Well, this was another good weekend at Fur & Feather (for the most part, not going to get into details on that). After we came out of the woods the other day, Chip had shot a few times at a buck in the clear cut. Well when Chip and Britt went to look the buck bedded back down about 20 yards from the shot and jumped up and took off. So they did the right thing and backed out for a few hours.
So let me back up a bit and say that the last deer that me and Chip tracked alone was a black powder doe I shot a few years ago and we came up on her and spotted her on a ridge looking at us. It is a kind of freaky thing when this happens and has only happened to me a couple of times in almost 25 years of hunting. I placed a 50 cal 245 grain between the eyes and WOW that is one we will never forget! But the experience having my hunting buddy with me there made it better for me. We don't like to wound anything and try our best for to make a good shot, BUT in hunting sometimes it just happens (especially in our club, we've got some MISSING FOLKS in our club, I can say that I am a member of this group!)
Well Chip and I went back in to go look for the buck after checking his rifle. We looked for about an hour and a half and did not find a single drop of blood. But we found some tracks that we followed but there are so many tracks in this area it was hard to know what deer we were following without blood.
So I said I was going to jump up on a hill in some thicket to see if he bedded down up there and check the next valley. Chip went back to where we started, and then it got fun!
Chip yelled, "JIMMIE!!!" and I said "Did you find him?" and Chip said, "HE IS COMING RIGHT AT YOU!"
About that time I saw the buck running in the valley I was going to look at coming my way. I yelled back to Chip "Are you clear?" and the buck stopped in some thicket and I lost him. Chip said he was clear and to shoot if I could (in the woods, I wasn't throwing any lead without knowing where my podna was, he ran behind the hill and hugged a tree!!! Smart man!) Well I eased down the hill a bit to get a better look in the bottom and saw the buck standing there not really knowing where this guy was that was doing all this yelling. It was a safe shot almost in the opposite direction of where I now knew Chip was, and I put him on down! It was nice after missing 3 times with my black powder rifle to know I still remembered how to shoot!
We were so amped up, we were high fiving and jumping up and down and freaking out like two 13 year olds because the experience was just so cool. We immediately started talking about the last time and my doe and we did it again! It was just a great day and I was grateful to be there with my friend.
Chip really did think the buck was bigger than what it turned out to be, but that is just one of those things that happens in hunting. He got a little dissappointed because he really believes in growing bigger bucks and I just reminded him of how cool this experience was for both of us and the important thing was that he did the RIGHT thing. So many of us hunters have so many stories of (If I had only... AND ME ESPECIALLY AS YOU ALL KNOW!) But when Chip jumped the buck, he patiently backed out of the woods, gave it a few hours, responsibly went and checked his rifle, and then went back in there and didn't give up! I was proud of him and proud that I got to play a role in his story.
He offered me half the meat but that was his deer in my mind and that was all there was to it. He did do one more thing that I thought was cool as hell, he gave the rack to me to give to my boy (a future Fur & Feather Hunter at 2 years old). When I showed the rack to him, he thought it was the coolest thing in the world! I'm going to make a plaque and hang it in my son's room and put on it the "The Chip and Jimmie Buck!"
