The following story is about a bow hunt that unfolded in a typical way, but concluded in an unusual and unplanned way. I’m not an expert archery hunter, but I’m always wondering how my hunts could have been better executed. Actually, all hunts never conclude. As we travel their paths in our memories every day, we cycle through new observations, questions, and answers.
By Mike Bowman
I finished my lunch, corked up my face, bit off a plug of black licorice, and hiked into the middle of the fall woods shortly after the morning’s intermittent sunshine had stabilized. With the hillside warming up, it was turning into a beautiful afternoon for deer hunting, unlike the morning that had froze me out. This was my kind of hunting weather: brisk and breezy, with a blue sky as backdrop for the green pines and fall colors. My favorite tree stand is surrounded by all of this. It’s up a Scotch pine about one hundred and fifty yards behind the house. The area is thick with brush and briars, hawthorns and hardwoods, spruce and pine, and crisscrossed throughout with faint deer trails. The sunshine drenched the woods and brought out the gray squirrels, who were distinctly absent this morning. They skittered off in every direction as I hit the trail. Even a black fly or two greeted me.
By about 2 PM those black flies were probing the perimeters of my nose, eyes, and ears and I decided to just pack it in and go home. Any deer within a hundred yards couldn’t possibly miss my flinching twenty-five feet high up in the tree. Mother Nature was testing the bug repellent that I’d forgotten to use. But before descending from my treestand for the hike home, I stood up and blew a couple of challenging buck grunts toward the open woods and awaited a result. Over the next ten minutes I absorbed the scenery while observing various groups of black‑capped chickadees flitting from tree to tree, pecking small bugs off the limbs. I hoped that their menu included black flies. Then a twig snapped far off to my left, to the north. Since my platform faces east toward the open woods, I slowly scanned over my left shoulder and saw some nice antlers bobbing about 75 yards away. They were attached to a deer who was headed southwest along a deer trail that misses my stand by at least fifty yards. He eventually passed through the perimeter of a campground that I have. It’s a small clearing north of my treestand. It has grass, a few trees, and a firepit. That’s when I made out the mass of his body. The clearing silhouetted a considerably big buck that was on the move. With no one listening to me, I quietly whispered a curse word in dismay of the unfolding events that were probably initiated by my call.
As he slowly passed my campground he gave no indication of turning, least of all toward me. I thought about luring him closer and reached for the grunt call when he suddenly paused. I, too, paused in mid-thought and mid-reach, as he seemed to melt into the brush. And then I couldn’t make him out at all. It was best not to call him. I kept scanning, my eyes and ears probing the leafy cover here and there, but with ineffective results. Then I heard buck footsteps from somewhere. Buck footsteps are often distinguishable from most deer noise in that their weight and cadence convey a purposeful intent. Eventually I focused on his movement in the cover and saw that he’d changed directions and was now heading due south on a different deer trail that was, fortunately, uphill and upwind from me. I estimated that he’d pass within 25 yards of me if he continued on that trail, which intersects at right angles yet another deer trail, the one that I used to get to my stand. At that intersection there’s a slight clearing where the two trails crisscross each other. The plan that I cogitated would conclude with a non‑trivial twenty‑five yard shot into that clearing. The first step in the plan required that I quietly rotate clockwise on the platform, a difficult thing to do with every muscle vibrating. Then I slowly clipped my release onto the string and waited, ears listening and heart beat ramping up.
While mentally rehearsing the developing situation, the footsteps stopped. No longer oriented to see the buck’s approach on the trail, I could only view the clearing at the trail crossroads. The local woods became silent, and my ears strained to detect any telltale sounds. I thought it interesting that this buck wasn’t grunting while he himself was searching for a grunting buck. I remember that black flies probed my forehead under the brim of my hat and that I didn’t flinch. Somewhere out there in the thick brush the big buck was immobile, probably sampling the woods for the scent, sight, and sound of another deer – or me. Meanwhile, twenty-five feet up in my tree stand, I also stood immobile, silently inhaling the cold air around the licorice in my mouth. The survival instincts and habits of the older, and therefore successful, deer include the following: walk, pause, smell the air, focus on movement and sound, identify it, swivel ears to listen for anything behind you or to the sides, smell some more, decide whether to continue walking or begin running, … or, stand perfectly still smelling the air for a few long seconds to provoke any predators into revealing themselves, or if some distant unidentified object catches your attention, catch its attention by stamping, or turning your head away in disinterest and then quickly looking back. And it almost always works! Perhaps this buck had seen me maneuver in the tree. It wouldn’t be the first time that I’d been picked off while turning around on a stand. Then I started to wonder if he had changed course yet again, after I’d turned in the stand, or if, with my back toward him, he was already silently sneaking away behind me on another deer trail. If he had done that and my back was toward him, it would be a major miscalculation on my part. The urge to turn myself around for a look back was great. Instead, I resisted and remained frozen, awaiting the outcome from the inevitable mistake that one of us had just made. I hoped that it wasn’t me.
