Greg Gearhart
10/8/99
Yesterday, I had to be home in time to put Laura on the bus, but Tammi is not working today and I can stay out longer. I am hunting another new location at Shearer’s. This stand is reached by following the road that leads past the garbage dump and continuing approximately straight up the hill after the road peters out. This area is thick and has a lot of runs, most of which go more or less straight across from the neighbors field to the Shearer’s corn field that borders Warrington road. My stand is set up mid way between two of the heavier runs. It is about a 15 yard shot to either run. Again, I did not have time to trim or mark the trail into this stand. I got an earlier start than yesterday in case I had trouble finding it and I did spend a few minutes looking, but did not have too much trouble. However, I had wanted to cross the run right below the stand so that deer would not hit my scent trail until I would have already shot. While looking for the stand, I did cross further to the Warrington Road side than I wanted.
While getting up into the stand, one of my steps fell off the strap and I had to go back down for it. Then, when I was attaching my safety strap, I discovered that it was not long enough to fit around the tree. This is the thickest tree I have ever put a stand on and the strap for the stand had just made it. I hadn’t thought about testing a safety strap when I set up the stand. Now, I had to use the strap that I normally use for my waist to extend the strap around the tree and then replace my waist strap with an extra step strap that I had brought up to hang my pack on. Next, as I was pulling up my bow, I found that the cord had gotten into or around the nock on one of the arrows and that arrow, free of the quiver, was coming up before the bow. If it fell, it could have hit and cut the bow string. I remember thinking that this was starting off as another banner day in my bowhunting career. Finally, with all of that taken care of, I was settled in and ready to shoot at about 6:50.
Not much happened for the next 40 minutes until I noticed a lone deer crossing 40 to 50 yards below my stand, heading toward Warrington Road. I saw that it was a buck. He crossed my incoming path without scenting me and continued to angle up the hill in a northeast direction, which brought him to my left close enough to shoot, but into a thick area that did not allow a good shot. I drew as he entered this spot and he stopped in the brush. At this point, an odd thing happened. My vision became very blurry. I’m not sure if my glasses steamed, or if this was some sort of odd version of buck fever, or if this was God’s way of saying,” Wait for the better shot that I have in store for you.” I let the bow down and the arrow nock popped off the string; fortunately, the arrow did not fall off the rest. But, even with my impaired vision, I saw his head pop up when he heard this. I carefully renocked the arrow and then hit the young buck grunt on my new grunt call (purchased at the Alsheimer Seminar last week). After a few moments, I thought the deer was gone. But my vision quickly cleared up and I saw that he was still standing in the brush 20 to 25 yards away. All I could do at this time was watch as he was on the alert and I didn’t think that I could even risk enough movement to use the grunt again. This is probably the longest I have ever stood on a stand watching a deer that I thought I might get a shot at and my heart was pounding as hard as I can ever remember. I really have very little idea of how long this was. Probably not more than a minute or two, but we all know how long that can seem. I’m glad that I had this time to think about and get ready for the shot. Gradually, he turned and started walking back toward my stand, using the run that I had set up for. I believe he must have crossed my trail at least twice since I first saw him, but I don’t think he smelled me. I drew again and he soon stepped into a clear area just a little to the left and about 15 yards below my stand. This looked pretty close to a complete broadside shot, so I released and saw the arrow disappear into what looked like the center of his vitals. He took off going back in the direction that he had come from. Later, I would find that this was more of a forward quartering shot than I had thought, but it was still a good shot.
I nocked another arrow and waited a few minutes, but then lowered my gear, climbed down and went to find the arrow. The head was buried a few inches in the dirt and had good blood, obviously a complete pass through. The arrow did have some particles which made me worry that it had been a gut shot, but I determined that this was dirt kicked onto the arrow as the deer ran away.
I decided to wait an hour before tracking and passed the time by packing up gear, measuring the shot distance (just over 15 yards), and finding the start of the blood trail. While doing this, I heard what sounded like several deer go across the ridge top moving from the direction of Warrington road toward the neighboring property. They sounded close, but I was down hill of the stand at this point and could not see to the ridge top. I believe that I could have seen these deer from the stand.
When my hour was up, I started on the blood trail, which was pretty good for about 30 to 40 yards, but ended after that. At about the same point that the blood trail petered out, the brush gave way to a more open wooded area which sloped downhill a little more sharply and allowed a good view of the flatter ground below. A quick look around revealed the buck lying about 50 yards further on. Closer to him, I found several more good blood spots. After finding a downed deer, I like to backtrack and examine the trail as a way of improving my tracking skills. Thinking that he might have deviated a little, I searched in several directions for more blood, but found none. There was simply a distance of about 50 yards between the last blood and a good spot of lung blood only a short distance from where he went down. Had this been a thicker area where I could not have simply seen him lying at that distance, it might have been tough to find him. However, in thicker brush he might have left more blood on the higher leaves that would brush against his side.
I found that the arrow entered about the middle of the rib cage, but a little higher than I would have liked. It angled back and down, but still came out the other side with two or three ribs to spare and got both lungs. Total distance that he traveled was about 100 yards.
The deer was an average size buck with a nice four point rack. Not bound for the record books, but a trophy for me.
Greg Gearhart
Chair, Olive Mount Bowhunters