Wednesday, December 21, 2005
Picking The Wrong Stand.
Let’s face it. I picked the wrong stand tonight. It’s not the first time, and although I try not to make a practice of it, I do make the occasional mistake when it comes time to choosing a spot.
A friend came to hunt for two days, and spent two morning without seeing a deer. Last evening wasn’t very good either because the deer weren’t moving, but tonight I pinned my hope on a stand where I’ve seen a very large buck on several occasions.
Matt chose what would have been my second choice. His stand was an elevated coop that I call The Flagpole, and it is a dandy spot. It is up in the air a long ways, and many people don’t like it, but it attracts big bucks like iron filings to a magnet.
I sat in a ground blind, watching a field, and saw only a few small bucks and does. My hunch, as so often is true with hunches, didn’t pan out.
Now Matt, on the other hand, saw about 40 deer and some 30 of them were bucks of various sizes. One was a big wide-racked buck with a 30-inch spread but the tallest points were only about six inches high. The buck carried 14 points on a nearly perfect rack.
“That is absolutely the biggest whitetail buck I’ve seen in many year,” he said. “It could be seen coming through the woods, and he came within 15 yards of me but never offered a shot.”
Matt said the deer ran every other deer out of the area. There was some second-cutting hay on the ground, and the buck laid claim to it. He lowered that massive rack at any other buck or doe that came within 20 yards of him, and it was obvious he wasn’t willing to share any of the hay or any of his space.
The buck hung around the area for a half-hour, and as the daylight began to run out, the buck moved on in search of an estrus doe. Two or three of the does, and one or two small bucks returned, but that buck had provided Matt with a world of anxious excitement.
“I probably would have shot that buck if he had presented a decent shot, and then worried about how to pay for it,” he said. “It was one of the most exciting moments of my life, and to think that big rascal is still hanging around looking for does at this time of the year.”
I told him the second rut is underway, and although it is nothing like the primary rut, it is enough to bring some of the major bucks out of the woodwork. Most of the does now being bred are small does coming into their first estrus, but there is still some competition among major bucks for breeding rights.
The buck he described has been seen by several people but no one has really had a decent shot at him. He is too big to just shoot at without knowing the shot will be a killing one.
Such bucks, although very scarce anywhere whitetails are found, should be a huge animal next year if he survives the winter. My hunch, hopefully better this time than in my choice of stands tonight, is this may be the major buck on the ranch next year.
We certainly hope so.