Monday, October 27, 2008
Never Let A Lie Get In The Way Of A Good Story
Deer tales are cut from the same fabric as fishing lies. You know: the trout was this long or the buck’s rack was this wide, all told with a straight face and widely spread arms.
The strange thing about some of these deer tales is that some of them may be true. Some are so wild they must be true because no one could dream up something so far-fetched.
Some are told to get a rise out of any listener. Some are told as outright lies, and as earlier stated, some could be true.
A man I know tells of watching a doe lead a buck past his stand during the rut. The doe walked in front of the hunter who patiently waited at full draw from the comfort of a wooden ground coop. The doe walked past the shooting window as he waited patiently for the buck.
The nose and antlers of the nice 8-point came into view, and the buck crossed from left to right. The hunter waited for a broadside shot, and when it came, he aimed and shot.
The arrow shaft, he said, hit the edge of the window frame and kicked sideways. The buck turned, looked the hunter in the eye, and bounded off, unhurt. He hears some thrashing in the nearby marsh grass and tag alders, and steps out to recover his arrow.
There near the coop door lay a dead doe. The animal, according to the story, caught the deflected arrow in the spine. When the arrow shaft hit the window frame edge, it kicked to the side, and hit the doe. He swears it is true, and who am I to argue the point.
Years ago, a hunter told me he had talked to a hunter who insisted his tale was true. He’d spotted a buck jump a dry drainage ditch at the same spot several days in a row.
He set out to ambush the jumping buck. As the story goes, he peeked through tall marsh grass and watched the buck come toward him. He came to full draw, while laying on his back on the ground, and waited.
The buck could be heard at the edge of the ditch, and as the animal sailed over his head, he released the arrow. The arrow entered, he said, just behind the brisket, hit the spine and exited the animals back.
He said a motorist almost hit the animal as it crumpled on the road side. Again, a sworn true story. Could it happen? I guess so, but shooting while laying on your back seems a bit of a stretch.
There once was a passel of guys that used to go to Tennessee each year to hunt wild boar with spears. They would confront a big boar, plant the butt end of the spear shaft into the ground, and when the boar charged, they would meet it with a big spear point.
So the story goes, they killed a number of boar in this manner and wanted to try it on deer. They knew they couldn’t entice a deer into a charge, so they decided to try spearing from a tree stand, even if it wasn’t legal.
One gent said a fat little year-and-a-half 6-point came walking past his stand, and he drew back his arm, and threw the spear. The point sliced in behind the front shoulder, knocked the deer off its feet, but it ran off and the spear fell out.
The violator climbed down, gathered up his spear, and took up the copious blood trail. He trailed the deer for 150 yards, saw it ahead and started walking up to the animal, his spear ready for another thrust in the unlikely event the animal got up.
He squatted down, the spear held with the point upright like a Masai warrior, to admire his handiwork, when the spear was ripped out of his hand. He jumped up, spun around to see a smiling conservation officer. He was ticketed, and lost his deer and spear, or so the story goes.
Some of these stories are almost too tall to be a true tale. They do show a great deal of imagination if they aren’t true, and like I said earlier, some of them are so far off-center they may even be true.
The countdown to the opener has begun. Be safe over the weekend.—The Whitetail Wizard