Dan,
I have read many Hunter profiles here on the Beast but have never come across yours. Sounds like you have a ton going on right now but how about a real, real short version. How did you get into deer hunting, family? How did you eventually learn your tactics?
Thanks,
Rick
I grew up in a poor family in S.E. Wisconsin. My Dad worked 2 jobs to get us out of the city. He did not believe in women working and wanted my Mom to stay home and raise us right.
I had a job taking care of cattle and working a farm when I was 9, and kept helping till I was an adult working in a machine shop.
We lived off the land. I trapped, made money from the furs, and we actually ate the critters we caught. The least we could do if we were going to take there lives my Dad always said...
We harvested wild nuts, apples, berrys, mushrooms, ect. And made wine, grew a huge garden (small field) and caught lots of fish... Mostly bullheads, bluegills, suckers, crappies, whitebass, what ever yielded the most food per effort.
I started out hunting everything, or just chasing it down and catching it when the opportunity arose.
I started deer hunting at a pretty young age, younger than we were legally allowed. My 1st deer was a button buck. My 1st bow kill was a very long shot 6 pointer. I shot a lot of deer. Back in the 70's it was not like now, there were very few "big bucks" People would drive all the way to your house to see a small 8 pointer and you would get a slap on the back for months by people saying "heard you got an 8 pointer". Unfortunately we never took many pic's back then...
I was a killer... It was about bringing home food.
Back in a time when a 125 inch buck was considered huge. I was hunting in an area where "brown its down" was the attitude and a time frame when deer were considered food. You rarely seen 2 1/2 year old bucks. One year a buck showed up that was different, this buck grew a 9 point spindly rack as a 1 1/2 year old buck. and did something even more amazing, he survived to be a 2 year old. I found one shed side while tracking a different deer during hunting season. I recognized it immediately from seeing the buck during the hunting season prior. That year as a 2 1/2 he had a rack that would be P&Y. I was unable to get more than a few sightings of him that year despite trying hard. The next spring I went to the buck bedding area where I found the 1st shed and there laid one of his 2 sheds from his 2 year rack. It was a bedding point on a rolling rounded hill. Never found the other side of the 1 or 2 year old racks. Just had one of each. At this point I really wanted this buck. I started scouting a lot more. I always kind of geared towards bed hunting, though everyone said to stay away from it. I realized even back then that deer did not move much in daylight and you needed to be close to maximize your chances.
At the time I set up permanent stands and over hunted them, at least thats how I see it now looking back...
When he turned 3 1/2 he made a major jump to a 140's class animal. I started getting really serious about hunting for him and had many unsuccessful run ins with him. I called him in, got him to come in to doe scent, and kept getting busted. I had him come out of one of his bedding areas in a river oxbow and made a bad hit on him. The arrow took a bad flight and caught him in the hind quarters...
After that season I really put my mind to killing that buck and that was a turning point in my hunting career as I scouted very hard and started looking very close at the big buck bedding areas. I found both of his sheds that spring both in the same bedding area on the rolling point that I found the previous two. I had them mounted on a plaque. I found most of his bedding areas and really learned them inside out. That fall I was very confident.
I had several run ins with him again during the early season and the rut but had a hard time sealing the deal.
Gun season came and I had a simple plan, stalk into every one of his buck bedding areas till I found him and shoot him. I learned quick thru run ins with smaller bucks that they were bedding facing down wind, wind to back, and the best sneak was from a cross wind. I hunted hard all week hitting every bedding area with little to show for my dawn to dusk daily effort.
On Thanksgiving morning the wind was right to sneak into a couple that I had not yet checked. One was a small thick ravine thick with dogwood surrounded by an overgrown field. I new if he was there and I stepped into the redbrush he would simply run out the other side. So I got up in a high spot and threw a large rock at the top of an old junk car that was in the middle of the bedding area.
The large buck rose from his bed and sprinted out of the brush heading across the open grass. In the excitement I quickly started shooting and could see the slugs missing in the sparse snow and dirt, I told my self to concentrate and squeezed off the last round in the gun.
The buck never lost a stride and just kept bounding out of sight. I reloaded and got on the trail to follow up, I new I missed, but always followed up on my shots. I was really hoping to find the buck farther down his tracks and get another shot. When I got to the point where I took the last shot there was a little speck of blood on the snow. I looked up and could see lots of blood sprayed all over the snow.
I jogged up the trail to where I last saw the buck and there he lay, the last shot was true. Scored in the 160's.
Until I killed him, I always hunted alone and learned from the deer.
This buck was my mentor... All the deer that lived or died after that were my teachers...
A farmer whom owned a farm I hunted brought over another hunter from his farm to meet me and see the buck. That hunter Was named Andrae D'Aquisto and he had just started sand casting treestands. We hit it off and started a friendly competition. There was a little back and forth, but Andrae generally won... His bucks were usually just a little bit bigger. He always did whatever it would take, or cost, to get onto the best properties, or the spots where he located a huge buck. I gravitated more towards public land, or the farm that gave permission, the equal playing field of all hunters.
I taught him what I knew, and he taught me what he knew... I think the biggest things Andrae taught me, was to respect the deer I hunted, and to think with an open mind. The tactics he used seemed off the wall, and weird, but they worked. Like me, no one taught him to hunt, so he did not learn "how your supposed to hunt" he learned from the deer. Truly one of huntings greatest men.
I hunted all over Wisconsin, which meant hunting farms, steep hills, rolling hills, swamps, marshes, big woods, and I also hunted out of state a lot back in those days... Wisconsin is unique that it has a lot of public land and all the different types of terrain within its borders. Farm land, marsh, swamps, hills, big woods, etc, and I hunted and learned in all of those areas.
I started going to the shows with Andrae and selling the Lone wolf treestands. At the same time both of us were excelling at hunting and the bucks we were shooting were drawing a lot of attention...
Attention can be both good and bad... Lots of outdoor writers would come around and want to write about what we shot. I got invited to hunt with celebrities, and got on a few TV shows,
but there was also a dark side... A lot of people accused us of poaching, and said no one could legally shoot bucks that big year after year. Even a well known local celebrity said publicly in a seminar that he thought I was a poacher. That was hard for me to take... I think I had a big ego back then, and it got deflated. Andrae got mad about it, but kept going.... I kinda slowed down on the hunting and started guiding hunters. It took a lot of years, but I realized guiding is not for me...
I got back into hunting more to record into history the tactics that I learned over the years of hitting the hills, swamps, farms and woods than to prove anything... At this point in my life I am way more happy to help a friend get a buck then to shoot it myself. I kinda have a soft heart for the ones I kill... Not sure such a magnificent animal needs to die like that. Don't take that wrong. Im no anti-hunter or bunny hugger. I just have a lot of respect for the creature, and really, I ain't starving no more...
I was way happier for Mario watching him learn my ways in the swamp, and then in two years shooting back to back "biggest bucks ever". He was so happy with his big ten this year that he almost got a little misty eyed... To me thats what hunting is all about. Sharing and passing on the torch...
I had to redo all the pictures on here, and a lot were loss, I also found out quickthe the beast photo album has a limit. So hopefully, eventually I add more of the pics to have them in this one thread. But for now, this is it.
