2013 Mo Gun Season – Sticker 8 Finale!!!!

In early October I ran my cameras at the KC property and it turned out to be a good card pull.  I came across a nice 8 pointer with 2" kicker on his right G2. He immediately jumped out at me as a shooter.

The Friday evening before the MO Youth season. I took my oldest daughter Makenna on her second  bow hunt and with the new shooting house completed we decided to set up there for the evening. It was a beautiful, cool, clear fall evening and about 90 minutes before dark deer started pouring into the food plot. As luck would have it Sticker 8 decided to show himself. He was chasing does all over the field just begging to be shot that night, but I had already filled my early season buck tag so all we could do was sit back and watch the show.

Opening weekend of the 2013 MO firearms season came and went with no shots fired. I had the Sticker 8 on my mind as I headed to the KC property for a quick morning hunt. I decided to hunt the middle timber stand straight east of the shooting house. Right out of the gates I had two does come in from the direction of the food plot. They fed around a bit then headed south. About 20 minutes later I notice movement to the north. A doe was heading right to me, but she kept stopping and checking her back trail. She angled south and about the time I lost sight of her in the timber I caught another flash  of movement to the north.It was a good buck coming my way so I got myself positioned for a shot. As soon as the buck got into better view I immediately realized that it was Sticker 8 and he was headed straight for me. I tried to keep clam as he closed the distance until he finally made it into 12 yards. I let out a “Meerrrpp” to stop him settled the cross hairs the let the Tikka bark!!! After the shot he took off and I immediately saw blood dumping out of him. He was hit hard and I knew he wouldn’t make it far. In disbelief of what had just happened I text Pete and Scott to tell them that Sticker 8 was a dead deer!

After giving him plenty of time, I got down and started the recovery. The track job was short and sweet and the Sticker 8 was finally down! This is the third mature buck taken off the farm this year and hopefully won't be the last!!!

 

New MO Farm Produces Early and Often

 

I was lucky enough to pick up a new local farm to hunt this year. It’s only 52 acres but it hunts much larger. Ironically it is only about 300 yards from the Blue Springs Honey Hole farm we used to hunt with a lot of success from 2006-2008.

      The landowner let me plant a +1 acre food plot in a mix of Biologic Maximum, Winter Bulbs/Sugar Beets, and Outfitters Blend. The day after the field was planted we got about 1.5" of rain and the plot has blown up! I have been monitoring my trail cams and have had a lot of pics but nothing real big. After doing some scouting I found a perfect funnel on the northeast side of the farm. There is also a huge oak tree that is absolutely loaded with acorns and I knew as soon as they started dropping that this would be a magical spot.

September 22
The first morning I hunted set was Sunday morning September 22^nd. It was an absolute beautiful, cool, clear morning. Around 8:00am I looked over to see two does coming in. At 12 yards I let the arrow fly and it found it's mark. Boom I was officially on the board with my first kill off the new property.

September 27th
I was able to slip out of work early. I had dinner plans with the family, but it was hot and I knew that I would be done early enough to get to the stand. I arrived at the stand at 5:45pm. I had literally just climbed into the set and got my pack squared away when I noticed movement to the east. Out popped two a nice 2.5 year old bucks that I had on camera. One was a smaller 8 pointer and the other a solid 9 pointer. I was kind of in a panic because I didn’t even have my bow in the tree yet, but after five long minutes I was finally able to ease my bow up and get an arrow knocked.

 For nearly an hour I watched the young bucks eat around the base of the giant oak tree. Both were solid bucks with great potential, but knowing there were much bigger bucks roaming around I elected to give them a pass. Just before 7:00pm I noticed movement from the east again. Another buck was running towards the other two. I could tell immediately that he was a good one and bigger than the other two. Once he got closer I grabbed the binoculars and saw that he was 10 pointer with nice tall tines. Definately a shooter! I had some branches between me and him so I had to sit back and watch the show. The smaller 8 pointer came up to the big 10 and they started sparring. It was awesome and a first for me to see bucks fighting. Finally the big 10 made it to one of my shooting lanes and turned broadside at 33 yards. I slowly drew back, zeroed in on my pin and let the arrow fly. As I saw the arrow track I knew it was really low and not a lethal hit, so I knocked another arrow. The buck had bounded off about 15 yards farther away and stopped in another opening. At 38 yards I sent arrow #2 on it's way. As soon as I shot the buck ducked and turned; obviously jumping the string since he was alert. I heard a loud crack and he took off like his tail was on fire.

 Not knowing exactly where the arrow hit him I waited another 30 minutes before picking up the trail. As soon as I walked up to where he was standing at there was blood everywhere. He'd run about 200 yards before piling up in the bottom of a large ditch. The MO archery season has barley gotten started and my first buck tag is filled; not a bad start to the season!

