I got in to the area I was going to hunt and sat down at the base of a Pine tree while it was still too dark to see this morning. I was facing East, breeze in my face, hoping a deer would come out of last year's clearcut into the woods in front of me.
The sky on the horizon was just barely light enough that I could make out black silhouettes of some tree trunks close in front of me. Spent another minute or two with my head down getting overhauls zipped up, priming the lock, etc, and lifted my head back up to glance around.
About 25 yds in front of me, silhouetted against the faint light on the horizon, was the unmistakable black shape of a bucks head facing me, ears silhouetted out, antlers silhouetted up (4 pointer?? - 6 pointer??) facing straight at me.
Since I was sitting down low looking up at a slight angle, all I could see was the black silhouette of the head, no body was visible yet. I froze...but he had me in his radar, staring down at me on the ground...with the breeze in my face I knew he couldn't scent me so he was trying to see/hear what the big dark blob was.
I made the mistake of thinking it was so dark and I was down so low that I could slowly get the rifle out from under the big hand warmer muff on my lap...hadn't moved it an inch or so and he'd had enough, wheeled around and bounded away. No panic running, no snorting, etc...just decided, "no, I don't like this", made a few big graceful bounds and was gone.
I'll tell you, for me, those encounters are what makes deer hunting special...sure we all like to bag a deer, but a situation like this is really good too...it was less than a minute facing each other but it was really something...that close to one of natures biggest and brightest...knowing that mind was working overtime trying to figure out was in front of him, and finally those instincts kicked in and he was gone...king of the woods... :master:
An hour later I saw a doe coming along from my right to my left, and would pass behind me...I couldn't do anything but hope she'd change directions but she didn't...when she passed behind me and hit my scent stream in the breeze, she went snorting off into the next county.
So today, they won: Flintlock 0, Deer 2...but a great day just the same... :redthumb:
The sky on the horizon was just barely light enough that I could make out black silhouettes of some tree trunks close in front of me. Spent another minute or two with my head down getting overhauls zipped up, priming the lock, etc, and lifted my head back up to glance around.
About 25 yds in front of me, silhouetted against the faint light on the horizon, was the unmistakable black shape of a bucks head facing me, ears silhouetted out, antlers silhouetted up (4 pointer?? - 6 pointer??) facing straight at me.
Since I was sitting down low looking up at a slight angle, all I could see was the black silhouette of the head, no body was visible yet. I froze...but he had me in his radar, staring down at me on the ground...with the breeze in my face I knew he couldn't scent me so he was trying to see/hear what the big dark blob was.
I made the mistake of thinking it was so dark and I was down so low that I could slowly get the rifle out from under the big hand warmer muff on my lap...hadn't moved it an inch or so and he'd had enough, wheeled around and bounded away. No panic running, no snorting, etc...just decided, "no, I don't like this", made a few big graceful bounds and was gone.
I'll tell you, for me, those encounters are what makes deer hunting special...sure we all like to bag a deer, but a situation like this is really good too...it was less than a minute facing each other but it was really something...that close to one of natures biggest and brightest...knowing that mind was working overtime trying to figure out was in front of him, and finally those instincts kicked in and he was gone...king of the woods... :master:
An hour later I saw a doe coming along from my right to my left, and would pass behind me...I couldn't do anything but hope she'd change directions but she didn't...when she passed behind me and hit my scent stream in the breeze, she went snorting off into the next county.
So today, they won: Flintlock 0, Deer 2...but a great day just the same... :redthumb:
eace: 
