Rookie mistake

I had a really nice buck come trotting down a trail, right towards my stand at NOON today. Having stood all morning, I was sitting to give the legs a little rest. I stood up and when I tipped the seat up it made a loud bang against the tree. He stopped and looked my direction, but after a few seconds, deemed it safe to continue.

Think this was the rookie mistake? Guess again.

While he was walking towards me, I slid my face mask down. Somehow my arrow popped off the string and clattered up against the rest cage. He instantly threw his head up and stared right at me.

You are probably thinking “that buck is gone. That certainly had to be the rookie mistake. It wasn’t.

Instead of continuing on the trail he angles towards the field edge right into a perfect opening. I get him to stop, I settle the pin right behind his shoulder and…….I jerk the trigger harder than I ever had before. Before the arrow was even out of the bow, I knew I really screwed that shot up. Missed him clean at 30 yards.

Safe to say, today was not the day for that buck to hit the dirt.

Now to try and get it together for tomorrow…

Just gotta learn from it.Next time he comes in you will be ready. Never Stop Learning.

I think at some point, everyone has one of those days. Few years ago, I was running really late to get out to my farm. Low on fuel, I stopped at the gas station and filled up. Not problem, had my sneakers on so the smell of fuel was not big deal as it wasn’t on my boots. Got out lto my woods and had to rush. Threw on my coat and could smell DOG. At some point, my wet dog made a bed out of my coat. Rushing to get out I paid very little detail to wind direction and where I was walking. Directly up-wind of a bedding area and as I was climbing my ladder, realized I never took my tennis shoes off. Great, now a scent trail of diesel fuel from the gas station right up to where I was sitting.

I had only been in my stand for 10 minutes at the most and here comes a shooter. Beautiful wide 8pnt that I had been after for a couple weeks. Couldn’t believe how stupid this deer was. Nose to the ground smelling my foot prints and coming straight to me. I had leaned against a tree about 20 yrds away from my stand as i was watching the wind patterns before climbing into my stand. That buck walked right up to the tree and was sniffing it. Clear shot at 20 yrds with him quarted away- what could go wrong? Released my arrow only to hear the worst thump I ever heard….and not in the direction of the deer. Both the deer and I looking up, there was my arrow stuck in the tree about 15 feet over him. Deer turns rear end to me, and I nock up another arrow. few minutes later, he’s gone and I never got another shot. Sitting there in dis-belief, I notice the one and ONLY limb hanging down between us and a razor cut into it. I never saw the limb and of all things, hit something that was about 3/8″ diameter and blew the shot. Education comes at a cost.