GA Deer Season 2022

[WNC2500]

@RobertD, i totally agree with your statement about just hunting one animal keys you up and takes your focus off of just enjoying being in the woods, and seeing what happens. I hunt in multiple different places/stands and always count it a blessing when I see and choose to harvest what God allows to trot out in front of me.

Good luck on connecting with some deer this next week!

 

[RobertD]

@RobertD, i totally agree with your statement about just hunting one animal keys you up and takes your focus off of just enjoying being in the woods, and seeing what happens. I hunt in multiple different places/stands and always count it a blessing when I see and choose to harvest what God allows to trot out in front of me.

Good luck on connecting with some deer this next week!

Thanks! And yes, it really is about where you want your focus to be... the seeing what happens part is a lot more fun to me. Definitely how I'm approaching this last week.

 

[RobertD]

Got out behind the rain today to see if we could get into some deer action. All told we saw three does and a small buck, along with a young tom turkey and a covey of twelve bobwhite quail. We are so blessed to live in an area with healthy numbers of wild quail, and it was a thrill to have them feeding around our ground blind shooting house while trying to be super still so they didn't spook.



There are a few visible in this photo, but damn do they blend in well.

I wondered for a minute if my wife would feel motivated to shoot the buck, but when I heard her whisper "look at his little antlers, he is so cute" I knew this little fella would be getting a pass. I picked at her about this and she responded "Well hell, I'll get more meat from a big doe anyways." Touché... she's so cool y'all I swear.

I'm heading out in the morning to finish my season (Out West again), though as mentioned I'll be hunting property I haven't yet hunted this year. I'll have tomorrow evening, all of Friday and part of Saturday to hunt.

 

[CowboyLeroy]

Got out behind the rain today to see if we could get into some deer action. All told we saw three does and a small buck, along with a young tom turkey and a covey of twelve bobwhite quail. We are so blessed to live in an area with healthy numbers of wild quail, and it was a thrill to have them feeding around our ground blind shooting house while trying to be super still so they didn't spook.

A turkey you say?

 

[RobertD]

Two stands on this property. Wind bad for both. Had to improvise, turkey hunting style.

Views






Far treeline in the first picture gave me this guy, right at sundown on a hot October afternoon in 2020:

Post in thread 'Deer - lets see em' https://www.hunttalk.com/threads/deer-lets-see-em.252724/post-3085566

Down the old logging road in the far treeline of the second picture is where I caught up with this guy, on a wet cold December evening in 2021:

Post in thread 'Deer - lets see em' https://www.hunttalk.com/threads/deer-lets-see-em.252724/post-3308668

I don't want to overhype it, but this place has been as good to me as anywhere in the world when it comes to hunting success. Maybe there is a little luck left out here somewhere!

I did find this old thing earlier... wonder how long it's been there.

 

[RobertD]

My hiding spot worked out well... almost too well.



Cell pics always look further away - this buck and another like him were impossibly close to my hiding spot. They never did see/smell me.

What was more interesting to me was a large eight point pushing does way out into the field in front of me. I watched him a while but he never got closer than 600 yards out.

I could've made a move on him using an old logging road trail through the woods that could've gotten me closer to him. The wind was right and the opportunity was there, but the presence of the smaller bucks close by kept me pinned down until dark.

Back at it tomorrow.

 

[RobertD]

Morning hunt was less than productive. A beautiful morning in a nice hardwood draw, but neighbors shooting and then driving an ATV up and down the property line more or less ruined my hunt. Blew twelve deer out of the hardwood draw. But that's hunting.



I'm headed back to last night's spot. If it's going to happen at all, it'll probably happen down there, this evening. Fingers crossed.

 

[RobertD]

If it's going to happen at all, it'll probably happen down there, this evening.

It happened. My season is over and my second buck tag is filled. Couldn't be much happier. Story and pictures to come.

 

[CowboyLeroy]

It happened. My season is over and my second buck tag is filled. Couldn't be much happier. Story and pictures to come.

Ya season ain't over til you kill ten does now hurry up and post it before I do

 

[EastTNHunter]

It happened. My season is over and my second buck tag is filled. Couldn't be much happier. Story and pictures to come.

We’re waiting

 

[RobertD]

And so we find ourselves at the end of the season.

Over the past 24 hours, when I ought to have been telling the story of yesterday's buck, I had a few other things to get into. Some background:

I haven't yet mentioned it, but for the closing of the season we shared our camp with five new friends, a crew of good old boys from the southernmost reaches of the Great State of Louisiana.