2012 MO Firearms Business

Scott rolled into town from MN on 11/9/12 for the start of Missouri's 2012 firearms season. Like years past, we'd planned to hunt the Macon Co. property for the entire week.

Opening morning the wind was wrong for some of our best stands, so Scott hunted the Graveyard and I climbed into the Poachers Pond stand. There wasn't a lot of movement, but we both saw a few deer and were able to pull several of our camera cards. Saturday evening Scott hunted the Gash and had 9 deer out in the field, but no shooters. I hunted the ground blind about 300yrds north of him and only had a single doe come out in the meadow, no shots fired. 

Sunday's forecast called for heavy rain moving in early and settling in until 4pm, so we made the decision to sleep in and get rested up for the remainder of the week. The rain started around 8:30am and it poured most of the afternoon. The radar showed the front moving through around 4pm, so we headed to the farm and slid into the ground blind to wait out the storm. Someone forgot their rain gear, so we had to improvise a little bit in order to stay dry on our walk in. The only deer we saw were two minis feeding in the cut beans.

The temps dropped off with the weather front pushing through and Monday morning was cold and clear. I was hunting in the South Meadow stand and at 8:30am I heard deer coming down the hill from the south. A doe and mini made their way into the bottom and milled around for a while. I waited for about five minutes to see if her boyfriend would show up and then it was going to be doe killing time. The doe worked her way into 18yrds and was standing directly in a large scrape when the .06 barked for the first time in 2012. She held a solid neck shot for 40yrds before the lights went out. I had a couple small bucks work through after that, but nothing mature.

Tuesday morning was once again cold, clear and there was a light layer of frost on the ground...ideal conditions for deer to be moving and we weren't disappointed. Scott rolled into The Beach stand and I slipped into the North Ridge stand. There were several deer in the draw east of my set and I could here bucks grunting and chasing prior to legal shooting light. At 7:40am Scott's .06 barked for the first time, followed up shortly by another shot...two does down! Just after 8am Scott touched off another round and his third doe of the morning was piled up. Shortly after that I heard the Ruger bark again. After killing the third doe a nice 3yr old 8 point worked down the ridge behind the stand. He was inside 50yrds when Scott shot, but the buck just stood there looking around before finally running off to the northeast untouched. We're not sure how he missed that chip shot, but there was no sign of  hit and Scott was pretty disappointed with himself.

We'd planned to meet on the road at 9am and get his nannies pulled out and hung in the barn, but at 8:57am I heard footsteps coming out of the east draw, so I grab the bow and got ready. A mature doe and mini worked up the saddle right in front of me and when the doe got to 12yrds I sent the arrow on it's way. The hit looked perfect, but she didn't react like normal and after bounding off to 30yrds she just stopped and stood in place for about 90 seconds. I could see the entry wound right behind her shoulder but didn't see any blood, so I nocked another arrow and dumped a second shaft into the boiler room. Ol' Girl wasn't holding both shafts and she went down inside on 40yrds. We had a little bit of work to do, to say the least.

 

That evening Scott slid into Poachers Pond and I climbed back into the South Meadow stand. I had only seen a couple squirrels and birds all afternoon and shooting light was fading fast, when I heard a buck grunt over the top of the hill. I immediately grabbed the VECtor grunter and can call and responded with several grunts and doe bleats. The response was immediate as I spotted a huge bodied deer tear over the top of the meadow and start thrashing trees and working a scrape in the the bottom corner. I couldn't tell much about his antlers, but his body size absolutely indicated a mature deer. With only 2-3 minutes of legal shooting time left I got aggressive and let out two more challenging grunts on the VECtor and the buck had heard enough. He grunted one more time and started coming down the meadow edge with his ears pinned back and all stiff legged looking for the competition. I quickly threw up the binos and all I saw was mass and big brow tines....for sure shooter. I tired stopping him in the first two shooting lanes, but he kept coming. He finally pulled up after I "muuurrrpped" loudly at him, the only problem was there was brush covering the lower 3/4 of his chest. As badly as I wanted to bow kill him I wasn't going to let him walk, so I quickly swapped the bow out for the .06 and let it do it's thing. The 22yrd shot was on the money and the buck tried making up the meadow hill, but after 25yrds or so the lights went out and he rolled back down the hill towards me. I knew he was a mature buck, but really had no idea how big he truly was because it all happened so fast. I was pleasantly surprised when I walked up on him and saw that he had everything...huge body, mass, big brows, and tall g2s and 3s. He's the biggest buck we've killed off the farm to date both body and antler wise. 

 What's cool about this buck is that I'd never seen him on the farm before then, but when we got back to the hotel that night and checked the camera cards he showed up Sunday afternoon and worked a scrape right by Poachers Pond. It's a good thing I turned the camera to video mode for the first time all year on Saturday, when I pulled the card.

