First Deer with a Muzzleloader
As I stated in a previous post, I went deer hunting with Nick early this morning. We drove and then hiked out to this place that Nick had set up about a week earlier… out in some woods overlooking a field, outside Franklin a ways.
We got there around 5:30 or 6:00 A.M. We set up chairs and got comfortable… it was freezing. As Nick stated, now began the time of 97% boredom involved with any ordinary deer hunt. We sat… and waited.
Not thirty minutes after setting up our spot, we heard a coyote howling about 150 yards away in the field below us. Nick called to it using a wounded rabbit call, hoping that it might just come in close enough for us to take a shot at it. But it was dark, and we were being a little bit optimistic. It stopped howling… ten minutes later, after not having heard or seen anything, we heard a loud howl and yelping about 15 yards to our right. It was right on top of us! It was still mostly dark so we couldn’t see it… but it was there. Nick had his pistol in case it decided to jump us or anything, but we never saw it.
Back to waiting…
Around 7:00 A.M. it was beginning to get light outside. I had a pair of binoculars and was scanning the edge of the field below us. Suddenly, three does came running out of the woods onto the field. They were about 300 or 400 yards from where we were sitting - much too far to take a shot with a muzzleloader. To get a descent dead-on shot, you have to be within 100-150 yards.
We started walking slowly towards where they were grazing below us, stopping periodically when their heads would lift up… hoping not to be seen. We finally got within 200 yards… the closest we could get without stepping out into the open field where they were grazing. Suddenly, a small 8-point buck came running out of the woods, chasing the three does. Two of the does ran off into the woods in the opposite direction, while the buck lingered for a while on the field. It was a good 300 yards away - again, not close enough for a good shot.
We kept our eyes on the one doe left on the field… it was grazing closer and closer to where we were sitting - about 130 yards away now. The buck wandered off, to my great disappointment. It was never in range, so we decided to just go for the one shot that we could get on the doe.
With a muzzleloader, you only have one shot. It’s a black powder rifle that uses a lead bullet and … yes… black powder. It takes a good 2 minutes to reload once you’ve shot it, so we had to pick our shots carefully. If you miss on the first one, you end up empty-handed while a wounded deer is wandering out in the woods somewhere.
At a 120 yards, the doe we were watching got the bright idea of laying down in the grass behind the hill it was grazing on. All we could see was the head sticking up through the grass… again, too risky of a shot to take with only one bullet at 120 yards away. We waited a good 10 minutes. It finally stood up and started walking away from us, back towards the woods. It had heard something, and it looked like it was getting spooked.
At this point, I was leaning up against a tree on the edge of the field with the butt of the muzzeloader firmly in my left shoulder. I was watching through the scope, trying to stop my hands from shaking. Nick whispered to me, “As soon as it stops, pull the trigger.” It kept walking…
Nick made a bleating noise with his mouth - enough to make the doe stop out of curiousity. I pulled the trigger. “BOOM…” I looked up and all I could see was a huge cloud of white smoke in front of me. As the smoke cleared, I saw the doe fall where it had stopped only moments before out of curiousity. It got back up, ran about 30 yards towards the tree line but never made it. My first deer…
[Just as a note, I respect people who choose not to hunt. Nick and I both save and eat everything we shoot. Nothing goes to waste. It's also a fact that deer hunting keeps the deer population larger, as well as healthier, than if deer hunting were prohibited... if deer hunting were prohibited, many deer would live long enough to get diseases and parasites that would kill off a whole herd and actually eliminate a lot more of the population of deer than if they were hunted.]
Published on 4 Nov 2007 at 8:03 pm.
3 Comments.
Filed under A Day in the Life.
haha that’s awesome philip! too bad you didn’t get to see the coyote, but um good thing you didn’t die or anything. =)that would’ve been sad, you know missing the micro test and everything… hehe I’m just messing with you! but yea, your first deer, great!
Jessica Chen on 5 Nov 2007 at 11:34 pm.
haha thats great….i like the ‘disclaimer’ ;o)
Olivia on 6 Nov 2007 at 8:23 am.
you are such a guy.
Jess Gauley on 7 Nov 2007 at 4:16 pm.