'm already bubbles leveled anchor hit and I'm like, there's his leg.

I'm tucking it right up against his leg and I, aim low and I let it go instantly hit him. I'm like, I heard, I said, a heart shot him and my arrow didn't go through him, but I felt like I got good penetration and he took off and kicked my arrow out right away. And I watched him run into the hardwoods.

And he's not doing good, got the he's only really using three legs and he's going I'm like He's gonna tip over right there and I was just losing it that quickly changed because instead of tipping over he just stops and I'm like, [00:37:00] you know Then as soon as he stops like okay, he's gonna tip over he's gonna tip over and then you know a minute turns into two two turns into five and then we're approaching like that ten minutes of him staying there and I have like I have big doubts.

I'm glass on him. He's 90 yards away probably. And I'm like, Okay, I don't, I'm seeing his off side, I think I see blood, but I'm not sure, but I don't see anything going out, and I can see his mouth is open, and he's hunched up like he got shot in the guts, and he's flicking his tail, and I'm like, what is going on, and he stood there so long, I was like, starting to pack my stuff up, because I was like, I can sneak up to him and shoot him again, because it's been raining, leaves are wet, and all these doubts are going through my mind I'm using a lighter arrow this year used to usually, I'm a 630 grain arrow.

I'm shooting a 500 plus, like little over 500 grain arrow now. I have all these doubts going through my head and I'm like, what is going on? And, we don't seem to tip over that happens. I'm like, did I hit his shoulder? Did I hit his, I don't know. I knew it wasn't high shoulder. I knew it was low.

And I figured I was, if you [00:38:00] got his leg bone coming down. And, left is towards his chest, his front of his body and right is towards his butt. I thought I was right of that bone where I hit him. So I was like, man, I don't think I hit that bone. I got decent penetration. But then when he's just standing there, you're like, what?

And I was like, I heart shot him. How was he standing there? He lays down. So after 15 minutes, he lays down. So not even 15, I bet 10 minutes. So then I progressed to get out of the blind and I start sneaking up on him. And I, line some trees up. He's laying down, facing directly away from me, which was good.

And I just start sneaking. I get to 45 yards laying straight away, but I can see him. Then. I'm like glassing him, trying to see what's going on, and he keeps laying his head down on the ground. Now, every time he did that, I would take a step forward, until he picked his head back up. I got within 30, like 38 probably yards from him, 36, something like that.

And, I can see his head really good, but he's facing directly away, hunched up in a ball. So it's I have a little bit of his back, back of his head, and his rack. [00:39:00] And I'm starting to like you're doubting everything. And I'm like, okay, he lays his head down one more time.

I'm like, I'm going to get to that tree. I got to go an angle. If I can get behind that tree or alongside it, I'll have a, quarter and away shot. He's like laying body down. So backbone, exposed to me and his like chest in front is like away from me. So it's like the worst.

Circumstance to try to get an arrow in there, but also good for sneaking up on him So I was at 36 felt I was like, man I feel really good about getting 20 25 for making a good second shot. As I'm like Trans, you know go sneaking through to that point He gets up on his own and now wind is blowing from him to me and he's facing away from me and it is windy and I'm making like no noise.

So like I felt really confident about this. So I'm in between trees and he stands up on his own, facing away from me and then looks back because I was like going the way I was sneaking up on him the way he ran. So like I, it would have been [00:40:00] like I was blood trailing him. So he just looks back and I'm just frozen and I was like, okay.

And he's like panting with his mouth open, but I see no blood coming out of his mouth. So I'm like this whole time, like I was glassing that and I never saw any blood. I'm like, man, if I hit him in the lungs and stuff, like he should have blood come out of his mouth. All these things are just flying through my head.

So I am staying there frozen. He stands up, he's facing directly away from me, but looking at my ear, like looking right at me. And I'm like, it's dark timber, not dark timber. Sorry. But it's big trees, a lot of them. So obviously it's darker in the woods and outside. So I was not, I wasn't probably skyline because there's trees everywhere.