 

We hunted until Thursday afternoon but the deer movement slowed down considerably and we had a lot of venison in the freezer already, so Scott headed back up to MN that afternoon and I rolled back into KC to prepare for the Smithville Lake Disabled hunt I was guiding at that weekend.

I met up with the disabled hunter I was going to guide; William Hall early Saturday morning prior to the safety meeting and check-in at Smithville. We were hunting blind 13 to start with and we started seeing deer as soon as it was light enough to see. Around 7:30am a mini came hauling out of the draw in front of us and William wasted very little time laying the smack down.

 

Saturday evening we hunted blind 13 again and saw several deer, but no good bucks and all the mature does where over 200yrds away. Sunday morning William decided to change blinds and selected a blind overlooking a cut corn field. The action was pretty slow to start the morning, but around 8:15am I spotted two does that had slipped in on us. William got his gun settled on the shooting sticks and dropped #2 in her tracks. It was the perfect way to close out another great Missouri firearms season. 

I've still got one MO archery buck tag,  a managed archery hunt in December, and several antlerless tags in my pocket so I'm hoping to add some more meat to the freezer and bone on the wall in the next month. I just hope the good luck continues!

MO Opening Day Double Tap

9/14/12 - I arrived at the north MO farm around 1:15pm on Friday afternoon to pull camera cards and jack around before opening day. I was very pleased with what I saw on the cameras.There were multiple shooters using the wash out to the south, including a new giant that I haven't seen before; looks to be in the 160-170's range and running with the short tined 10 that was one on my target deer.

9/15/12 - Opening morning found me set up in the Retarded Genius stand. I've had two target bucks coming through on the regular around 7am along with numerous does and I'd been planning to hunt that stand for the last month if the wind was out of the south at all, and it was. I'd planned to get in early to avoid bumping anything, but that backfired. There was a doe bedded right under the stand and she let me get about 10yrds away before she busted. She ran west about 30yrds and proceeded to stomp and blow at me for several minutes before calming down and working back in front of the stand prior to legal shooting time.

There were a couple does feeding in the field at first light, but they worked off to the south end towards the sanctuary before cutting into the timber. Just before 7am I caught more movement on the field edge and watched the first gray fox I've seen mouse around the field for several minutes. I tried squeaking it in for a closer look, but it was preoccupied with finding breakfast in the field. At 7:25am I spotted a single doe working down my entry trail off the field. She came all the way up to the base of my tree, before back tracking towards the pond. At 12yrds she starting angling to the SE and gave me a perfect quartering away shoot which I took full advantage of. I put a great heart shot on her and she piled up inside 40yrds right on the field edge and the start of my entry trail, bless her soul; no dragging required.

I helped Roger change the oil on several of his tractors and repaired a couple of leaky hoses mid-morning, ya gotta keep the land owner happy! I worked up my doe and headed back into town for a little siesta before the evening hunt.

Based on the camera pictures and a SE wind gusting to 20mph in the forecast for the evening, I was headed to the Water Way stand. I was settled in by 3:45pm and just sat back and soaked up the scenery for about three hours.

Just before 6:45pm I spotted the first deer of the evening, a doe with twins. They came right up the drainage ditch under the stand and chased each other around for several minutes before heading up to the pond. Right at 7pm I spotted a big 140" class 8 point working out of the timber across the levee. I have several pictures of him and had already decided to pass him, because I believe he's only a 3 year old. From that point on deer poured into the field from the timber and out of corn. Around 7:30pm I spotted the short tined 10 step out south of drainage. He stood and surveyed the field for quite sometime before making a move. He finally started walking the bottom side of the levee towards my stand, but he kept stopping and checking his surroundings and eying all the other deer in field. With almost 20  other deer, including two other target bucks in the bean field I was sure he'd head that way. Luckily I was wrong and he decided to about face and walk up the drainage towards the pond. When he cleared the right side of my cover tree I grunted at him softly and he stopped to check it out; my arrow was on the way almost instantly. The hit was great and the buck mule kicked and exploded out of the drainage to the south. All the other deer erupted out of the field and it was kind of chaotic watching them run in every direction, but my buck was already staggering before he got on top of the levee. I heard him crash up top and start coughing, so I just gathered my gear and quietly slid out of the area.

After meeting the Walkers and Pat for a great dinner we headed back to track Ol' Boy. As we drove across the levee I could see him laying just inside the timber just off the levee road, so we where able to drive within feet of him. He was a known 5 year old on the farm and had an enormous body, but was just never going to amount to much score wise; but I was still tickled to death killing him. It was an amazing start to the 2012 season and more than I could have asked for on opening weekend.