I heard the footsteps start up again. Nothing was moving in my present field of view. The footsteps were unhurried, at the same pace as heard earlier, telling me that I was still undetected. My ears and eyes began to intersect on the deer trail where the footsteps should be, yet I still couldn’t see him. Slowly the antlers materialized behind some briars and hawthorns, gliding along the path leading to the trail crossroads. With the buck in view, I smoothly went to full draw while lowering the sight pin on the clearing that he was about to enter. He paused again in the cover. This was good exercise for my heart, which by now was soaring like an eagle, as the Iroquois might say. He stood still for a few moments outside of the clearing, his antlers tilting as he sensed the local breeze. I was downwind from him but I wondered if he’d caught some of my old scent at the trail crossroads. One of these trails was the very path that I’d taken down to my stand. I hoped that he smelled the cooking of a late lunch coming from some unidentified distant kitchen. He stepped forward and walked right into the clearing. He was a heavy eight-pointer and I wished that I’d had more time to admire him. I swallowed hard and anchored the kisser button to the corner of my mouth. The twenty-five yard pin was aimed low behind his shoulder. My finger tightened on the release trigger. But then he suddenly turned left and began walking downhill toward me on the other deer trail – MY TRAIL! I held up the shot because he was now turning toward me, making a giant circle in the woods that would pass within ten yards of my stand. It would result in a better shot for me.
Moving downhill, he again paused within the trail cover. Was he spooked? Apparently not. The innate behavior of older deer reduces their vulnerability, whether pausing to scan ahead, listening for invisible threats, or just immobilizing themselves within light cover. All I can do is wait and wonder. But then he began walking again. My eyes swept left ahead of him down the trail and I selected an opening to shoot through. This part of the hunt seemed to progress too quickly for me. Despite my muscle movements running on “automatic,” programmed by years of practice, I felt an urge in my body to slow down. I adjusted my stance, leaned forward and relaxed my knees slightly in order to make the imminent high‑angle shot. Just as his head entered the opening I said, “Ma!” and he hesitated a bit, actually just a hitch in his step. He continued on. I repeated “MA!” louder, and this time he froze right in the opening, facing downhill. The pin, already aimed low and locked onto the ribs behind his shoulder, vibrated slightly. Although this is “can’t miss” distance, it’s without guarantees; the arrow will take one tenth second to reach him. My trigger finger squeezed and the arrow accelerated over the launchers.
With no discernible arch to its trajectory, the arrow struck him high (in a spinal vertebra) as he lunged forward right past some saplings. He crushed them as he rolled onto his left side, partially burying the carbon arrow shaft into the ground before snapping it off. My fingers stiffly loaded another arrow as fast as they could, but they didn’t set it properly atop the launchers. When I made my next shot at his ribcage, the vanes on the arrow got pinched between the launchers, instantly braking the carbon arrow to a dead stop. It teetered harmlessly off the riser, the shaft tumbling from limb to limb down to the base of my tree. As he struggled to get up, it was apparent that blood was flying out of him in good quantity. A good hit, but was it enough? I didn’t analyze it because he was still flailing his way downhill with only his front legs, thrashing his rack and hooves into small trees, ripping up dirt, moss, and vegetation. I mentally criticized myself while rapidly loading my last arrow. I shot it as soon as a clear path to his ribs appeared through a distant downhill opening. The arrow arched through twenty‑five yards of air, striking him above his left shoulder, and exiting above his right shoulder. If I had another arrow, I would have shot it, too, but I was out. Who needs four arrows to kill a deer? On this day, apparently I do.
