Hard Lessons Learned

[Boogieman1]

Year was 2005. Just finished crawling out of the water with a stringer of crappie when a older gent asked me if I caught all them here. I knew by the house he came from he had a lot of land backing up to the lake including a 50 acre alfalfa field. I replied yes sir! Do you like crappie? I give u all you want for sole hunting rights. The man jumped on it an explained he didn’t hunt and has also never seen a deer on his property. I didn’t care and knew better based on the area in question. Told him I was gonna hang some cams and determine if there’s something I wanna go after. He asked me, if I get any pics can he have them for wildlife tax purposes. No problem I have been asked that b4.

I located in that time in my hunting a heart stopper. Was grey and old but prob didn’t score mid 120’s. But who cared he was a biggen to me. I showed the land owner the pic and he appeared just tickled his land had deer. Fast forward Halloween of that season I hunted it for the first time. The buck came through quick within range but I had no shot. Went back to work and got a call from the man a few days later. Said to swing by and take a look at something. He shot him opening morning of rifle season from his porch in the alfalfa field 200 yards away with a rifle. Cared nothing about the buck and wanted me to have him head and all. Guess he never understood why I hunted. I didn’t take the deer and never returned or talked to the man.


While I would never recommend lying to a landowner. There’s a don’t ask don’t tell policy I follow these days. I don’t have pics and don’t use words like nice! Or biggen! But instead pretty buck!

What’s your hard lesson learned?

[Twenty Up]

Man that’s rough.

I arrowed a rather large 140-150’s 8pt on some public land. On the phone with a buddy explaining the scenario I see an orange blob stumbling towards me. I told my buddy I’d call him back and here comes this glazed eyed, knuckles to neck tatted character. He was clearly under the influence and extremely lost. I pointed him the way out and explained to him that I had shot a deer and would be coming back later to track/drag him out. He asked where and I pointed with my two arms a general “over here” direction.

Fast forward 6 hours and homeboys truck was back in the same exact parking lot, also found his crossbow bolt on my bucks track (confirmed with 2 blood dogs).

I never found the buck, but am convinced this guy went in behind me and tried to kill the buck himself. Jumping a gut shot deer isn’t ideal and makes the tracking 100x harder....

In the future I’ll never tell anyone that I shot anything, if I have to explain anything, the animal will always be a “doe” or “spike” from here on out.

[Hawthorne]

Keep moving and keep scouting. But most of all keep your mouth shut. Lol

[Boogieman1]

Was rough! Lol Heck still rough. I’ve done some bone head stuff both b4 and after this incident. But I realized quick “Doah” my bad. Usually resulting in permission being leased out from under me. I get it money talks and Benjamin’s cut a lot of friendly ties. But in this particular case to the best of my knowledge that never happened. For the life of me I don’t know why that man sniped that buck off. When I said I didn’t want him his exact words were if I didn’t take him he’s just gonna lay out there and rot. Still see the man every spring fishing and I guess the bitter feeling is mutual cause we haven’t spoke a word since.

Something a lot of guys don’t think about is sometimes depending on the circumstances public is the least pressured stuff in the area if its enough acreage to get away. You take private that’s cut in small 30-50acre parcels. The owner says no one hunts but fails to mention kids/ grandchildren. And oh ya the family friends who only come down 2 weeks a year. When you mix that in with the surrounding small parcels getting peppered public is not near as bad hunters per acre. That said it is was it is. And this 10 acres is often not the same player as this other 2 acres based on cover and topography. But one thing about private that’s stinks is owners. Atleast public u know out the gate it’s competitive.

[matt1336]

Yeah my big mouth has hurt a few spots for me too.

[Edcyclopedia]

Good story / lesson, I suppose...
Funny how life goes, or not so funny, I suppose..

[Crazinamatese]

One of many hard lessons I learned is once that dead deer is loaded in the truck or car, get the heck out and don’t look back lol. 2010 gun season my brother and I filled our tags on a couple two year old bucks and a couple does on the neighbors land and decided to hang out in the woods for awhile sharing a 6 pack of beer and smoke cigarettes celebrating our kills. In the open field one of the biggest bucks came trotting out of the woods not even more than a hundred yards out across the field and all we could do is watch since our buck tags were filled we still talk about that moment during deer season.

[Swedishbowhunter]

I had secured some much sought after land out of state for myself and ex hunting buddy. On our way there I tell him about how i have been looking at maps of the place very closely and I believe that I found the "secret" of the property. We get there and we went to throw up some cameras, as we walk over to my suspected secret overlooked spot the sign lights up like crazy and gets better with each step. At the exact spot I had picked by internet scouting two heavy trails split an island of trees. I say and point to a tree "that is the tree I need to get in. He says start trimming it I will grab your stand. I then noticed a monster rub just 25 yards away, & we both were excited as this was the best looking spot we had ever seen. I started trimming and he went to fetch my stand, only to return with his stand. He said mine was too far back in the truck to get with out moving a bunch of stuff. I really didnt think much of it as we had done this sort of thing in the past, we hung a camera over a scrape and got out of there. 3 days later the wind was going to be right for the spot so after sitting elsewhere in the morning I snuck in there and grabbed a chip out of that camera. It was a freaking buck parade, almost all were daylight pics and there were 2 giants. At this point he says "I am sitting there tonight!!" I chuckled thinking he was joking & at this point I am still just so excited and proud that I had picked this killer spot out by utilizing the info I had learned from here and endless hours of podcast and studying maps. Then as we are looking at the pics one more time before heading out he says I am sitting that stand tonight, its my stand in that tree. I asked if he was serious and he was like yep. So now its time to go sit and instead of just telling him to pound sand i considered the fact that he hasnt ever connected on our out of state trips and I have had super success. Also he had a ton of problems going on in his personal life and was basically 100% depressed so I felt sorry for him. So I let him go sit there and I went to go sit elsewhere. On my way i realize if I walk in where I want to get to my wind would likely blow right into where I suspected this buck to be bedding. So I back out of that @ go sit in another spot that was really low on my list of places to sit. Sure enough he ends up shooting the 170" buck we had on camera. I was very happy that this spot I had picked out worked so perfectly, and happy he had finally broke his out of state cherry. So then the rest of the trip, not 1 hey good job picking the spot, not a thank you, nothing. Then he wanted to leave earlier than planned as he wanted to get back to his troubled life. He then went into a sort of depressed state and wouldnt even bs on the way home. I have to believe he must have felt like a complete tool for pulling this on me. This was this last November, and I havent spoke to him since. Rumor has it his ex girlfriend told another friend of mine that the only reason he went with me this year is he wanted to get the landowners contact info for himself(which he made a point of doing). Should be interesting what happens when its time to go this fall!!! Several lessons learned on this trip. 1 pick your hunting partner wisely 2. Loose lips sink ships

[4 the chase]

If you hear something fall from your stand in the dark before dawn, make sure it wasn’t the shell you thought you had chambered

[mipubbucks24]

Good thread, there are a lot of lessons in these posts. I have not really had some of these issues with other hunters because I am a loner, but land owners is a whole different story, they are a pain in the but and are one of the things that pushed me to start hunting public.

[Ryan549]

Keep moving and keep scouting. But most of all keep your mouth shut. Lol

Mouth shut, ears open. Best advice

[jkelley1487]

I had secured some much sought after land out of state for myself and ex hunting buddy. On our way there I tell him about how i have been looking at maps of the place very closely and I believe that I found the "secret" of the property. We get there and we went to throw up some cameras, as we walk over to my suspected secret overlooked spot the sign lights up like crazy and gets better with each step. At the exact spot I had picked by internet scouting two heavy trails split an island of trees. I say and point to a tree "that is the tree I need to get in. He says start trimming it I will grab your stand. I then noticed a monster rub just 25 yards away, & we both were excited as this was the best looking spot we had ever seen. I started trimming and he went to fetch my stand, only to return with his stand. He said mine was too far back in the truck to get with out moving a bunch of stuff. I really didnt think much of it as we had done this sort of thing in the past, we hung a camera over a scrape and got out of there. 3 days later the wind was going to be right for the spot so after sitting elsewhere in the morning I snuck in there and grabbed a chip out of that camera. It was a freaking buck parade, almost all were daylight pics and there were 2 giants. At this point he says "I am sitting there tonight!!" I chuckled thinking he was joking & at this point I am still just so excited and proud that I had picked this killer spot out by utilizing the info I had learned from here and endless hours of podcast and studying maps. Then as we are looking at the pics one more time before heading out he says I am sitting that stand tonight, its my stand in that tree. I asked if he was serious and he was like yep. So now its time to go sit and instead of just telling him to pound sand i considered the fact that he hasnt ever connected on our out of state trips and I have had super success. Also he had a ton of problems going on in his personal life and was basically 100% depressed so I felt sorry for him. So I let him go sit there and I went to go sit elsewhere. On my way i realize if I walk in where I want to get to my wind would likely blow right into where I suspected this buck to be bedding. So I back out of that @ go sit in another spot that was really low on my list of places to sit. Sure enough he ends up shooting the 170" buck we had on camera. I was very happy that this spot I had picked out worked so perfectly, and happy he had finally broke his out of state cherry. So then the rest of the trip, not 1 hey good job picking the spot, not a thank you, nothing. Then he wanted to leave earlier than planned as he wanted to get back to his troubled life. He then went into a sort of depressed state and wouldnt even bs on the way home. I have to believe he must have felt like a complete tool for pulling this on me. This was this last November, and I havent spoke to him since. Rumor has it his ex girlfriend told another friend of mine that the only reason he went with me this year is he wanted to get the landowners contact info for himself(which he made a point of doing). Should be interesting what happens when its time to go this fall!!! Several lessons learned on this trip. 1 pick your hunting partner wisely 2. Loose lips sink ships