 I'm going to be on doe patrol until the Nebraska trip in mid-October, but I'm sure I'll be able to suck it up. I'm looking forward to hunting with some good friends from MWT over the next couple of weekends, then head to Minnesota with a Yankee and Kansas GayHawk fan for their first waterfowl hunt ever. 2012 is off to a great start!

New Year's Day Buck

1/1/2012
Nick, Greg, and I braved the 25-35mph northwest winds Sunday night and headed to "The Winery" for a late season evening hunt. Greg set up in second field, Nick set up on the edge of the bedding cover and main field, and I hung a new set in the southeast corner of the bedding area.

I jumped five does walking in, but they just moved off into the cover without much fuss and we were all settled in by 3pm. The wind was blasting us all night and we all thought movement was going to be pretty slow...we couldn't have been more wrong! Just before 5pm Nick sent a text that several does were running around the big field and a few minutes later deer starting pouring out of the bedding cover. I had 22 deer filter by my new set during the last half hour of shooting time. They were all well inside bow range, but they stayed in the thick cover to my left which offered me zero shooting opportunities. Nick was also covered up with deer and around 5:20pm a nice buck popped out onto the field. A few grunts from the VECtor and the buck was bee-lining to Nick's stand. He worked into 10 yards but was facing the stand and didn't offer a clean kill shot. After a few minutes of staring down Nick the buck turned and headed back towards the thick stuff. He stopped briefly about 20 yards out and Nick took advantage of his mistake and slipped an arrow into him. Nick knew he hit him, but with the low light and not being positive about where the arrow connected we decided to wait until the morning to start tracking him.

Greg and I headed back out for a morning sit and Nick was going to meet us at 9:30am. The wind hadn't really let up much and it made for the coldest sit of the season for us!!! I was beyond ready to get down by the time 9:30am got here and I think Greg shared my excitement once he wasn't sitting 20ft. up a tree...

Fellow MissouriWhitetails.com member and MO Conservation Officer Vince (VECtor Game Call Owner) also showed up and he brought his silver lab Goose along to help with the tracking job. We found Nick's arrow right off the bat and it was covered in good blood and we all thought it would be a short tracking job....we were wrong again. The buck headed straight into the thick bedding area that consisted of chest high grass, cedar trees, and more poison ivy than I've ever seen. It was pretty slow going and Goose was having trouble cutting the trail. We slowly picked our way along the blood trail heading to the northeast. About ninety minutes into the tracking job Vince took Goose upwind of us about 80yrds. As soon as Goose got the wind in her face, her nose went up and she brought Vince right to the buck. Nick's shot was good, but just a touch back and it exited through the guts on the off side. The buck was dead within minutes of Nick shooting him, but after seeing the blood trail and how slow going it was in the daylight we definitely made the right call letting him sit and waiting until the morning to track him.

The 2011 season has been amazing so far and we still have a couple weeks left! I can't thank Nick and Greg enough for allowing me to hunt with them this year. I just met these guys over the summer at an MWT event and in sort order they have become very close friends and hunting partners and I'm looking forward to many more seasons of hunting with them! 

The second portion of MO's youth deer season kicks off Saturday morning and Scott and Logan are coming down for it. I'm hoping we'll be able to post up Logan's first deer story early next week, so if the deer god's are listen "send a couple our way this weekend"

Two Timer!

Heading into the second weekend of MO's firearms season I was up in the air on where to hunt. While talking to my cousin who owns about 1000 acres in southwest MO, he basically said the farm was empty for the upcoming weekend except for one other hunter. That pretty much made up my mind on where I'd be hunting.

I arrived at the farm around 5:15am and briefly talked with Jim about which stands I could hunt. He gave me the green light to hunt Blind 1, which is usually off limits because of the blinds owner. Right off the bat I had deer moving through the area as a doe and mini were headed right at the blind. The action remained steady all morning as smaller bucks chased does and minis all around the timber. Around 8:30am a spotted a big shooter to the north but couldn't manage to get a shot off.

After grabbing a quick lunch I headed back into Blind 1 hoping that the evening action would be as good as the morning's. With the warm temp and high winds I decided to take a little nap, so I'd be ready for the late evening action. I woke up around 2:50pm and immediately spotted a doe to the east of me. I watched her for about five minutes and no other deer showed I so figured it would be a good opportunity to fill another antlerless tag. I settled in and let the .06 do it's thing and she dropped in her tracks. I got down so I could get her gutted and pulled into the shade and while looking for a creek crossing I spotted a big set of antlers. It was a big mid-130s nine point that had been shot by an archery hunter during the 2010 season and obviously not recovered. I saw eleven more does that night, but no bone in pursuit of them.

