Finally got it done....

[nchunterkw]

I buddy who I never hunted with before invited me to his hunting property this weekend. Very gracious of him. He has a nice piece of property to hunt with a few feeders and stands and has been fighting with a bear that is tearing up the feeders. So we loaded up the truck at 4:10AM and headed out for the 1 1/2 hr drive and hunted the AM hunt. I was in a ground blind and he was in a tree stand. I saw one right at first light but it was so dark I couldn't even be sure it was a deer for the longest time...then I saw a few more off to my right but they never came in. Around 10AM he came to the ground blind and showed my picture of the feeder near him. 3/16" cable snapped i half, and 200lbs of corn down on the ground. Dang bear. These feeders are hanging between 2 trees about 15' up...30 gal drums with a motor on the bottom. Well this one was trashed. We headed out and then came back with the truck to load up the feeder and salvage what corn we could then headed back out to fix it. He also pulled his camera cards...so before lunch we took a look at all the activity. Lots of daylight activity with a few new bucks...one nice 8-pointer. But the star of the camera was "Trey". A fat little 3 pointer that was not camera shy at all. My buddy likes to hunt horns, and I'm not that particular anymore, so I told him Trey would be the perfect deer for me to shoot. Get his crappy genes out of the gene pool and feed some people. Plus I'd feel better not shooting a "nice" deer off his property where he put in all that work. Just me. Turns out too that we owe the bear an apology. He didn't do it. It was the high winds we had last week when hurricane Ian came through that took down the feeder.
So we head off to a great little lunch buffet, then drop by TSC and get all the parts we need and get that feeder back in business. But how to hang it? So another trip back to the woods with the truck, and with me hauling a 20' ladder back there on my shoulder. After a little "redneck engineering" and a "hold my beer" moment, we had 100lbs of corn in the feeder and it hung where it needed to be. It was 3PM so we headed back out. About 4PM we started a nice slow walk back into the stands. Neither of us figured we'd see much given all the noise we made, but you never know. I was in the ground blind again. And the woods were really quiet. Around 5:40 I saw some movement to the left behind my feeder at about 45 yards. Good thing because it was an early morning and I was needing something to keep me awake. So this doe and something smaller (I think) played hide and seek in that brush behind the feeder and to my left until about 6:30 or so. Sunset was 6:45 and by 6:55 it would be too dark to see in the woods. Around 6:44 I was thinking it was a good day. weather was great, had a good time, saw some deer, got my buddy's place all set back up and with an hour and a half drive back home, we'd get home at a decent hour. Well, about 1 minute later ol' Trey came strolling into the lane from my left without a care in the world. 20 yards broadside. He moseyed around eating corn and when he cleared the brush in front of me and finally gave me a nice broadside stance and moved his near leg forward, I sent my 500gr arrow tipped with a 200gr VPA 3 blade through both lungs and the arteries at the top of the heart. Trey shot straight up in the air for about 2 ft then took off to the left and away from the blind. I heard him crash about 5 or 10 seconds later. Well, so much for getting home early! My buddy came over quickly. He heard the shot and the crash too. My arrow went clean through and buried...I mean buried that broadhead in a big oak tree. Arrow was shattered from that impact. Bummer....maybe I need to invent a broadhead extractor tool. These VPAs aint exactly cheap. So we started to trail him. Had good blood at teh shot and for about 10 - 15 yards then it was a bit spoarce. I walked forward about 50 yards toward where we thought he crashed, no deer so I moved over 5 yards and walked back towards the last blood spot. 5 yards from it I picked up the trail again and now it was good. Coming out both sides in big drops and big drops in the middle. He made it a total of 75 yards according to the Basemap app on my phone.
A quick bit of field dressing and a short drag to the field edge was about all that was left. My buddy got the truck and we loaded him up. Hooked him up to the backhoe and lifted him up. My buddy went for ice while I skinned him out and then quartered him up. He had a 1/2" thick layer of fat on him. Will be a perfect eater for sure. I finally got home around 10:40PM. Yeah I was exhausted, but it was a good exhausted...because you know...

Happiness is a warm gut pile..............with nuts on top.

[gerald strine]

Congratulations on the harvest and new hunting location sounds like a great start of the season.
Nice write up thanks for posting.

[Bcxbow]

Congrats Keith

[DuckHunt]

That sounds like a long enjoyable day. Congrats on the last minute success.

[xcaliber]

Congrats Keith

X2!

[ODH]

My kind of hunter, congrats brother!

[one shot scott]

Congratulations!

[mr meat]

Congrats

[Normous]

Cheers and congratulations Keith.
I keep a machete in the truck for broadhead extractions deep in trees. My wife is known for hitting trees and I think it cool she goes back later time to chop it out....she's notched a few

[Prmtvbowman22]

Congrats on your deer. Years ago I bought a cheap dent puller found a bolt that fit drilled and tapped the head and with 2 or 3 pops on the slide heads come right out . I usud to salvage lots of field points at the range stuck in wood frames.

[flinthead]

Good job buddy!!

[Boo]

Congratulations Keith!

[wheelsquad]

Way to get it done Keith!

[grouse]

That was a full and satisfying day! Good work and go get another one.

[nchunterkw]

Congrats on your deer. Years ago I bought a cheap dent puller found a bolt that fit drilled and tapped the head and with 2 or 3 pops on the slide heads come right out . I usud to salvage lots of field points at the range stuck in wood frames.

Was looking at cheap dent puller yesterday online. Great minds! Haha! I'll need to rig something up cause those BHs are not cheap.