Earlier this year I bought 43 acres of prime deer and turkey habitat near my home at auction.  It's always been my dream to have my own place to hunt and thankfully the dream was realized in a big way this morning.  About two hours after entering my custom built ground blind, I saw two does that kept looking over their shoulders.  Sure enough, two bucks trotted along behind them.  I found the biggest of the two in my scope and fired.  Missed!  He trotted off so I shot at the second, smaller buck ten seconds later.  He went down in his tracks.  Once the gunsmoke cleared and adrenalin subsided, I counted 12 points on his rack.

I just returned from the check station and the proprietor asked to take a photo of the buck.  She said it's the biggest rack of the 30 bucks she's checked in so far today.

Congratulations!! I hope I'm that fortunate Monday.

Congratulations!

My season hasn't went as well. On October 1 (opening day of archery season) I nailed a nice 10-pointer right in the ribs at 30 yards with an arrow. Subsequent tracking failed to turn up the deer after following a 150-yard bloodtrail. I was so upset that I didn't hunt for 2 weeks. I have passed up 9 small bucks so far this year, as I'm waiting on a wallhanger.

Opening day of firearms season I hunted my usual funnel that produces a good buck every year. A spike came within 15 yards of my tree at 11:30 AM, but I let the little "buckaroo" walk away. At 1:30 PM I shot a doe at 30 yards. Since it was cool out, I was going to let her lay and wait on a buck, but a trespassing hunter spoiled that, so I left and went on an evening hunt in an adjoining county with a friend. I ended up with another downed doe at 4:45 PM, after a very short wait.

I didn't see anything this morning and came home at noon. I took a friend who already got an 8-pointer with me to videotape a hunt this afternoon. As we neared the spot I had decided on, again a trespasser had already set up. We moved over about 100 yards and climbed two adjacent trees. Not long after we got set up, I spotted a buck walking parallel to the fence about 75 yards away. I "mouth bleated" it to a stop, and fired just as it turned away from me. I climbed down and went to where it was standing. Clean miss, no blood whatsoever. And to top it off, the view of the buck was obscured from the camera, so I don't even have it on video. Oh well, it wasn't the biggest buck in the woods anyway, only about the bare minimum for what I'm after.

well got a nice fat doe opening day of gun season, freezer half full now goin out again this weekend hopefully Ill get the nice 8ptr that didnt come up for a hugg.

Congrats!
Was that twelve full size points or were some stickers?
I've only been out twice for gun season.  Once I passed on a spike and the second time I gimped a decent buck.  We tracked him 600-700 yards until he hit a creek.  We could never pick up the trail on the other side.  I work at the naval base and I was supposed to hunt there this coming Sunday and 4 more Sundays after that.  Turns out, CAAA mission requirements outweigh deer hunting.  Pffft.  So, I'm going to be sitting in the small woodlot behind the house where I saw the spike.  It ain't much, it ain't mine, but it's all I got.  I have seen a nice buck back there that I'd like to take.  If it gets towards the end of the season, the spike will go down.
I did get my first deer with a bow a few weeks ago.  So that's something.
Jim