Confessions  of a deer hunter;
This morning I was sitting in the woods with my back against a large boulder, Bambi's mom came by at about 35 yards. she gave me a quartering away shot which I took. she ran about 100 yards through the swamp and mud , and I ran after her. She gave me another shot quartering away from the opposite side and I took it.
The end result was that both slugs entered the chest at the back ribs and exit the opposite front shoulder. Both fronts are destroyed! Kicked my self all the way home.. should have seen it when I was looking through the sights but was too impatient.....pat

Congrats, I havent even seen one yet, but it is early in the season, usually dont get good down here until Jan.

Thanks Confederate, I have made much better shooting decisions than i did today that is why I am not as happey as i should be. It is still to warm up here too. When the temp drops into the low 20's then it gets fun. The deer start moving into the open to get sun and water starts to get hard to get. The two problems for the deer make for an interesting hunt..pat

about six years ago i took my 45-70 contender out for a couple of days on a hunt.i saw a nice 4x4 mulie.you guys back east would say it was an 8 pt. we call them a 4pt. of course you knew that.it was about75-85 yards out standing broadside so i thought i would see what kind of penetration this cannon was capable of . so i put the crosshairs on his shoulder and squeezed the trigger.he dropped and kicked like hell for a few seconds and then died.  when i got to him his left shoulder had a hole about the size of a quarter. the right had a hole  almost the size of a softball. iwas using rem.400gr sp.  both shoulders were shattered and you guessed it i decided not to try that again.i didn't get my elk that year so i scewed myself out of alot of meat.[pissed]

Last year I was on stand on the side of a hill.
Below me to my left was a county road with cow
pastures on the other side.About noon I see
mulitple trucks pull up and a group of weekend
warriors jump out with shotguns and lack of
gun saftey.They headed into woods on the far
side of the pasture.I was family friend with
the hunter and knew of only one other man
allowed to hunt there and it was'nt them.I
was going to ask them about it when they came
back from their drive.Well about 10min later
two young does came running across they field
right at me(the road was between us)from my left
and these yahoos came running after them.Real
hunters they were,trying to chase down the deer.
There was eight hunters and the all opened up
on the two deer,all unloading there guns.The
deer in the lead that was closest to me got hit
in the rear but kept comming at me.the deer be-
hind it got hit about 12 times,I was about 120
yds away and just saw it being impacted with
slugs,it was trying to crawl away(spine hit,back
legs dead)and got hit a few more times.the deer
was still alive so two of the guys shoot it
about 3 times to kill it.All the while one guy
was still leading on the deer heading across
the road,towards me.This idiot shot across the
road and at me,I was head to toe in orange too!

While they loaded the deer in the truck debat-
ing on who "killed it deader" I walked up and
confronted them.I told the idiot he shot at me,
that they should'nt be allowed to hunt after
seeing their deer,that they were poaching and
that they shot across the road.SO? Was all they
said.I told them I was calling the land owner
and sheriff.Never seen overweight rednecks move
so fast.Sad,I honestly thought maybe PETA was
right if the majority of hunters behaved this
way.

In conclusion that is how not to harvest a deer.

Paterpk, how much meat were you able to salvage from that deer?

ya there is those kind of idiots everywhere..we have guys shot here in idaho every year."i thought it was a deer" is the most common excuse. those of us that care make sure of the target BEFORE we shoot. sometimes it would be nice to put some of these hunters out of our misery.

When the pumpkinpatch army invades the woods. I stay the hell out.

I haven't weighed it but both rear quarters are fine as are the straps I would guess with out bones maybe 50 lbs.
enough to make the gobernmet fees pay off....pat

when a deer weighs about 150 lbs and you pull off 20 lbs of hide and 35 pounds of internals and 10 lbs of head 40 lbs of bone.... ect. it doesnt seem like a lot of meat. But is is the finest meat[:)]

Figure the cost of your rifle, ammo,hunting gear and the time you spend in the woods and it is without a doubt the most expensive meat in the world...[:D]

The time I spend in the woods is pure joy! cant be bought or sold at any price. Makes hunting worth every penny. Even if i am hunting with a camera, which i do often it is good for my soul. the hunting gear is all reusable so no cost can be counted with out doing a lot of math that considers manhours in the woods , fun factor, emotional distress releif (replaces head shrink time for city people), and such. the only thing I figure in the cost is the 2 lightfeild slugs and the government fee....pat

I know what you mean, sigman. Opening day here in WI. was like a war zone. My dad & I were set up to make a drive through a bunch of pines & brush piles when all hell broke loose! Shooting everywhere! I was ready to start digging foxholes. Didn't see a darn thing until about 11am. when I walked up to 2 small yearlings about 50yds. in front of me. They were walking around one specific tree when I jumped them & they ran off. I walked up to where they were, and saw a large doe literally wrapped around the base of the tree. She must have been there all morning because her legs had dug 3 foot holes in the ground. Some dumb bastard had taken a pot shot at her & not bothered to track her down. The yearlings must have been hers. Putting her out of her misery was the only shot I took this season. It was a very disgusting sight & really pissed me off! Most hunters around here practice with their firearms, the person who took a shot at this deer obviously needs serious range time!

[pissed]

150 lbs!  The last 3x4 mule deer I shot weighed 270 lbs.  We had 140lbs of wrapped meat!  Must have been back east.

We do have some big bucks in Ohio.  It's just a matter of how long they can eat some farmer's corn before their luck runs out.

thats why i gave up shooting them w/a gun and now only use a bow. i got my 2 over 2 weeks ago and the nice thing is it is a hell of a lot safer in the woods during bow season (at least in N.Y. where we do not have any x-bows ...yet)

Amen, Paterpk, amen. Took my latest buck on Monday afternoon with a single shot to the vitals, and had him butchered and freezing in vac-wrap by Tuesday evening. Freezer is FULL of meat that is simply imcomparable to any kind of store-bought stuff, and it's not only fresher than anything else anyone is buying, but it's absolutely free of preservatives, antibiotics, and growth enhancers. (Unless you count corn! [:D])

Godspeed...

It's MY Deer....ok ok just let me get my saddle off it........