Sunday morning could not have been more of a drastic change from Saturday. It was 24 degrees out with winds out of the northeast and a light drizzle. I headed back into Blind 1 again because of all the doe sightings. I had deer moving through all morning again but still no real shooters. Around 8:15am I spotted two does way up north and right behind them was a giant 150-160" eleven pointer. I heard a shot about fifteen minutes later to the northeast and just hope the poachers across the fence didn't kill him.

Around 9am I caught some more movement to the north and spotted a decent buck working his way through the thick stuff. I was starting to panic because there is a big tree top down that obscures a lot of my field of vision and shooting windows and the buck was headed right towards it. The buck was broadside at about 180yards and my only shot was to stand on my tip toes and try and free hand a shot...I can assure you shot #1 didn't connect and I felt my heart sink. The buck briefly disappeared but he popped back out about 35yards farther away. I let shot #2 rip from my tip toes again and thought I may have hit him, so immediately got down and headed up there. As I approached the area he was standing when I shot I saw the buck and doe staring right at me just before they bolted. I took off running to the north and caught them crossing an opening on the property line. I cut shot #3 loose and nothing again...shot #4 same results, NOTHING!!! I realized I only had one bullet left so I settled in and let shot #5 go.....and down he went! I was pretty wound up after all the commotion and elated that I put a decent buck down. This was by far the best hunt I've had on the farm the the biggest buck I've taken off it. It was a great close to my 2011 season....I'm out of contract days!!!

2011 MN Firearms Opener

The MN Rifle Opener kicked off with clear skies, winds from east/southeast at 10-15 mph, and temps in the mid 30's. I started the season perched in my normal stand location and was all settled in about 20 minutes before shooting time. I was a little concerned what the weekend might bring because the wind was suppose to increase throughout the day and blow 25-35mph by afternoon.

The morning started very slowly in my neck of the woods. The squirrels even decided to sleep in. Finally around 8:20am I spotted a figure moving through some thick brush to my south. I studied the movement for a minute as it headed towards a small opening. That is when I saw a solid rack and a huge tank of a body. The deer was moving from east to west which was going to put him into some thick brush and not allow any type of shot. I grabbed “the can” and gave the buck one bleat. He stopped in his tracks and whipped his head in my direction. After a brief minute the buck put his head down again and I gave him a another bleat. The second call was to much for him to resist, he was hooked and started walking directly at me on a bee-line.

I picked out an opening in the timber the buck was working his way towards. I settled the cross hairs of the scope in the opening and waited. Seconds later the big fella stepped into the opening at a quartering to angle about 40 yards from my stand. I settled on the center of his shoulder bone and let the .06 bark. The big fella immediately face planted, but somehow managed to pull himself together enough to get back on his feet and make a death run towards my food plot. I watched as buck labored towards the plot opening, he was coughing up blood every step of the way. Once the buck got into the food plot I let him hold one more round for good measure. The second shot stopped him cold in his tracks. The buck stood up on his back legs, coughed up what looked like a gallon worth of blood and dropped to the ground stone dead. This was easily the biggest deer I had ever killed up in Northern MN.

The rest of the weekend was uneventful for me and the rest of the party after 10 AM on Saturday. Brian had killed a big doe, Wayne shot “ANOTHER” fork buck and his son Kevin killed a very nice 8 point buck all by 10 AM. Then the wind picked up and the deer movement completely shutdown.

On my way home Sunday afternoon I did scratch out a grouse and a pheasant on my way out of the woods. Pete got to enjoy the pheasant shoot live via phone for some added enjoyment. Nice little cherry on top of my weekend. Next weekend is Missouri's rifle opener. Pete and I will be getting after it for 9 days in Macon County!

MN "Monster" Goes Down!

I took a half day of vacation time on 10/29/10 to take care of some halloween stuff with the kids and then get out for an afternoon hunt. I made it to the woods around 2:15pm. It was a perfect fall day. Temps in the low 50's and a light southeast wind at 5-12 mph. Perfect wind for my money set.

After checking a couple areas for deer sign I made my way to my set. Just as I stepped onto the trail that leads to my tree a deer jumped from his bed (which was located directly under my stand) and ran about 80 yards to my south. I immediately dropped down to my knees and got next to some brush. At this point I was just hoping the deer would wonder off with out making a scene and I could make it to my stand (which was only 20 yards away) for the remainder of the afternoon.

After starring in my direction for 10 minutes the young 8 pt finally started to settle down. To my surprise he started to work back towards my location. At this point I figured I would try and close the distance on him and see how close I could get. For the next 10-15 minutes the 8 pt and I played cat and mouse with each other. Every time he would step behind a tree I would slide a bit further to my west and a bit closer to the trail he was walking. I had to keep sliding West because the deer was now interested in finding out what I was, where I was and trying to scent me. By sliding West I kept my sent away from him as long as possible.