The deal was to host their crew on their yearly doe hunting excursion, in exchange for them hauling several coolers of fresh oysters, shrimp, speckled trout, etc. over to cook for themselves and us, their hosts.

The whole ordeal was a success, and the Cajuns left with those same coolers loaded down with eleven deer and six hogs. Some amount of largess in the form of a few dozen oysters, several pounds of shrimp and a stray bag of elk sausage had to be tragically left behind with the Georgia crowd to make room for all that pork and venison.

So yeah, life has sucked for the last few days.

Thus the delay in my posting: a certain amount of hog butchering, oyster shucking and beer drinking had to be tended to last night, and then there was cleaning up this morning. I then drove the two hours home at noon and made good on a promise to take my wife out one more time. (Which she correctly pointed out was really just an excuse to sit in the woods once more before calling it a season.)

Now, with all that taken care of and a bit of background given on what hard times I've been living through, I can tell the story of my second buck.

 

[RobertD]

Knowing yesterday that my upcoming evening hunt would be a Final Countdown sort of evening, I was itching to get down to the woods that had been so good to me these past few years. I struck out early on the fifteen minute drive down to the place not long after noon.

Before hunting, I knew I had to get my mind right, so I drove into the little town just south of the place and hit up the local chicken joint, an absolute gem of an establishment that I would never name online for fear it might become one of "those" places that people drive from far away to eat at. It's already made the pages of one popular culture magazine as a top tier Southern chicken restaurant, and one time is enough.

I bought a two piece box (dark meat) and a lemonade and drove out to the property. I parked out by the highway and climbed up into the bed of my truck, then sat on the toolbox soaking the fried chicken in hot sauce and drinking lemonade. I was beginning to feel good about the evening.

The only problem was the wind. It was as it had been the day before: wrong for both stands. I considered my options. Should I return to my hiding spot in the bushes on the east end? Slip down into the woods somewhere and let the wind take my scent out over a neighboring pond? Or say to hell with it and sit one of the stands anyways, knowing that I'd seen deer on the upwind side of it the night before (including that nice big eight point)?

I chose the "to hell with it" option, as I often do. I called my wife to chat for a bit while I loaded up a pack with gear for a long sit. I told her my plan, offering an argument that the wind wouldn't likely affect my chances at a buck (this turned out to be a lie) in a way that any stranger could tell was designed to convince me of my plan's efficacy and not her.

After our brief chat, I shouldered my pack and rifle and began the nearly mile long walk to the far end of the field that makes up the heart of this property.

 

[RobertD]

The red arrow is where the stand is located, as seen from my ground hunting spot the day prior.



Ranging clumps of old peanut hay from the stand told me that the group of deer I'd seen about 600 yards out the day prior had only been 200-300 yards out from the stand I was by then sitting in. This plan, I thought, may just work.

Unsurprisingly, deer movement around the open field was minimal for most of the afternoon. I read some, dozed some, and even climbed down to do some stretching at one point. But not long after my camouflaged yoga session, I started seeing deer.

Two does fed out into the open, out by the highway nearly a mile away. A young spike cruised the field edge to the north. A small eight point fed out into the field not twenty yards from my ground hunting spot, unaware of how dead he would be if I hadn't decided to sit elsewhere that evening.

Everything was shaping up nicely. I had an hour or so left and was seeing deer all around.

At some point thereafter I caught a bit of movement below and downwind of my stand. I saw the unmistakable mellow gold of an antler tine through the scrubby pines growing in the old logging road by the stand. I decided right then that I had found my buck.

 

[RobertD]

Boy was I wrong.

The buck was walking the same trail I killed my big buck on last season, only moving right to left instead of the other way. The wind was also blowing the exact opposite direction.

I bet you can guess what happened next.

The deer was creeping along, looking for a vantage point to spy on me from. He - not joking - got right to the spot where I shot the previous year's buck, and stuck his head out just far enough to look up into my stand from 38 yards away.

He was a classic South Georgia whitetail. Reddish brown hide, bright white throat patch, and a perfect set of 120" 8 point antlers. I would've shot him and happily called it a season, even if he isn't exactly the bruiser buck we all dream about.

But the joke was on me. His brief glimpse told him everything he needed to know, and he spun back into the woods with a decisiveness and flair that really hurt my feelings.

(There's now a picture of this buck posted in a comment on the next page.)