And, but I was just in between trees. So I just, in my head, I'd never tell myself don't move. He has no idea you're there. So after about a minute, he starts trying and, when he got up, I never tell myself his legs were weak, his back legs were shaking. So I'm like. So I'm still [00:41:00] feeling very optimistic this deer is going to die, you hear crazy stories, how deer recover and never find them.

He starts trotting away, like from right to left, which was, would have been a really severe cording away angle. So I take the opportunity to pull my bow back. And I had my pin, I had my slider already set at 35 yards. So as he's trotting, that cording away. I, he's going, he opens up just a little bit and I'm like, okay, I got an opportunity right there.

So I think I made like a little noise or something. I think I squeaked again and he stopped and looked back at me and I let go. And all he did was like duck and, but turn to his right. I had a pretty narrow window already and I might've been, a little lead and I'm just a little bit.

Cause last thing I want to do is hit his back leg and just not do anything. So he ducked and turned and went and snorted and my arrow goes right alongside him and smokes a tree. So it makes this like loud noise. So he's like running and I here I am thinking this deer's like super wounded.

He's been [00:42:00] laying down for, at this point in time, probably a half hour. Maybe 40 minutes. Actually, it was probably 45 minutes from the time I shot him to the time I got the second shot off was 45 minutes. Because I'd call my dad as I got up after I so I took off running after him Like towards where I shot him because there was like a train There's a little mini train feature with a little different elevation So like I can't see deer once they cross that so I like just run after him and you would think this deer That's wounded pretty good.

Like I should be able to semi like Catch up and see, but no, I got to where I missed them and hit that tree with my second arrow. And I just stood on top of this little rise and was just like, eagle eye, just looking glass and nothing don't see a deer anywhere. So I'm instantly just dude, this deer blew at me.

He took off running. I couldn't hear how he was running because I was running, but I don't see him anywhere. Call my dad. And I'm like, dude, I just got a second shot at Jake. I hit him and it was like a 14 yard shot. [00:43:00] And talking to him I gotta find my arrow. Like my, I just got to find this arrow because if I got, two inches of penetration, we're in deep trouble.

If I got nothing, if the thing is, just got to see after I grabbed my arrow out of the tree I hit, it was second arrow. I look at his bed and there is good blood. Is not as blubberly. It is like what you want to see like blood and where he got up and start walking good blood Leading up to his bed great blood.

So I'm like what in the world is going on and Find my arrow came out after two bounds and I have a solid blood for nine inches No broadhead, but solid blood for nine inches. So I'm like, okay a deer isn't much wider than nine inches. We're not shooting these, 350 pound deer from Canada or anything like that.

So I'm like, okay, if I put the arrow right where I know I need to put it, like I'm in the goods, like for him to act that way. The, see the blood I saw, I did not gut shoot him. Like I was just not thinking I got shot on, but I was just really concerned with it. So I'll get back to, where my arrow is talking to my dad, [00:44:00] obviously called Tony with find it Fred.

And I'm like, dude, like we're like, he's dude, no way. This is awesome. Yeah, it's awesome. But this is what happened. He's man, that is so strange. He's let me reach out to my network. Which is so great. Cause these guys all communicate, they're all in it for us as hunters. So I'm like, I got a couple of things going against me.

This deer ran through. The woods everything is soaked. So like the blood that I did find, you could tell, like it was runny blood because it was, the leaves have are holding water and we have this huge rain system coming our way. So me and my dad even talked about this too. I was like, okay, by the time I, wait for you to get here, get, cause I want some help, or wait for Tony to get here with the dog, whatever it may be like, we're not going to be able to get back out here and find him by the time.

The rain starts pouring. So then it was like, okay, Tony, do we need to push this deer? What do we need to do? You have your dog, which obviously can track way better than we can. Do we, do we run this deer down possibly? Do we get another shot in them? If need be, [00:45:00] because he's, certified.