Mannnnnnn, that is a hard one. I am sorry that happened to you. You handled it with class though. It's really hard to find a hunting buddy that is on the same page, it's probably why some of us hunt alone most of the time.

[Swedishbowhunter]

I had secured some much sought after land out of state for myself and ex hunting buddy. On our way there I tell him about how i have been looking at maps of the place very closely and I believe that I found the "secret" of the property. We get there and we went to throw up some cameras, as we walk over to my suspected secret overlooked spot the sign lights up like crazy and gets better with each step. At the exact spot I had picked by internet scouting two heavy trails split an island of trees. I say and point to a tree "that is the tree I need to get in. He says start trimming it I will grab your stand. I then noticed a monster rub just 25 yards away, & we both were excited as this was the best looking spot we had ever seen. I started trimming and he went to fetch my stand, only to return with his stand. He said mine was too far back in the truck to get with out moving a bunch of stuff. I really didnt think much of it as we had done this sort of thing in the past, we hung a camera over a scrape and got out of there. 3 days later the wind was going to be right for the spot so after sitting elsewhere in the morning I snuck in there and grabbed a chip out of that camera. It was a freaking buck parade, almost all were daylight pics and there were 2 giants. At this point he says "I am sitting there tonight!!" I chuckled thinking he was joking & at this point I am still just so excited and proud that I had picked this killer spot out by utilizing the info I had learned from here and endless hours of podcast and studying maps. Then as we are looking at the pics one more time before heading out he says I am sitting that stand tonight, its my stand in that tree. I asked if he was serious and he was like yep. So now its time to go sit and instead of just telling him to pound sand i considered the fact that he hasnt ever connected on our out of state trips and I have had super success. Also he had a ton of problems going on in his personal life and was basically 100% depressed so I felt sorry for him. So I let him go sit there and I went to go sit elsewhere. On my way i realize if I walk in where I want to get to my wind would likely blow right into where I suspected this buck to be bedding. So I back out of that @ go sit in another spot that was really low on my list of places to sit. Sure enough he ends up shooting the 170" buck we had on camera. I was very happy that this spot I had picked out worked so perfectly, and happy he had finally broke his out of state cherry. So then the rest of the trip, not 1 hey good job picking the spot, not a thank you, nothing. Then he wanted to leave earlier than planned as he wanted to get back to his troubled life. He then went into a sort of depressed state and wouldnt even bs on the way home. I have to believe he must have felt like a complete tool for pulling this on me. This was this last November, and I havent spoke to him since. Rumor has it his ex girlfriend told another friend of mine that the only reason he went with me this year is he wanted to get the landowners contact info for himself(which he made a point of doing). Should be interesting what happens when its time to go this fall!!! Several lessons learned on this trip. 1 pick your hunting partner wisely 2. Loose lips sink ships

Mannnnnnn, that is a hard one. I am sorry that happened to you. You handled it with class though. It's really hard to find a hunting buddy that is on the same page, it's probably why some of us hunt alone most of the time.

Thanks man,

[Boogieman1]

Tough break Pudster! Large antlers bring a lot of evil out in some folks. Personally what always makes me shake my head these days. Is when a friend asks to me to hunting with him at his lease. They usually tell me something like u can shoot a buck and all the doe u want man! They just don’t wanna go alone. Next thing you know 4 hrs in to a 7 hour drive you start hearing all the bucks that you can’t shoot. Your lease your rules I get it. But tell me that crap out the gate and not when we are almost there. That stuff is the kiss of death for me. Makes me nervous and convinced every buck I see is one of those “not for you” bucks. Stuff happens fast in the deer woods I don’t have time to be flipping through photo albums or sending text pics trying to get a green light. I flat hate it and would rather not even go.

[Drenalin]

Leave your cell phone in the truck, or the bottom of your pack. Don't be looking at that thing when you should be hunting.

Anything you're going to carry in the woods with you deserves to be thoroughly checked out before you step off. You don't need surprises when it comes to things you can control.

There's no such thing as too much practice, especially with a bow.