I didn't let it get me down long. Though I'd just educated a young buck and proven why you don't sit bad winds, I held out hope that my plan would still work. Maybe, I thought, I'll wind up being glad I didn't shoot him.

 

[RobertD]

Not long after getting shown up by the eight point, a doe entered the field on the upwind side of me. I ranged her at 252 yards. Getting warmer, I thought, knowing anything that came out between where she was and where I was I would be comfortable shooting at.

A few more does filed out. A few minutes later, a large bodied deer came out into the shaded field edge. I knew immediately he was a buck, but saw little in the way of antlers. I glassed him and saw that he had a tall, extremely narrow rack that curled inwards above his eyes. He was unique. No "trophy" but, I was looking to fill a tag and the freezer at this point, and not necessarily the wall.

I had long before decided any big bodied male deer that came out on the upwind side of me was a shooter, so I readied my gun. But just as I begin to shoulder it, I saw another big bodied silhouette enter the field. I glassed that deer quickly, and saw that he looked to be carrying a pretty solid set of antlers while being just as large of body as the first buck.

And so I knew immediately that the second deer was the one to shoot. I estimated him to be about half the distance out to my 252 yard mark from where the doe had been. I shouldered my rifle, shooting more or less offhand, held on his lungs and fired.

 

[RobertD]

As the first shot rang out, I watched a geyser of ruby red dirt spray up behind him. I'd shot just over his back.

There are times when reflecting on a mistake is appropriate, and there are times when fixing that mistake is a better course of action. Later, I would have a stern talk with myself about rushing ANOTHER shot and being lazy with my shooting form when shooting out of treestands. But in the moment, there was no time, and I didn't even really let it register that I'd missed before racking another one and firing again.

The second shot found a home in the buck's vitals. He mule kicked and bounded out into the field.

See, I am not bragging, especially after admitting that I missed my first shot, but the truth is this: After wounding the buck on the creek earlier this season, I sat in my home office one night dry firing and cycling my rifle (an old Mauser that's taken me a while to get the hang of) while holding the crosshairs on a spot on the wall, over and over and over again. The next deer I shot, I'd decided, would get shot again, as many times as needed, until he was all the way dead.

Thus, when I missed the first shot, I was already cycling into the second, never taking my eye/scope off the buck. I fired the second shot only a second or so after the first. And I knew by his reaction that it had been a good one.

And the third shot was a good one, too: As he ran out into the field, I held on a spot close to where the first shot got him. He slowed a bit, and I fired the third round. The buck went down. I racked the old Mauser again. Incredibly, the buck stood up again, and I fired a fourth and final shot. He dropped like a stone.

 

[RobertD]

I am sure the neighbors all wondered what in the blue hell was going on out on the north side of town that evening.

Meanwhile, I was in my stand, looking at my second buck, dead in the field. At this point, I felt a wave of joy and gratitude wash over me, and I said a prayer of thanks to God out loud for deer and hunting and all of the beautiful and wild and painful things it comes with. I don't always do that, but in that moment I felt compelled to. I called my wife to let her know what I'd done, a joyous tradition that dates back to the earliest days of our relationship. I let her know that this deer wouldn't have to be tracked either, then climbed down and went to check out my buck.

And this is how I found him:

 

[Nick87]

I am sure the neighbors all wondered what in the blue hell was going on out on the north side of town that evening.

Meanwhile, I was in my stand, looking at my second buck, dead in the field. At this point, I felt a wave of joy and gratitude wash over me, and I said a prayer of thanks to God out loud for deer and hunting and all of the beautiful and wild and painful things it comes with. I don't always do that, but in that moment I felt compelled to. I called my wife to let her know what I'd done, a joyous tradition that dates back to the earliest days of our relationship. I let her know that this deer wouldn't have to be tracked either, then climbed down and went to check out my buck.

And this is how I found him:

View attachment 259750

That's a good southern buck, way to end the season. Congrats!

 

[EastTNHunter]

Great time length. Great buck. Great saga. Fitting end to it. Thank you for sharing

 

[RobertD]

That's a good southern buck, way to end the season. Congrats!

Thanks Nick, and thanks for following along.

Great time length. Great buck. Great saga. Fitting end to it. Thank you for sharing

Thanks for reading! And about the tine length: One of my buddies was helping me break him down later and made the comment "I guess there's just a strong gene for tall tines on that farm." This is the third deer I've taken off the property and they've all been tall like that. They all have also had at least one bladed G2, though the other two had it on the right and he had it on the left.