Thanks guys. Just trying to fill my brothers freezer. It was him, my nephew and I this morning. I have the dumbest luck when it comes to deer hunting. I had planned to go hunt another ridge about 300 yards away. We were walking in together. Well about 200 yards into the woods, I realized I left my cellphone in the truck.
So I dumped my climber and bow, sent my brother and nephew on in to their stand (about another 200 yards in), and headed back to the truck. Grabbed my phone, walked back up the hill to my stand and bow, and thought I shouldn’t go further and blow their hunt (its daylight at this point). So I looked around and saw a tree down the hill about 30 yards that I could climb up. It was literally the only tree in that area I could get above 8 feet up.
Walked up, climbed up, and sat down. Text my brother and told him where I was. About 15 minutes later my brother text me and told me I had a buck and a doe heading my way. I thought “So? Not like I’ll see them”. Heard a deer running off to my right and here they came. “Well I’ll be damned”. He ran her up the hill behind me and she stopped, turned 90 degrees, jumped some lay downs, and headed right for me. I had already stood up when I saw them. Now she’s at 15 yards coming my way (remember I’m up a tree but down hill from her). We’re at eye level at 15 yards. So I reach for my bow and now she’s covered the distance to 10 feet. I literally have just taken my bow off the bow holder. I don’t have it up or my release on or anything. It’s just dangling out there in space.
She stops dead in her tracks. I can’t see her because she’s on the other side of the tree from me. But I know she’s got me pegged. And here I am holding bow off the side of my climber like a retarded matador with a hunchback and I can’t move. “Well this really sucks. Way to be prepared there, great white hunter” I think to myself. And then I see her head pop around the side of the tree. Yep. She’s looking right at me. And we just made eye contact. “Idiot! Why did you look at her!?” She busts out and I know she’s headed back from whence she came and then probably a little farther, but she only goes back up the hill to about 15 yards and turns broadside with her head behind a small tree. I can’t see anything but her body, neck, and ears, but I know she’s looking back towards the buck. “It’s now or never bud cause she’s about to flip you the white kiss of death”. I hook my release, draw, aim, and release, in about 3 seconds. She kicks, runs about 20 yards crashes into a tree, get up, crashes into another tree, and piles up. And the rest, as they say, is history.