My first hunt.

Barbara Jarrett

I'd always wanted to go deer hunting and it wasn't like I had no experience with weapons having been raised around them, hunting for small game , rabbits and such as well as being labled an expert marksman by the USAF. So one year I decided that was it I was going to give it a try.

I deliberately chose opening day as my then boyfriend was an avid bowhunter and would be hunting elsewhere that day. I wanted to do this myself. I wanted no one saying that *he* took me hunting etc.

I left the house that morning at about 6:15 just as it was getting light enough to see where I was walking without a light. It was cold and the clouds threatened rain. Perfect I thought as I trudged up the ridge behind the house. I got to the top of the ridge and sat about 30 yards off a main deer trail in some young white pines. As I sat my mind wandered as it does when one is sitting in the silence of a late fall day. I kept a sharp eye out for movement alnog the trail but there were deer there. As my mind wandered again I suddenly heard a sound....what was it? I concentrated on the sound. Turkey! It was a turkey I was hearing. A hen clucking and chirpping and then more joined in. A Gobbler let fly with a full throated gobble. They were all around me! In front, in back....everywhere! I sat for 20 minutes listening to the birds calling back and forth. Finally they moved on just as a light misty rain began to fall. 

I was beginning to get chilled from sitting still for so long. So I decided to walk all the way to the top of another ridge behind me. My BF had a stand part way down on the other side. It was in a known corridor that the deer traveled  on a daily basis. As I got almost all the way down to his stand the misty rain became a light rain in earnest. I was getting more and more chilled even while walking so I turned around and headed back up the slight incline, following the trail back. I wasn't paying close attention and it finally registered that I was hearing leaves rustling and small branches craking under the weight of a large animal. I froze and looked at the trail ahead and uphill of me looking for movement. After a few seconds which seemed more like an hour I saw it. Right to the left of the trail I was on. A deer ambling along with it's head down nibbling as it went.  I threw the rifle up to my shoulder and looked through the scope to see if I could see antlers and how big they were. All I could see was that it did have antlers. 

At that time I didn't have a shell in the chamber of the 25.06 I was using. So I gingerly pulled the lever back to pop a shell into the chamber. I got the lever back just fine but when I went to push it  home it wouldn't move! After trying to work it free for several seconds as quietly as I could I dropped to a crouch and decided the noise was a risk I was just going have to take. I fumbled frantically and finally got the bolt shoved back where it belonged. I slowly rose back out of the crouch I was in to see if the deer was still there. Not only was he still there but he still had his head lowered and was eating as he slowly made his way along. Incredibly he'd neither seen nor heard me! I put the rilfe back up to my shoulder and looked throught the scope once again. Yep, he still had antlers. I took a breath and slowly let it out as I fixed on a point about 6 inches below his spine and directly in back of his shouder. Slowly I squeezed the trigger. I never even felt the recoil or heard the loud 'boom' of the rifle as it went off. Suddenly the buck jumped and kicked just like I had been told he would if he'd been hit. He took off straight ahead in the direction he'd been ambling along towards. 

Shaking from the adrenalin rush I realised I had no idea where he'd been actually standing when I fired. How was I going to track him? Holy cow, I thought, now what? I walked over to where I *thought* he'd been. By this time I was shaking so badly I had to rest the rifle on the ground. I took a few deep breaths and lit a ciggarette. By the time I was done smoking I was steady enough to look around and see that the direction the buck was running in took him to the fence at the top of the ridge. There was a very distinct crossing place with several deer trails merging at that exact place which told me that this was more than likely where he'd gone. At this point I was going on instinct as I'd yet to find any blood to track. I carefully crossed the fence. As I headed downhill I could see that the trees and brush I was making my way through would end in a little valley about 50 yds below me. About 20 yds further on I suddenly smelled something I'd never smelled before......could it be from the buck? Another few steps and there it was....a blood trail on the ground. The smell grew stronger with each step I took. I cleared the trees and brush and came into the open. I turned to my right to look further downhill and there he was. About 30 yds down an old logging road from me, flat on his side.

I cautiously approached and poked him in the rear with the muzzle of my rifle. Nothing. He was down to stay.  Elation overtook me as I looked over my first deer. He was a 3 pointer but of good size. He looked to dress out at about 130 - 150 lbs. His rack was not large and he appeared to be a younger buck. What amazed me was that apparently when I fired I was shaking so badly that the muzzle dropped and my shoulder shot ended up almost a full gut shot. Not good. But when I looked at his belly there was a small slit about 4 inches long right below the bottom of the breast bone and that was it. How this kind of shot brought him down and so quickly remains a mystery to me.

I left the house about 6:15 and was back by 8:30 to get the ATV to load the deer to bring him out. Not bad for a first hunt.

Barbara Jarrett