The Biggest Opening Day Adventure
Saturday opening days are always a little more exciting. More hunters and more deer getting moved around usually mean more opportunities. Although the weather was going to start off hot it would cool off nicely throughout the weekend. Paving the way for buck pole excitement and lots of hunting stories.
This year was going to be a little different. I wasn’t going to the east side of the state and I wasn’t going to hunt in the morning. Chalk up another opening morning of not seeing a deer although this year at least I wasn’t hunting. Amanda had a cousin getting married in Missouri and she went to that and my mom was recovering from knee surgery. That meant if I wanted to go hunting this weekend. I would have to assemble my very own orange army of all 3 girls. I knew it would be difficult but I looked at it as more of a challenge and adventure. They were excited to go and I also felt pretty good about our chances at an opportunity to take a deer. There probably aren’t going to be many times that the 4 of us all will deer hunt together in the same spot so if it went down, it would be epic!
Then we had all the planning and variables to juggle. How much time could we sit there, how to dress them, and how to keep them quiet. I also had a wind that was changing to deal with and just figuring out exactly where to put the blind. I absolutely despise deer hunting out of those portable blinds, its much easier for me as one person to blend in and sit still vs trying to make a blind look natural. This was our only option though and I knew it would be tough to find cover to put in front of us and behind us to look as natural as possible. We did find a pretty nice spot and cut a couple shooting lanes. Our “spot” should be able to handle the wind direction change and also conceal the blind itself until it is too late for the deer. The only downfall is that it would only give us a couple smaller shooting windows and not much time to react to a deer. The farms we hunt have very few pinch points but this was one of them. If we saw a deer it was going to be in range. I would have liked to get a little further away because of the small girls making noise factor. 55-60 yards was the best I could do though. We would be unaware of any deer that might spook before they got to that window.
It was a relief to get all settled in and at least hidden. Mabel has enough experience from all our turkey hunts to be pretty helpful with Millie who’s 3. June is still learning but has been on enough adventures to hold her own. Reminders to keep voices at a whisper were frequent although they did a great job at truly getting loud. I know that was tough for them to be in such tight quarters and stay as quiet as they did. The backpack full of snacks and coloring books came out and everyone was happy. We practiced putting our earmuffs on a few times and what we would do if we saw a deer. It would have to be a much different reaction than when June or Millie spots a deer on a car ride. There were just a few times I had to really reign them in, once when they found a couple sticks and started sword fighting as it was getting close to prime time. Still no deer sightings and I was kind of surprised but everyone had their earmuffs on just in case. Light was fading and we were losing hope at seeing a deer.
Then it all happened really fast, I spotted a deer moving through with no intentions of stopping. Checked to make sure it wasn’t a fawn, checked to make sure earmuffs are on, and stopped the deer. It was a small buck who frequents that area and unfortunately for him I wasn’t carrying any free passes in my pocket today. He was slightly quartering too and I touched one off. He dropped and I could tell it hit him right where I put the crosshairs. It was time for high fives and just processing how fast that all happened.
I looked back and he was gone! That wasn’t on the list of things I expected to see after hitting the ground and how his front legs reacted. We headed on out to assess the situation. We could see where he hit the dirt and wheeled around getting up. With one little patch of blood right there, the blood looked good though so that was encouraging. I kind of expected him to have just rolled down into a little ditch right there but he wasn’t in there so we started checking around for what direction he went.
The next spot of blood looked great again but it was all happening so fast that he wasn’t really pumping it out fast yet. We were hot on the trail and about 8-10 yards in my panic was turning into excitement. It was obvious to me that he wouldn’t be far away. Bear Creek Ballistics 450 rounds are pricey but those solid copper bullets leave amazing blood trails. He made it about 40 yards through some semi thick stuff before we found him piled up. It honestly worked out way better because the girls got to follow a blood trail and learn about that. We also had to cross a little ditch with water in it and they are always excited to put their boots in the water. After some high fiving and a quick talk about the deer we made a plan to go get the truck, pick up all our stuff, then drive the truck as close as we could to the deer.
We did all that but not without a little agitation from Millie, she’s just the right height for getting hit with everything while creeping through the woods at night. Getting hit with sticks while walking, getting hit with sticks while being carried, there were some tears. But we got picked up and we headed back to where I shot the deer. The girls were in charge of the track job this time and I turned Mabel and June loose to find the deer (which they said was their favorite part). It was a good first tracking job to start with and they made short work of it. Millie was also coming through with her claims that she was going to touch the deer if we got one. She has always been a little more apprehensive than the other 2 and wanted nothing to do with the deer last season. She’s been getting comfortable with geese, ducks, and turkeys since then. She got right in there this year. The gut job brought out some reactions for sure as they had never seen that.
Mabel rode in the back of the truck with the deer (which reminded me of being a kid) until we got to the road. As soon as we stopped for her to get in there was a bunch of rustling in the brush and she was having no part of getting out of the back of the truck. We determined it was an opossum and nothing that was going to come after her but it was a good laugh.
Next order of business was getting home so I could wash my hands and arms before heading to Wesco. Some celebration slushies were in order. We made some phone calls and then they wanted to crank one of their favorite Hardy songs “buck on the wall”. Excitement was high during the car ride and they were proud of our deer. We got him hung up and the hide off as temps began to cool for the night, the weather just worked out well.
It certainly wasn’t a big buck but it was a special one and also on the historically worst day for me to go deer hunting. We were going to make some fun memories whether we got a deer or not but it sure was cool to be successful also. Opening day 2025 will go down in history for us!