He was still trying to get away and I needed to be on the ground to finish him off. With hands and legs somewhat under control, I rapidly lowered my bow to ground, unhooked myself from the safety rope, and express-elevatored myself down the ladder. At the bottom of my tree I grabbed the bow, retrieved my fallen arrow, and ran downhill. I snuck through the brush and came up behind him, loaded the arrow, stood up, and at a range of ten yards put my final arrow, broadside left to right, through both of his lungs. I watched him continue to thrash around for several seconds, waiting for the inevitable roll over and “death grunt.” Big deer die hard if they aren’t running. Then he relaxed and expired, which was the desired result. I made sure that he was dead by walking around behind him, clear of his rack, and tapping on his eyeball with a handy twig. The big buck’s turmoil, and mine, was over.
Epilogue
Up at the house, my wife heard me call her on the walkie-talkie and I suggested that she bring the camera and meet me halfway down the trail out back. When we met up she asked me where the buck was and whether it was field dressed yet. After a quick explanation about the nature of the scene she was about to see, we threaded our way down the path, past the flattened vegetation streaked with blood. This was to be her first visit ever to a fresh deer kill site. She steeled herself and took some pictures of me with the buck. Then she politely asked to be excused.
The buck was much larger than any I’d killed before. I was amazed to see that my forearm from elbow to fingertip could fit between his main beams. His body was bigger than any previous deer of mine. The punishing drag home lasted until nightfall. It took weeks for my strained muscles to repair. When I hoisted him all the way up with the gambrel in my garage, his head never left the floor, a new milestone. I foresee an improved hoisting technology sometime before next season. Days later, when describing how big he was to another hunter, he interjected, “How many points?” to which I responded, “Eight.” His response was a furrowed brow and, “Oh, yeah? My cousin got a ten-point!” Thereafter, I started showing the picture of myself with the big eight to save some explaining time.
After a few days of cold aging, I carefully butchered the deer. I found that the first broadhead had hit the vertebra and had subsequently been separated from the arrowshaft when he rolled over on it. It hadn’t actually penetrated to the spinal cord; it was only embedded in the solid bone surrounding it. I think that the force from the arrow’s impact had so jarred the vertebra that it pinched the spinal cord at the joints, paralyzing him from that point backward. Since he was paralyzed and only moving with his front legs, he didn’t expend the physical energy that he normally would have from running. Therefore, my later arrows, one of which penetrated both lungs, did not cause the usual copious hemorrhaging that occurs when a deer runs. In fact, a photograph taken immediately after the hunt shows no evidence of the blood that you normally see around the mouth of a fresh-killed deer that was shot through both of the lungs.
What did I do right? There were two big decisions. First decision: when I spotted the buck to the north of me, when he wasn’t heading directly toward me, I didn’t grunt at him to make him turn my way. Why not? Years ago in a similar situation, I grunted to bring a wandering buck in closer and it spooked him. This time, I hesitated. Instead, I observed how the situation was developing. Because the buck was responding to my original grunts, and he knew about where they originated from, he eventually turned toward me on his own. Second decision: after I had already quietly turned around on my stand to face the clearing at the trail “crossroads,” I could have made the mistake of turning back around on my stand to look for him after he suddenly went quiet. Here I was worrying that he had changed course and was sneaking behind me, but that wasn’t the case at all. Older and smarter deer often immobilize on the trail in order to check for danger. Be patient and wait for them to begin moving again. If I had turned around on my stand, he probably would have spotted my unnecessary movement.
Was it my fault that my first arrow missed the lungs, and instead hit him high? In all likelihood, it was not. I’m saddened by the complication that overtook this particular hunt. When bowhunting whitetails, aiming broadside low behind the shoulder is no guarantee of a sporting outcome. Most hunters are cognizant of how deer can, and often do, react to the sound of the bow. Each deer is different, but most deer usually cock their legs in preparation for the explosive first jump away from the sound. By aiming low, the deer will “drop into your arrow.” On this particular day I could have aimed even lower, but risked a complete miss. Was it my fault for mis-loading my second arrow? Yes. In the excitement of the rapidly developing situation, I mis-loaded my second arrow on the launcher and it cost me a rapid follow-up shot. When unplanned events begin happening fast, we need to react by double-checking. Should I have brought more than three arrows? Yes. I should have brought at least four. Should I regret that after eleven years of bowhunting I still can’t guarantee where the deer will be at the moment of arrow arrival? Yes. However, I understand that we can’t control a deer’s incredible reflex reactions; we can only anticipate them. With the memories of each passing season, I anticipate continued questioning and better understanding on my part. Our failure to learn is what makes any hunt unsuccessful.
The Big 8:
End of the Drag:
