Squint to see the antlers.

[waksupi]

Finally found SOMETHING for the freezer. I may have taken this one even in a year when we had a good deer population. Spindly antlers, one growing forward, one back. Never would have been good in the gene pool.

Rattled him in to about 30 yards. This was on my neighbors property, just a couple hundred feet less elevation, but MUCH less snow than I have been hunting in.

I used one of my .358 Winchesters, with a Mountain Molds 265 gr. boolit. I discovered my alloy was way too hard, as this boolit shattered. This is the first time I have had this happen with my hunting boolits. But, I'm not 100% positive they were my hunting loads, I just picked up a box of cartridges I had sitting by the safe, so they are really mystery loads. I'll have to check the hardness on them this afternoon.

If I would have been thinking, I could have held my rattling antlers in there, and made him look bigger!

I saw a flock of turkeys down the road, and discovered I still have a tag, so will be concentrating on the turkeys and hares, until we get good enough ice for fishing. Whitefish run in the river is getting stronger, so I will go after some of those for smoking. The elk are scarce enough in this area now, that they will be a target of opportunity if they make a show, but I won't be knocking myself out looking for them.

[starmac]

I have never heard of a good way to prepare them horns for the dinner table anyway.
That looks like some good groceries to me.

[MtJerry]

I am jealous. Been hunting all season and haven't seen a buck I could kill. "Bucks only" is really hurting us this year along with low deer counts. Of course I've seen about 8,000 does!!!!

[Red River Rick]

Ric:

Yesterday was a rabbit and today a deer! At the rate your going.............you'll have the freezer full in no time. All you need now is to drop a nice calf elk.

Good going!

RRR

[bruce drake]

It seems like every doe in the neighborhood knew I only have a buck tag and the only bucks I've seen have been in the cantonment areas on mainside here on Post where it's Archery only.

[gon2shoot]

Bout time Ric, I was starting to wonder if you were really trying. lol

[OBXPilgrim]

Opening day of gun deer season in NC & I watch a button buck for 45 mins. Has to be "exposed antler protruding". Lucky little pile of veal tender venison

[mroliver77]

Man we are allowed four deer this year! I am afraid they will get populations knocked down to the point of buck only season again. The deer really put the hurt on our soybeans this year!
Jay

[357maximum]

Good Job Ric..........maybe your boolit was just too darn cold. I saw rubber shatter once after being exposed to liquid nitrogen....maybe the same similar type thing happened.


Ya'll should come hunting in Michigan as the DNRE wants all them all deers extinct so that yuppie peoples can drive blind at warp speed with no danger to their Beemers anyway.

[waksupi]

After cutting this little guy up, I guess I didn't really have a problem with the boolit shattering, at least not that I will ever worry about. The shot entered the left side lung, and exited the large leg bone, shattering it, and making a pretty good hole in the shoulder blade. The exit wound was around 1 1/2", about what I expect from a .35 with a good boolit. I had found a few very small lead fragments, probably under 5 grains each, so the major part of the projectile obviously did what it was supposed to. Good hole in the lungs, and the blood was in one big clot inside the body cavity. It dropped where it stood.
Even with the damage the boolit did, I didn't loose more than 8 ounces of meat, if that. Cast boolits just don't seem to have the problem of blood shot in meat, as high velocity bullets do.
Nosler's only wished they could work as well.

[Smoke-um if you got-um]

Deer shortage ? Here in Maryland they're about to be declared varmints. Just kidding, but the deer population has grown to be extremely large in most areas of the state. If a person hunting each season, bow, ML,shotgun/rifle, filled all the tags available for both antler and non-antler deer quite a few freezer's would be filled to the brim.

[Crawdaddy]

Congrats on the deer. You can't eat antlers so the rack doesn't matter. Good luck with the turkeys.

[-06]

Congrats on your buck. Got ticked off royally this morning. Let a doe pass yesterday and this morning I was watching a nice six pointer come into range. He bedded down before getting to me so I waited about an hour and decided to jump him up. Circled him to get a safe shot but he outsmarted me and ran toward our home. Will be there again waiting for his highness. Next time I will shoot him lying down-lol.

[waksupi]

Well, he will be lying down after you shoot him, anyway! I hunt bedded deer, and have shot a half dozen bedded white tail bucks over the years. I figure if I can sneak up on a white tail buck in the timber, I win, he looses.

[DanWalker]

Nice job! Enjoy the venison.

[white eagle]

should be tasty

[Doughty]

shoot-em-if-you-got-em,

If Maryland wants to do away with their deer population, just have them get some Montana wolves and lions. They won't have a deer population for long.

Richard

[chambers]

Good job on the deer hunt!

Another way to reduce the deer herd similar to Wisconsin: large black bear population, large growing wolf population, many coyotes, CWD eradication for portion of state, DNR wants to drop the herd to record low levels. When we use to bow hunt 20 years ago 20+ deer a night, now 5 deer a season if you have a good year on private land.

[white eagle]

amen to that chambers
all gun season so far 1 deer is all I have seen