It's Not Over Yet

For one whole day after hearing that Mr. Big had been shot, I didn’t hunt. I sort of felt like there was no reason to. Then, after a day and a half of not hunting had passed, I realized that there were other deer in the woods so to speak. It was time to stop moping around and try to put some meat in the freezer.

 Even if I couldn’t shoot Mr. Big, there were still other bucks around, and some of them were pretty big. Most of them wouldn’t be dropping their antlers for another month or so, so this was my chance to get back out there and fill my buck tag, and as many doe tags as I wanted.

Now that it’s mid-December, the rut is over, the cold weather has set in, and up in the mountains where I live, we’ve had several inches of snow. Once this first week of firearm season is over and the drivers go back to the city, a handful of corn will ensure deer under your stand most mornings, and every night. Filming a doe kill shouldn’t be a problem; it all comes down to which will come first, the deer or the darkness.

And so, that afternoon I headed back out to my stand, a little under the weather but hopeful. It was supposed to snow so hopefully if the pressure of the drives hadn’t messed up the movement too much, some deer would show.

I climbed into my stand and set up my camera and remote, then took my shells out of my pocket to load my shotgun. Since it was so cold out, I didn’t feel like taking my gloves off, so the shells rolled out of my hand and all three of them hit the ground.

I sat in my treestand for a full five minutes, looking down at the three red cylinders on the ground.

Taking my gloves off, I climbed down, picked them up, climbed back up into my stand and loaded my gun.

Putting my gloves back on, I reached into my pocket for my cell phone.

Instantly it slipped from my hand and fell the 20 feet down out of the treestand to the snowy ground below. I sat there and stared down at the light blinking “new message”. I had two options. I could leave it there and wonder who had sent me a text and wonder what it said, or I could go down there and get it.

I climbed down and retrieved my phone.

That afternoon I saw nothing. I heard some drives going on a few miles away, but no deer were pushed my way. It started snowing, and the wind picked up. I put my hood up and leaned back against the tree.

It wasn’t the best day I’d ever had in the stand…but it felt good to be back out there. Sooner or later my luck will change, and when my deer walks by I’ll be ready. This season has been one of the worst I can remember, but it’s NOT OVER YET.