So if you have to dispatch a deer you can do that with him legally. But then the big concern was like, this is a bigger deer. Like last thing I need is Fred to go. Up on this, this four and a half year old buck that's got, tines everywhere, big beans, good mass that's still plenty alive and catch a tine, that dog's, his, that's his asset and that's, part of his thing.

Why put him in a bad position? So we are discussing all these things. My wife comes home, is on her way home from work and I call her up because she's going right through that storm and it is raining so hard I can't even hardly hear her on the phone so I'm like, okay if we try to track this deer without a dog, like we are not going to get very far before the rain hits us and then we're, it's washing this blood away.

We make the decision to just wait till the morning. Because it was like, okay, the area these deer are in, they feel very comfortable because there's low pressure, the way it's set up. Like I have not hunted it a lot. The good bedding and all that kind of stuff is in an only one area, pretty much [00:46:00] there's not much, that doesn't make sense for them to go anywhere else.

So talk to Tony, looked at the wind conditions for the next day. I said, Hey, we're having this wind. We can X off a lot of these spots really quick with your dog. Sleepless night ensues for me, and I just keep going back and forth I'm like, man, that, that arrow was great it went right where I wanted, should be a heart shot I've never seen a deer do that the blood I saw is like blood that I usually, find dead deer at the end of, but just the resilience, we get there in the morning, and, obviously, it poured rain Wednesday night, so Thursday morning, we get there, and, I had stuck my, I had stuck an arrow, the arrow I hit him with was where I shot him.

And then the arrow that I missed that hit the tree, that was in the bed. So I stuck both those there so we had good landmarks. And I was surprised at how much blood was gone in that bed because there was a lot of blood. You could find a little bit still, but like a lot, that rain washed a lot of it away.

So we have a game plan. We're like, okay, like we'll let Fred do his thing, [00:47:00] but we're going to work this drainage to this spot and then we can cross off that. And then. We'll cross off this, and then on the way back, we'll go this other way. Just use the wind to the dog's advantage. Fred hits, he does his thing.

He hits the bed, impact sight goes right to the bed. And I was like, okay, he, but then I didn't know how much he could, he was tracking me because that's exactly the way I had walked when I, snuck up on the deer. Cause sometimes dogs can they can tell when you've been there or whatever.

So I was like, yep, that's exactly where I walked and you could see. Where he went to the bed perfect, and then he left the bed and was like on the angle that I assumed the deer ran. And we're like, okay, yep, he did go that way. Back where he came from. So Fred's doing his thing, but then you can tell he was like doing it, but he wasn't like locked in completely.

He was at first, and then he got it. And I was like, okay, this makes sense. There's standing water, there's this kind of stuff. Let's work this edge. So that dog, man, he just, he's he handles so well with Tony and we just start going [00:48:00] and we jumped a lot of deer in the next like hour, but with Fred, he would, he could, he was downwind of the deer.

So like he, when he would smell a deer, he would stop and pick his head up and look. So then me and Tony would walk up to where he was and then sure enough, 50, 60 yards away, we'd see deer jump. And we, could get good visual on what they were, does little buck, whatever it may be live deer, Fred doesn't even care about those live deer.

He's not the deer we're after. So we keep checking off these areas. And it was just really nice because knowing that we were seeing the deer that were jumping that you could obviously tell you could smell and they were, 50 to 75 to 80 yards away. So we're like, okay, he's covering a lot of this.

So we get to the spot that I figured the mature deer like to hang out in bed and do their thing. And there's this little rise and I could tell Fred could smell deer. So I'm like, okay, I'm going to just check this rise out, stand top and get a good look. So Fred, is doing his thing with his heads up and he's smelling and he's he's almost like [00:49:00] pointing out like, Hey dudes, there's deer over there.

