Then he turned a little and went across another 5 yards down the creek through an area I just couldn’t sneak an arrow through. I pulled out a desperation call and grunted . Every time I grunted he would stop and look back but he just had his mind made up and kept on going along the creek. I stayed in the stand until 11 waiting it out to see what else would come by and contemplating my next move. I ended up seeing 3 more bucks come by that morning but they were all 1.5 year olds. They all crossed exactly where they were supposed to
Finally I couldn’t take it anymore. How often do you know for a fact that there is a 5+ year old buck not too far away? I said to myself, I’m going after this buck and killing it! I made a plan to circle way up to the north and around this buck. There is a bean field recently cut that always has a bunch of doe sign in and around it to the north and more doe bedding to the west. The field is about 700-800 yards away through the timber and doe bedding is all up and down the creek that runs East to West. The buck headed to the Northwest. I figured this buck probably didn’t stay on his feet much longer after he went past me and thought he probably bedded somewhere within a couple hundred yards.
I made a big semi circle in a northerly direction to try and get around him thinking he would be trailing a doe in the evening on the way towards that field. They never make it into that field in daylight but it’s a long way. As I get closer to where I think the buck might have laid down I see some decent fresh sign on trails coming from the suspected bedding. I start to look around and decide where to setup, look down and there is a huge fresh bed matted in the leaves. Right away I knew it had to be from that buck. The bed was about 4 feet long with big tracks around it depressed down into the soft dirt under the leaves. There were also fresh rubs around it that were real fresh. Now I’m psyched! I start trying to pick a tree to setup in hoping the buck had bedded there then got up or possibly the bed was from the previous day.
As I’m trying to decide on a tree, I see movement and lookup as the buck is heading directly at me from 40 yards away. I grab an arrow from my quiver and thought, “oh crap, this is really going to happen.” The buck gets to thirty, looks up and I think he said to himself “oh crap, this is really about to happen “
He stars me down for about 10 seconds then turns and bolts.The buck must have heard me coming around behind him while bedded, not known what it was and jumped out of the bed and was coming back to the same spot. Was super close to pulling a bump and dump. Now this buck was bedded in the wide open hardwoods. The wind was blowing really hard so I’m thinking he bedded out there so he could use his vision for protection. Also as I later found out, there was a human access trail about 40 yards away that he was watching. I set up there anyway that evening hoping for the best but no buck.
The next morning I headed back to the same area as the previous morning sit but adjusted by 100 yards to try and cut him off before he got to that creek. Hoping he would come back through since I was a couple hundred yards from where I spooked him. No buck showed up by 9 so I got down to scout. When I got down I decided I would head back towards the last spot I seen him and try to connect the dots on the travel route he used and how that connected to the bed I jumped him from. As I walk down along the creek I come to a 90 degree bend in the creek and realize it runs me right back to that access trail cut by the state. Right then I catch movement and a deer with a rack running out of the thick cover on the other side of the creek and access trail. Again 2 days in a row, a buck (not positive but my gut tells me same buck) was bedded watching the access trail. From this spot the buck could watch the people trail and monitor doe traffic along the creek bottom. No wonder this deer has reached maturity.
I just started hunting this piece last year in late season. It’s big and it gets a ton of gun season and rut bowhunting pressur but this is two years in a row I’ve had a mature buck in bow range there and failed to release an arrow. I’ve got less than 10 hunts total there but I’m learning this place quick and feeling confident about killing this deer if no one beats me to it.
This is just another example of seeing things Dan and others on this site talk about concerning mature buck behavior prove to be spot on. This is rut bedding where the buck can also keep himself alive while keeping tabs on does. You really become convinced of this stuff when you see it with your own eyes.
Sorry for being long winded. Hope I didn’t bore anyone to death.
