Coming Along Nicely

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Kraftd
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Coming Along Nicely

Unread postby Kraftd » Sun Oct 25, 2015 12:59 pm

So for those following the Live from the Field thread, I had an excellent couple of days of hunting the last few days in Central Wisconsin without actually getting anything.

Thursday PM, set up off of a cedar island in our swamp that I found precise beds in last winter. I knew the neighbors food plots were east and we have a trail just east of the bedding area, but never actually hunted back in the thick nasty stuff, usually stuck to transitions along islands in the swamp. Wind was NE and just off for the beds. Well I set up just off the bedding and heard a deer start milling around at around 4:30. Sounded like he was going to head out a little too far north, so I grunted at him and three times softly and heard him thrash some branches and start working my way. After about ten minutes, I finally got a visual and it was about a 130-135" eight that would have easily dressed 200, just a perfect swamp buck. He milled around in the thick stuff inside of 20 yards for about 20 minutes. I just needed him to cross the trail on either side of me for a shot. I think he hung up a little when he couldn't see the other buck. He started working off north and busted me trying to shift a couple of inches for one of the couple of lanes I had that direction. The sun was also right at the top of the trees and I had brand new hip boots on that were just a little shiny I think.

Friday AM, I set up in a location I have hunted quite a bit and done pretty well, but knew it was good timing. Spot is on the other side of our swamp(west) and is a strip of swamp about 75 yards wide with hardwoods to the north and west and a hemlock island immediately east. The transition is generally north south and we had a WNW wind. Deer generally work these transitions back to bedding in the swamp in the am. Around 7:15 I heard a deer working towards me. I originally thought he was coming to my west in the thick stuff, but then he started down the transition along the Hemlock island that would put him about 15 yard broadside. I shifted a little to get to the other side of the tree and way overestimated the back cover I had with a cedar behind me and spooked him at about 20 yards. Never saw headgear, but it was a large bodied deer. Not quite big enough to be the one from the night before, but reasonably certain it was a shooter (3.5+ for me here).

Friday PM, with rain moving in I went to check out some public I had cyber scouted. I was targeting a transition where a hardwood point dropped down into a thick tag alder creek flat at a near 180 degree bend about 3/4 miles from the access. I went in around 12:45 and found a really fresh scrape line and bumped a doe and two unknown on their feet walking in. Set up a stand to see how long I could get and about 2:30 I had a fawn come trotting through and heard something else splash across the creek. The rain got just a little too hard for me to feel comfortable shooting without losing blood, so I spent about a mile and a half zigzagging the transition down into the creek flat. I jumped a deer that splashed across the creek so I went a located his (assuming anyway) exact bed under a lone balsam in a tag alder jungle. Ground was too soft to really tell track size, but they were sunk in pretty good.

Saturday AM, I set up at the end of the scrape line before it dumped into the creek flat hoping when the rain slowed down something would come freshen up. I had to get on the road around 10, so around 9, with the woods being super quiet and the wind having switched to NW, I decided to sneak in another quarter mile and get within 40 yards of the bed from the night before and try to grunt him out of it. Set off north and was going slow and quiet. Got to the spot I wanted and made a few loud grunts with the wind in my favor. In my mind I had imagined him crashing right in for some reason, so after 5 minutes, I figured I buggerred him out the night before and slid from behind the big Hemlock I stopped behind to get a closer look...and then heard him take a few bounds into the thick stuff, before eventually heading across the river. I have a feeling based on how it unfolded that he had stood up and was surveying the situation.

Long winded perhaps, but thought I would share for the newer guys around here. Three years ago before I joined the Beast I would have hunted the same stands at least a couple of times over these couple of days and been sitting areas based only on past success without a ton of thought beyond the wind being ok for where I've seen deer before. My dad and an old friend of his, both in their late 60's were up sitting our normal stands closer to access, and while they were having a blast, neither saw a deer over the same time period and I saw deer all four sits. I sat three stands I have never hunted despite hunting this area for 25 years and did not sit the same area more than once.

This trip really clicked for me. I feel comfortable knowing I'm setting up in good odds situations and trust my instincts as far as selecting locations based on scouting and cyber scouting. It feels really good to head to the woods with that kind of confidence. That being said...I clearly need to work on finishing, but I think I'll have some more opportunities to give that a go! One of my best hunting trips ever.

Good luck everyone, we should be breaking loose any minute now!



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