But it's not a dead deer. So I get to the rise and I look and I'm just standing there and all of a sudden deer just start erupting. And I see a deer get up big rack and I was like, Oh my gosh, is that him? And I'm looking like, Nope, it's not him. I think it's Mr. Krabs and he's got an arrow hanging out of his shoulder.

And I'm like, Oh my gosh. And like this arrow is it's a, it's not a bull. It's an arrow. And. It's all hanging out of him like when he's running it is going up and down like Whipping up and down like I don't know how the arrow stayed in him when he was running And he took off like no limp nothing a streak of lightning So I was like, alright good boy Fred good boy, live deer live Tony's got like a thing for him that you know, leave him leave him So then Fred just okay, then he goes back to Tony and then I walk over the bed where that deer was laying No blood nothing.

So I'm like, okay. That deer is probably fine. I don't know What neighbor who shot that but just goes to prove, you know I'm hunting an area that a lot of people are hunting around [00:50:00] so We jumped a few more deer, do all that. And we start X and stuff off. And then we get to the point where it's okay, we've covered this.

We've covered that. I feel really good about those areas. There's one spot here we haven't hit yet, but the wind's doing this and the sun was just starting to pop. And I was like, okay, Tony, like we have, we can do two things here from he's cause he's, he, as the hunter, he's asking you like, where do you like to be, that kind of thing just to help.

But also he's the handler. So I defer to what he thinks. Hey, from your experience, what do you think? He's man, I really to give Fred an opportunity to start that track again, he said, it's been a little bit, we've crossed a lot of these spots off, like maybe let's just give them a chance to see what happens.

And I was like, dude, I'm all for it because no matter which way he goes from that bed, we can either, take option a or option B and do the same thing we've been doing. Tony's yep. He's I got nowhere to be. I had nowhere to be. He's we'll spend all day looking. Cause like he, Tony was pretty confident the deer was dead.

And so was I think back in my back of my brain, I was like, we [00:51:00] haven't found anything, but I don't know how the deer could still be alive and just a matter of finding him and if he didn't get pushed by anything that night. Cause that was what we're really afraid of pushing them and him going just a country mile.

So we go back to the, shot site. We looped through, we didn't walk back through anything. We walked already. We took a big loop out in the field. Which I think Tony did that just to give Fred a good run at it and not be any disturbance, from us walking around. It brings it back to impact site.

Fred, boom, right to the bed. Hits the bed and just starts going. And he's going the same way he did before, but then all of a sudden he like... Gets it figured out you could tell like he was on this deer and I mean it rained so much I was like not close to Tony. I didn't want to jinx it But I was like, how is he how can he possibly still track this deer like in my head?

I'm like it doesn't make any sense But he is on a line and he starts diagonal and across this woods and he got to the point where He was going the first time but [00:52:00] then we And in my defense, I was like, Tony, I typically they run this way and Tony's okay, let's look and I'm like looking for blood looking for where they could have crossed and I don't see anything.

So I think Fred was just Hey I'll go this way because he, that's one of those things where you got to trust your dog or give it some more time. And I think I messed it up. This probably would have saved us a few hours if I would have just stood there and not done anything.

So learn for anyone who, you know. Has the same situation that I go through typically, sometimes maybe just give the tracker or the dog, give them some time and just don't just let them just do their thing for a little bit opposed to saying, Hey, this is what I think we should do or whatever.

Maybe you could be right, but I think sometimes that dog, man, they just, they have an inability to track with stuff in a way that we cannot just with their smell. No blood, nothing. Anyways, I'm like hanging back. And I'm like, paralleling the dog, but like off to the side aways. And this dog like, breezes through this wet spot, comes out the other side and is on a line.

And Tony's like following back a [00:53:00] ways, he's looking for blood or anything. And I'm like, okay, this is one of the area, he's heading towards like my plan C. There's a possibility when the deer went that way and he's going. And Tony just lets out this yell, there he is.

And I was probably like 80 yards away and dude, I, the excitement I had in that moment was pretty cool. Being able to do that with your buddy and see that, but sure enough, there was my buck. There was Jake stonewalled dead. And he had just made it outside the woods into some corn or on the edge of the corn.

And. Dude, that dog lined. I don't know how they do it. I'm sure a lot of guys who have tracking dogs I've had experience with labs and pointers and stuff, you know Getting pheasants and doing all those things and they still amaze me, like dogs just are so cool But he did that and yeah the celebration began like there he was In my shot, we see him laying there, the shots down.

I'm like, dude he's exactly what I thought he was. He's just a great buck, heavy mass, like heavy duty coming through. Got inline [00:54:00] G3s on both sides, like just a super sweet buck. And we got some sweet pictures and that kind of thing. And it was cause the sun was just coming up and we know just the static and the deer ended up going 300 yards from the shot.

So he went about, 100 yards almost from where his first bed was. And then he went on a straight line, diagonal through. And we don't think he bedded down a second time. It looked like maybe if he had bedded down, it wasn't where we found him because he had, straight legged out, tipped over, a look and, just some sweet pictures. So shout out to Tony and Fred, that's that's quite the team there. And I'm super pumped that I had this opportunity to do that with him. And he was there for that. But we got him back to the house and I, I was like, okay, what can I learn from this?

I was using a different arrow set up, but come to find out like that arrow still did what needed to do, I think as a hunter, every time you have a bad experience with something, you just try to blame it on, something like where, why it was bad because of my arrow, or it was bad because of my [00:55:00] broadhead, or it was bad because of a limb, or it was bad because a deer moved.

There's so many variables in this that we do so for me. I was like, okay I like I had a replay like I need to know what happened and I had adequate penetration For that shot where I went through it I did not hit his leg bone But I had broke, two ribs on the way in and broke two ribs on the way out And because it was low the two ribs on the way out.

I broke him right where they meet the sternum So I went through the like thickest part of his bone and that broadhead was like almost poking through as high on the other side I saw that, and I gutted him, and I, to my surprise, this deer, I did hit him in the heart. Now, I didn't like center punch the heart, but I put a slice, probably like a four inch slice, across his whole heart with one of the blades, and then I had hit both lungs.

Like if I were to, if I were to gut that deer and show someone and be like, Hey, how far do you think this deer was? You'd be like less than a hundred, probably tipped right over in sight, a shot and that just wasn't the case. Pumped up on adrenaline [00:56:00] coming in ready to fight, making that shot maybe the, the aggressive nature of where I hit them, going through thick part of his meat of his shoulder breaking a few ribs, it's not like I zipped one through high lungs where they had no idea what, like my Buckeye shot October 22nd, where I hit him, I, I, I barely broke a rib on the way in and the way out. Like I zipped right through both lungs, just above the heart that deer, had no idea what really happened.

He just ran and started, tumbling right away because of where that was. But he was clueless when he got shot. There's a lot of variables that go in, but I, I got him out and sure enough, that, that hide had a, almost poking through on the pass through heart had a big slash in it, both lungs were hit, and where I hit him the first time, October 10th, was, like I told Tony, I said, I think I hit him, if you cut the body in half, vertically.

Cut him in half that way. I went in right there, last rib, was what I had thought. And then, watching the video, it's okay, he ducks as the arrow is hitting them and it glances off or something. Yeah, it did [00:57:00] exactly that. It hit his backbone and the way the broadhead was going, it was actually, it was a, two blade with bleeders.

It hit him the flat way. So like the blades are parallel with his back and it hit that and just glanced off. It went in and out and there was probably only an inch and a half of hide, from entry to exit hole. So it was nice to seal the deal on this whole entire thing. Just, tagging out Michigan on a second buck on a bow, which I've never done on a great deer, four and a half year old buck that have had history with, that the deer wouldn't be.

