Well boys, it has been back to the ranch for the month of November. Tagged my whitetail buck on Saturday morning - sorry for the picture quality - unfortunately, didn't get any field pics...
We'd been fighting the wind all season on the ranch west of Cochrane, and the critters just didn't seem to be moving around much, but we knew that if we bided our time, and persisted, eventually the bucks would come into the rut and start moving.
I set up at first light along a fence line between two pretty productive patches of bush on the ranch. The wind was aready blowing, but not as strongly as it had been the day before.
I was in the wide open, on a gentle hillside, but tucked up against a large stump that hid my outline from above. At about 8:30 am, a doe came out of the west bush, and passed within 10 yards in front of me, ducked under the fence and disappeared into the bush to my east, without her knowing I was there - the combination of my camo and the stump seemed to be working.
Sure enough, about fifteen minutes later, a little 3X3 buck, head down, nose to the doe's scent trail, came out of the bush on the same path as the doe, passed by me and tucked under the fence. The difference this time was that when the small buck emerged on the other side of the fence, he snorted, his tail flagged and he started running around in circles, snorting away and making a real commotion - I thought for sure that he had winded me and was simply reacting...he was sure acting goofy rather than simply snorting and bolting into the bush...he suddenly stopped, looked back towards the west and then ran like he#@ into the edge of the bush to the east of me, where he stood looking back over his shoulder to the west...and then he took off running at full speed, crashing away through the bush...
I thought that something was about to happen, the way the little buck reacted, looking over his shoulder from where he had come, and then suddenly taking off like he did...it was time to go on "high alert"!
About two minutes later, a nice whitetail buck emerged from the bush to my west...he was on the same trail as the doe and his little brother had been on, head down, and chasin' the doe's scent. As soon as I saw him, I knew he was a "shooter". I very slowly lifted my 7mm-08 and got the crosshairs on his ribcage...he cleared one small tree and I lightly squeezed the trigger...KABOOM!!! Whoompf...A hit. The buck spun around and tried to shift into high gear to retreat into the bush from where he came, but he was hurting...he ran into another small tree and went down, but stumbled to his feet. KABOOM!!! Whoompf, another hit, and this time he went down for good!
I walked over to him and he didn't have any ground shrinkage. A nice typical 5x5, and my '07 whitetail hunt was over!
I gutted him out (he had a pretty thick neck and was really stinky!) and sat down in the sun to enjoy the crisp fall morning - the mountains looked gorgeous. My buddy, Doctor, then came along with his quad and towed my buck back to camp, where we hung him and I skinned him out. The Antelope Whisperer then came along and helped me finish getting the carcass ready for the butcher.
Another great day of hunting with the boys! Now its time to change the focus to my mulie buck...
Good luck to everyone for the rest of the season!
tyee43
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My '07 Whitetail (with pics)
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