As April turned to May, the buck continued to grow wider. Soon enough it was obvious that the deer would have tall brows and good mass.
As June came, the buck began growing quickly. He seemed noticably bigger each day. By the end of June, the deer had begun to grow matching droptines on both sides. I was losing most of my sleep over the buck already.
By July, I had the deer patterned extremely well. I saw the deer almost every time I went out glassing. He was hitting a couple clearings, and I would work my way back and forth to figure out which clearing he would feed at each evening. I hardly ever got close enough for pictures and I intentionally glassed from the same areas so I wouldn't bump the buck.
The first couple days of August were similar to July. I didn't have much trouble finding the buck. After the first couple days of August, I couldn't find him. I kept glassing and checking fields but he didn't show up. Here he is the first week of August.
I continued to glass into September. On September 14, the evening before opening day, I headed out to check some fields so I could make a plan for opening day. I decided to finish off the evening overlooking a clearing that the buck used most frequently through the summer. At last light, a massive bodied buck with a tangle of antlers on his head entered the clearing. I managed to snap a blurry, dark picture of him. I knew where I would be opening day.
On opening day I set up about 15 yards off the trail the deer took across the clearing. The deer crossed from a swamp on the other side of the clearing and made his way within 15 yards of the edge on the opposite side of the clearing. I had deer work by me all night, and about 10 or 15 minutes before dark I turned around, looked through the leaves, and could make out a big bodied deer coming towards me. After he made his way into a shooting lane, I recognized the buck, whistled, grunted, and finally yelled to stop him. He was farther than I expected him to come, so by time the arrow got there he ducked quite a bit and I hit him high as he turned around to run back the way he came from. I tracked him until 11 or 12 that night until the dew washed away almost all blood. The next morning I went back and found him.