When I wouldn't have been able to shoot this deer if I would have shot him as a three year old, or maybe pushed him or hunted hard like doing these kind of things all this, all these things had to go together to make this work and man I just it was such a relief like that celebration with a friend there and you know The only way it probably could have been topped is if the family was there too, for that, like the first year, be able to track that deer, their family, there's some, there's just, there's just all these memories that you have in these little experiences.

And, I feel very blessed to go through this. So yeah, I'm tagged out in Michigan. I've tagged out, I think [00:58:00] man, when I was 15, I think I shot two bucks in my gun. I tagged out then, and then 2020 I shot a buck opening day of bow season, and I shot a buck with Henry opening day gun. It's been three years since I, tagged out, and like I said earlier, I haven't shot a buck on a bow since 2020, so now I got two on, two on, two down for that, and I think it's I feel very blessed with that.

Yeah. That's the story of Jake and my November 8th hunt. And hopefully you guys can like, learn from, it's quite a story. Both my stories this year, the times, you got to put yourself in a position to make something happen to an extent, leaving my Illinois hunt early, a day and a half early just to come, cause I felt like I had a better opportunity to kill a deer in Michigan with the weather and the area and the scouting that you've done.

So I'm thankful it was 80 degrees in Illinois. Cause otherwise I probably wouldn't have made the journey back home. But it's been a whirlwind last today's the 14th. The last 10 days have been just crazy. I've drove to Illinois and back I've drove to Nashville, Tennessee and back and I'm driving up north tomorrow, but man, this is what we live for.

This is the time of year to, [00:59:00] to do these kinds of things and, make the most of it when you can. And I'm, I, like I said, I'm blessed to have the opportunity to do this and, appreciate you guys listening and hopefully you can learn something. I think I did a podcast with Joe Davis at Generations of Hunt.

We talked about calling and I told him, I said, Hey, I think the reason why a lot of calling doesn't work in Michigan is because we're calling at a age class of bucks that don't have. The high age class of bucks. So they're just not dominant, but like over the years, I've slowly noticed how there's more and more mature deer or mature, let's just say three and a half years old and older deer alive and walking around because guys are doing the right thing for their goals, they want to shoot older deer.

So they're passing deer. We're not shooting as many. So we're getting these pockets of these, mature deer, and they're actually doing like deer things. So like that Colin does work. I've, I seen bucks fight last year, like fight, like first time ever, like Dirt flying, fighting, like wanting to kill each other, so I've had luck in the past with, soft grunts and snort wheezes in certain circumstances and yeah, just goes to [01:00:00] show, just pay attention to the body language of a deer and get lucky.

Having the other buck come my way, man, that just sealed the deal for me. Yeah, and food plots too, the power of food plot, I think those doughs are coming out in daylight so early because I have food plots there, I have good food, it's growing great, that vitalized seed is just awesome, and that goes to show I, I don't know how much the seed makes, A difference, but find something you like, but I got some stuff from Packer Max too.

And we have another food plot. My brother in law has been hunting over that way and he just pulled some cards again. He's dude, there's big bucks all over this again. It's just in a spot that, is lends deer to be there more at nighttime. So just the, you're just hamstringed at your property and what you have.

But, being fortunate to have a spot where you can put some food plots right in these deer face, deer's face where they like to be, it just makes a big difference. But yeah guys, thanks for listening this week. Like I said earlier, if you want to support the show I would really appreciate it.

I mean if you want to get some Christmas presents anything outdoor related, hop on that website michiganwild. com or michiganwild. hollercommerce. [01:01:00] com That would be fantastic. I really appreciate that and hope you guys have a great opening day gun season Go make some memories of the family do this, hopefully your rut hunts were great.

I had just a grind, I think I hunted from November. Let's say no from November 3rd to November 8th, I had drove, let's see, 16 hours. Almost just to go to and from home plus all the driving I did during the week plus all the miles I walked all the sweating I did all the different spots I were and guess what it was all worth it when that moment came So yeah, have a good week guys Thanks for listening[01:02:00]

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