Posted: 3/1/2014 12:58:06 PM EDT
Yep, it's true, I took my first buck with a knife, and with this exact model of Puuko Sheath Knife (which I lost before the day was out) ...
And here's the little 6-point ... 
Now to ... The Legend of Big Buck Hollow It was Tennessee buck season iirc, 1974 ... Had been hitting it hard, reading all the deer huntin' books. Tennessee didn't have that many deer back then, I hear it's smothered with 'em now. Anyhow, dad has agreed to drive me up for another shot at it, brother whined off that morning, declaring the area not fit to hunt. We're running late, dawn had broke, I had a stand setup and took off in a jog for it. Wearing an old Army coat, by the time I arrived at my stand, all my 12 ga. slugs had departed my pockets and I just had the three slugs in the 870 and one #6 duck load in the top pocket. Why was I hunting with shotgun slugs ? Me and the brother had had a recent run-in and he elected I wasn't using his Model 99 250 Savage until he was unpissed at me. No time to argue, that's not entirely true - see running late part. I wasn't gonna be stopped and as all of Ohio knows, a 12 ga slug is potent deer medicine. Let's get back in the woods ... I couldn't take the stand sitting very long and clambered out and took off 2-stepping across the ridge behind me quartering into the wind. Heading down a ridge finger in deep hardwoods, I hear a ruckus downhill ahead and off to my right. Sounds like bears fighting. I hunker down and study the situation. About that time, two fighting bucks become visible off down the hill and one (the 6 pointer) gets his butt whipped and blade-45's my way ... He was going to cross in a trot from my right to my left out about 60 or so yards away. I took a bead with that rib on the 870 and let loose. BAM! bark flies, pump BAM! pump BAM! ... out of shells. Later I would find that my only hit had barely broke skin directly under his chest. Inches from being a running heart shot. 
Anyhow, at the last shot he turned my way and headed straight for me. I had that #6 and dropped it in, took aim for center of his face and cut loose. he kept coming, I side-stepped, he hit the tree head-on that I had been standing in front of. Bam, tree knocked him half silly. Out comes said knife and I started slashing like the amateur knife killer I was. Stab, stab, gouge, gouge, stab, etc. At one point I stabbed him in the top of his neck right behind his head and he ran off with my knife sticking gruesomely out. With so many stab wounds and a few #6 shot in him, he was starting to wear down. I slipped up on him, roped his antlers with my drag rope, yanked my knife out of his neck, and tied him off to a tree. He was giving it hell trying to bust that drag rope, and I slipped down the hill, came up and jerked his back legs out from in under him and layed into him again. I finally managed to cut his throat and he went to that Eternal Rut In The Sky.. A gnarly scene it was, but I had my first deer. On the drag out, an old geezer that had heard all the commotion, came to see what in the hell was going on. He helped me get it the rest of the way out of the woods. Somehere out there I dropped that knife, then drug the deer over it in heavy leaves ... I looked and looked, but couldn't find it. I was 4' 9" tall when I got my driver's license at 16, but I grew a bit more and finally ended up at 5' 9". I suppose that helped the legend as I heard some years later that legend had it some 12 year old kid jumped from a tree and killed a big buck with only a knife. No, I wasn't 12, but due to impatience, I had jumped from that tree. 
The End. Given that Team LaRue shop folks haven't heard this story, it's ironic their behind-my-back shop nickname for me is "The Beast". 
It's the first of the month and this is the UHFO thread you've been looking for. GO !! On winged sandals - - - GO !! |
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