Shot this guy at about 3:45pm, Friday, November 19. I lost my normal hunting ground about 3 months ago. I inquired about a piece of ground a friend farms and he graciously allowed me to hunt the lone feature on the ground, a ditch overgrown with trash trees and wide grass strips.
It's only attractive feature is that the ditch leads to a neighboring piece that shelters deer and has no pressure to speak of. I set up a ladder stand and after hunting from the stand in the morning I put up a ground blind. I did that because I discovered the deer like running the bottom of the dried out ditch and I did not have a good shot into it from the stand. That and because with a little trimming I also had a clear shot to the other side of the ditch as well.
Saw many deer in the morning and passed on a 9 point that crossed to another friends property. I alerted him via txt and he harvested that buck.
I went back out at 1pm settled into the blind and got set to ambush a buck. I had a trail cam and expected the buck to come from my right, maybe from the left but not likely. I scanned behind me to the other side and bottom of the ditch.
Started getting sleeping cause my WarmBag was warm! Nodded hard... which startled me. Started my scan by looking behind first...
There he was, staring right at the blind! He was on the other side of the ditch. I reached for my gun, did not have time for my bi-pod. I was so close to the back window I had to contort to get the barrel out... by that time he was running from left to right. I tried following him but did not have an opening. So I picked the next opening, pointed my gun, got sight picture through the scope, and lined up on him when he stepped in, he was at an extreme angle quartering away from me. I fired, the BO entered just in front of the diaphragm, crushing those ribs, halving the heart, and then ricocheting off the offside ribs. Entry hole only, no exit. He ran maybe 100 yds but stumbled the last fifty before he piled up.
I was using my Savage 10MLII firing a 300gn Barnes Original Soft Spire Point, 70gns of Reloader 7, Harvester Black Crush Rib Sabot, all lit by a Fed 209a. I love my smokeless ML! I was able to see him mule kick at the shot, knew he was hit good, and watched him fall in the field south of me.
Topic: IL Trophy Down (Read 1244 times)
