Flashback Friday

These pictures are from last years hunting season. It was a great year for us all. Rod, Dad, and I all ended up with a trophy. Dad and I parted ways in the predawn morning of the last Saturday. Rod and I had both shot 10 points the first day and I shot a doe the following morning. The spot for the three of theme was at the good old "sweetspot". I left Dad there and made my way to the "backdoor" to make sure no deer ran into the development. It was 10 degrees out and the wind was blowing at a good 20+mph. You do the scientific math - Very Cold!

About an hour after daylight I heard Dad's .308 crack the morning air. One shot and silence. My cell phone rang "I think I just shot someone's dog." You have to understand that in Pennsylvania any dog that runs deer during hunting season or any other time is fair game. A dog can run a deer until it collapses then it is usually killed. Dad had been watching a 6 point buck which was not a legal one in WMA 2D. Just about a 1/2 a mile was route 119 and it would have been another deer in the freezer. as he watched another doe come through the pines he waited for the flash of brown and waited to see if it had antlers. He decided if it was a doe he would just go ahead and take it. As the brown head appeared through the pines his .308 laid it down as quick as it had appeared. The problem was when it went down it thrashed and a tail was flipping around. The coyote had dropped in a little depression on the trial about 125 yards away and remained almost completely out of sight. All he could see was enough hair to know it was not a deer. His first instinct was a dog, but did not think it was a dog either. I told him that he had more than likely shot a coyote. I told him to stay put and I would circle around the back of the pines and try to push a buck toward him. I did alright, the same 6 point came meandering by again. You can't grow horns by watching them in the scope. Then he jumped I had just shot. His guess - Byron shoots = dead deer. He was correct except it was not the right kind of a deer. Then he heard a second shot.....

What happened next was not the best deer story I have. It includes a state cop and a Game warden. I had moseyed along the back trail overlooking Bob Herman's house. A spot where I have kicked up literally over a hundred deer over the years but never had any success. I would usually jump them and they would take off running through 40 year old overgrown Christmas trees. The property used to belong Musser Nursery. It is rather thick in spots with all kinds of "junk" growing in it. As I walked along I saw 3 doe bedded down about 50 yards ahead of me about 10 feet off of the trail. As is my tradition I never shoot a deer laying in its bed. They quickly jumped up and bounded away giving me time to look at each one of them in my scope. They were all doe. As the ran down over the hill I waited till they came to a stop at the edge of the woods by the harvested corn field. I picked out one and noticed I was shooting through allot of limbs and about 80-90 yards. When I shot they all took off and I could see two run across the field. The third one amazingly was till standing there. I shot again and it promptly fell over. What I did not realize that a spike with the smallest rack I had ever seen had been laying down along the field and stood up when they ran across the field. one of them curled back along the field toward the north and up into the woods. The second shot had dropped him in his tracks. I did not realize this for I could not see him right away I moved around trying to scope out if I had hit anything. A I started to make my way down over the hill I saw two hunters coming my way. I knew them both and figured we would swap success stories for the year. The one was a state cop and had taken a huge buck two years before at the very spot my deer was laying. They got to the deer first and I heard them say "Uh Oh...someone shot a spike!" WHAT????!!!! I could not believe it! After we talked about it he said that he had watched this deer for quite awhile in his scope and never saw the spikes. As you can see the tiny pencils on top of his head were covered by the big brown ears. Fortunately for me his hunting buddy was the head WCO for this area and he called him and got him out of bed to take care of my "mistake kill". Fortunately for me he was there and witnessed it. The warden could see that the spikes were very small and gave me a 25.00 restitution fee for a mistake kill instead of a 100.00 - 300.00 fine which would have gone on my record and also lost my license for the next year. He handed me another tag and said happy hunting and make sure is does not have an antler. I was so disgusted by then that I decided to quit hunting and head home.