Finally the deer got behind a huge blow down and I was able to sit up a bit more and relieve my cramping knees. This also allowed me to setup for a potential shot opportunity. At this point I had decided to take the young buck if he gave me a shot because I had invested close to 30 minutes in this stalk and the whole experience was extremely cool to watch. I have never been able to sit and watch a deer act like this for so long. Filling my deer tag would also allow me to spend the weekend at home and take Jake pheasant hunting on wednesday.

I could tell the deer finally decided I was no threat after not being able to smell me or pin point my location and he put his head down and started walking back to the original spot he jumped from. I quickly slid a couple feet to my right and prepared for a shot. I didn't have time to range him because the deer was now walking without a care in the world.....school boy! The deer stepped out and I softly grunted him to a stop. I guessed him at 30 yards, settled my pin and released the arrow. The hit looked great, but when the deer ran off the exit wound was way back. I was a bit shocked because the deer was completely broadside on impact. I was able to watch the deer run off 60 yards or so and then stop. He started to wobble and then laid down. I laid in the spot I took the shot from for the next 30 minutes before slowing working to my tree and settling in my stand. Once I got up into the stand I was able to track a massive blood trail all the way up to the deer who was dead 40-50 yards from the hit. Below are some pics of the blood trail. These pics where specifically taken and posted for our friend Nissan.



I was also able to smack a young coon before pulling my deer from the woods. Little guy didn't even try and hold it, just a little whimper and gave up! Sissy!

Montana MO Style

After having Scott down to MO for the better part of two weeks to take part in our archery and firearms season, I was headed out to Montana for the first time in almost 14 years. I left MO early on November 18th and headed to Minneapolis to meet up with Josh and Jeff B. After getting the final details sorted out and all our gear loaded up we hit the road for Northeastern Montana and a week worth of deer and upland bird hunting.

We arrived at our houses around 3pm on the 19th and quickly unpacked and jumped back in the rig for a couple hours of scouting and hopefully shooting birds. Montana didn't disappoint! About 3 minutes out of town and we were on our first bunch of huns. They held tight and the group flushed perfectly for Josh and I...only I decided to wet myself, Josh did bring down 1 bird on a great going away shot. we scratched out 3 roosters that evening and saw several deer.

On the 20th our local friend and pre-scout Greg Sodt met us for breakfast and we headed out in search of the "spring buck" he'd been scouting for the past week. We glassed the draw he'd been using for about two hours and all we turned up was muley does and little bucks, so we decided to move on. Throughout the early morning and afternoon we spotted 50+ deer, but nothing I was going to put my tag on.

The bird hunting helped break up the glassing throughout the day, and my shooting quickly returned to it's old form. Around 2pm we stopped by Rick's house and he said we could hunt the south side of his ranch. In 27 years of hunting out there Jeff had never even been allowed on the ranch, so we were excited. The country was amazing and it didn't take long to start spotting mullies hiding in the deep draws. We spotted two decent 4x4s but I elected to pass on both of them, even though Greg thought I made a mistake.

We were pulling out of the ranch around 4:30pm and as I was opening the last gate when we spotted a muley doe on a ridge across the road. I turned to get the gate and the boys spotted a large bodied buck drop in right behind her along with two more does. Greg knew the area well so we headed west of them and dropped in on the back side of their location. The deer had dropped into an old sandy railroad track bed that was surrounded by 30' hills on both sides. We started our sneak towards the deer and after 200yrds we spotted the first doe coming out around a bend in the old track bed. She was quickly followed by the buck and other does. It took all of 2 seconds to realize this was a shooter and definitely the biggest muley buck we'd seen. All of them were facing me head on, so I took a deep breath, settled the scope right on the bucks brisket, and squeezed the shot off. The buck instantly rocked back onto his hind quarters and tipped over in a cloud of dust. The .06 absolutely crushed him in his tracks! We pulled the rig up within feet of him and proceeded to celebrate and take pictures.

The giant muley ended up being +4yrs old and weighed well over 250lbs field dressed. I couldn't have been happier...and we didn't see a bigger deer the rest of our trip.

We celebrated a bit more than I would recommend that evening, but the cold MT air and cackling roosters the following morning cured whatever hangover I had in short order. We focused on roosters and whitetail does for the remainder of our trip.

The bird hunting wasn't as good as it was in the past for Montana, but it still exceeded my expectations. I truly believe the area we hunt is one of the few untapped upland bird meccas left in the country. We easily shot our daily/possession limits for the rest of the week, with Sunny's creek being the hottest area of all. I think we shot 26 of the 46 roosters off that section. Our shooting was on point, the dogs worked great, and the birds held tight all week. It was awesome to get back into pheasants, it's the one thing I miss hunting the most in MO.

Josh shot his whitetail doe on the 21st and Justin filled his tag on the morning of the 23rd. It took me until the final morning of our hunt to finally fill my whitetail doe tag. We were actually headed to Lon's for birds when we spotted a nice buck and doe headed into one of his draws in a horse pasture. After shooting the breeze with Lon for a bit we headed out in that direction. Josh spotted the buck standing up in the bottom, so I bailed out of the rig expecting them bust out across the pasture. To my surprise the buck just stood there and watched me get closer with every step. After seeing the rutting activity at a fevered pitch all week, I knew the doe had to be bedded under him. Surprisingly a decent muley buck popped over the ridge and into the draw and this was to much for the whitetail buck to handle. He chased the muley out of the area immediately and I saw my window of opportunity open.

I slid up to the edge of the draw and spotted the bedded doe about the same time she saw me. She busted out of the draw like her tail was on fire, but since I was inside 25yrds she was in a world of trouble. My first shot was just over her back as she crested the top of the draw, but shot #2 anchored her in her tracks and my Montana deer tags were officially filled.


We hunted birds for the rest of the afternoon and hit the road early the next morning so everyone could get home for Thanksgiving....I arrived back in KC around 1:30am Thanksgiving morning after 18 hours of driving!

We headed to Shana's folks house for Turkey Dinner and I was scheduled for my managed hunt Nov. 30 - Dec. 2, unfortunately I was called back to KC because of an emergency at work. I took full advantage of the antlerless season though, and was able to harvest another nice MO doe off the BS 70 farm. I've killed 4 deer from my natural ground blind on the 70 in the past two seasons including my buck in Scott's earlier post about the MO firearms opener. It's to bad we are losing that property this week. I'm going to miss the Zoo!

Missouri Marathon Ends with 2 Bucks and 2 Doe

I arrived in KC, MO the evening of Friday, November 6th. Pete and I decided to sleep in Saturday morning and drive to Macon, check in to the hotel and get out for the evening sit.

Of course the weather was windy and warm, like it is every time I hunt in Missouri. The first nights hunt was very eventful. I was setup in the Gash Set. I spotted what looked like a good buck clear across the bottom field walking along the river edge. I couldn't tell exactly how big the buck was because it was probably close to a mile away. Right around 5 PM I had a small spike/fork buck come down the hillside in front of me and work into the field. Twice I had him at 20 yards.

As I was watching the small buck I heard foot steps coming through the gash. After a couple minutes a nice 2 1/2 year old 8 pt came out and stood in my shooting lane at 23 yards. I looked him over and had to talk myself out of shooting him several times. He had a nice tall rack but wasn't very wide and was lacking good mass. Great looking deer for an MN boy! I grunted at him with my Vector call and this stirred up trouble between him and the little buck in the field. At one point the two deer came nose to nose before the young guy finally realized he was seconds away from a tail kicking and quickly put a 100 yards between himself and the 8 pt. I was able to call the 8 pt. back into 20 yards three seperate times with my vector grunt call before he finally worked into the field to eat.

Right at dark I had a Doe and her two mini's come off the hillside about 150 yards out in front of my set and work across the field. Not a bad first nights sit, to bad it would be my only good sit for the next 5 days. Below is a photo the spike/fork buck I was able to snap.

Things really slowed down as far as deer movement the next couple of days. The only deer I saw the rest of the time in Macon was a doe who got spooked off a hillside by a falling tree. She came running past me at 60 mph scared out of her skin.

Things were also slow for Pete most of the week although he was seeing deer almost every sit. On the morning of 11/11/09 Pete had a great encounter with a huge Macon Co. giant. Right after getting into the oak ridge top set Pete heard running and grunting in the draw in front of his stand. Shortly after that two doe crested over the top of the draw. Shortly there after Pete heard more grunting and a huge 150 class eight came over the ridge bumping the does. For several minutes Pete had the big 8 bumping the does around his stand. The whole time the BIG BOY was grunting and lip curling at the two does. Pete finally got the buck to stop at 31 yards and he released his arrow. The shot looked great until the big guy dropped and spun to his right after hearing the string. Pete's arrow hit him high in the left shoulder and never penetrated the bone. Another kick to the groin for Pete's 2009 archery season!

We did track the deer all afternoon to make sure it wasn't hit better than we thought. I did catch a glimpse of the big fella once in the afternoon as he ran off over 200 yards away. Even at 200 yards I could tell he was a true giant. Hopefully we will see him again later this fall or next.

We returned to KC on Wednesday night because Pete had to be in Columbia for meetings the next two days. I hunted the Blue Springs farm Thursday evening and Friday morning but still couldn't shake my curse. The good news was the farm was littered with sign. The bad news was I only saw deer while walking back to my car after dark.

Saturday, November 14th. The Missouri firearms opener finally arrived and we would finally get a chance to even the score after a week of getting our tails kick.

Opening day found Brian, Pete and I hunting the Blue Springs farm. We had cloudy skies, cool temps, a good northwest wind and periods of light rain. Finally some good weather had arrived in MO!

I had a deer in my field prior to first light but that deer was quickly run off by a grunting buck who either wanted a fight or some tail. Pete and Brian where seeing deer and turkeys right at first shooting light and pretty much the rest of the morning. I started to feel like my curse was for real as I wasn't seeing anything while those two where covered up in critters. At 7:15 my curse was finally lifted. I caught movement to my left and looked over to see a doe coming out of the woods at full tilt with a very good buck right on her tail. I tried stopping the deer 4 or 5 times and finally yelled at the top of my lungs which got there attention. Both deer stopped briefly at 65 yards to see what all the noise was about. I quickly settled in on the buck but had to rush my shot because his doe started to take off again. I thought my first shot found its spot but the buck reacted oddly. I quickly reloaded and took a running shot as the deer went for the woods. After the 2nd shot the buck stopped one more time and allowed my to settle in and take a relaxed shot. My 3rd shot hit home and the big guy gimped into the woods about 20 yards before I lost sight of him. Everything happened so fast that I was rattled worse than I have ever been by a deer.

I sat tight and waited until 9am for Pete and Brian to come over to look for the buck. The wait was brutal as I wasn't positive of my shots although I knew the 3rd shot hit home. After arriving, Brian walked into the woods where I saw the deer enter and quickly spotted him laying in a heap 30 yards past the edge of the field. It was quite a relief after having to rush my shot and not have the deer drop immediately. Below are some pictures of the big jacked up MO Una-buck.


Brian and I met for lunch around 11:45 and treated ourselves to a bag full of BK while Pete decided to stay put on the 70. At 12:30pm we headed back to the stands for the rest of the afternoon. On the way to our stands Brian spotted a deer halfway down the cul-d-sac field. After verifying it was a doe the stalk was on! Brian and I got around the field and slowly worked our way down a hedge row. With the wind in our favor and great cover between us we were able to slide all the way down to the end of the hedge row. Brian gave me the green light so I dropped my pack and Brian held back 10 yards. I slowly slid into the field and popped out in a sitting position ready to fire. The doe had no idea I was in her world. After a couple seconds she turned perfectly broadside and I let the .06 speak its peace. As soon as the shot went off I heard Brian giggling behind me and letting me know she went right down in her tracks. We quickly pulled her into the hedge row we had just stalked down and made our way to our stands for the evening sit. Below is a photo of the doe we stalked.

Sunday, November 15. Although we all saw deer Saturday night no more shots were fired. Sunday greeted us with a strong north wind, rain, and temps in the mid 40's. Pete was in the cul-d-sac set, Brian was in his ladder stand and I was in the killing tree. All of us where sitting well before shooting time. I had a deer come through my field shortly after sitting down and Brian once again had deer in his field all morning. Shortly after legal shooting time it started to rain, so I made the move to my Ameristep ground blind that sat only 150 yards away. Shortly after settling into my dry, wind free ground blind I spotted a doe trotting onto the field to my right. I quickly grabbed my gun and settled it on my shooting stick. Ol girl must have seen me move because she stopped at 75 yards and looked directly at me. School girl mistake! The .06 spoke its peace again and deer #3 was down in her tracks. Below is a photo of my 3rd deer. With that my 2009 MO deer season was complete.

Later that evening after I headed back to MN Pete got himself dressed in his frogtogs and set up shop in on the BS 70. He arrived at his natural ground blind right around 2 PM and settled in for an evening sit in the rain. Around 4:30pm after seeing a couple smaller deer things really picked up and in a hurry. As he was watching the field Pete heard a noise directly to his right. He turned to see a big bodied buck jumping the fence and landing within 4ft of him, literally knocking the right side of hsi bling over. After a few seconds the buck realized soethign wasn't right and he ran out into the field 60 yards or so. Pete settled the .06 on him and let it bark. The big guy went down but got up and gimped into the cedar thicket east of the field. Pete returned to the thicket the following morning and made a quick recovery of his deer after only 5 minutes of tracking. Below is a photo of Pete and his 09 MO rifle buck. We will be adding some better pics when he returns next week from his Montana trip.

Not a bad MO opening weekend. 2 mature bucks and 2 nice doe. Overall the BS property has produced 4 mature bucks and 8 doe so far this season, plus Brian still has his tag(s) to fill. Below is a pic of a bobcat I got at the BS farm on sunday morning. Easily one of the coolest pics I have gotten on my cuddyback.

Pete is off to Montana this week with a small game license, whitetail doe tag and a prized either species (Muley or Whitetail) buck tag in his pocket. I am taking the weekend off before getting after some MN pheasants next week.