This may not be a deer of a life time that good friend john shoot this year.  It is a very impressive deer.  The internet can give you a lot of information in a mater of seconds but don’t transmit emotions.  I had to wait two week to hear the story.  John was worked the Springfield sports man show this spring in exchange for the right to hunt.  John (LJ) went out last year to backwoods whitetail and was very excided.

He didn’t shot a deer last year but by looking at the rack he is holding you can tell that there are some good deer there.  He said that he saw lots of deer that would make Pope and Young recorded book.

LJ and I have been hunting together for 15 years.  I was there when he killed his first deer with a bow.  He is a very good bow hunter.  You can’t tell by looking at his trophy wall but by his sprit.  He is the most passivity hunter I know.  He lives too hunt.

LJ has the opportune to hunt deer with a gun but he wanted to kill one with a bow.  He is hunting wood lines separated by farm fields.  This is the reason that there are so many big bucks in this area.  Last year LJ saw many very impressive deer.  He went last year at the end of October for the pre rut. He said that he was going to shot a great deer or nothing. This time he went home empty handy.

When LJ showed up for his hunt this year the wind was blowing 40 to 50 miles hour.  He was very frustrated with the wind and the way that he had to hunt in Illinois.  LJ is use to hunting in the north east and was surprised by the open land that he had to hunt.   He had three farms to hunt and they were large open fields with small wood lot to hunt.  The crops were already been harvested and the deer would use the field as escape roots.

After the third day the wind die down a little and he began to see more deer. Unto this point he had seen a few does and a spike horn buck.  LJ said that the hardest part was to truest the guide.  He keep feeling very frustrated with his guide.  His guide keeps saying to truest him and he would kill a deer.

On the fourth day the guide said that he would put LJ in a different tree stand.  The guide wanted to video tape the hunt.  The guide parked along a field edge and john walk to the tree stand 200 yards away.  This seamed to defy ever thing that LJ knows about deer hunting.  LJ said that he was going to truest his guide.  As LJ sat in the tree he got very cool.  He could not believe the setup.  He was setting in a tree that as almost in the middle of a field.  There were a few small trees and bushes around his tree.  

About an hour after he got into the tree stand he was feeling very frustrated and cool.  He looked to his right and there was a huge eight pointer that was not 20 yards away.  This was the deer he was after.  All he had to do was shoot it.  He picked up his bow and tried to draw it back.  He couldn’t.  He tried again this time he lifted his bow up high and got the upper limb cough in the branch of the tree.  The deer heard this and ran off.  LJ was very frustrated with the hunt and himself.

He was not going to give up.  The guide said that we will try a new spot.  That morning the guide drove his ATV right up to the tree with LJ and the tree stand.  They setup the tree stand and the guide drove away.  As the guide drive away LJ was just shaking his head.  LJ was thinking that there is no way that any deer will be walking by this tree stand after all this.  The wind had died down and it was not as cool as it was the day before.  LJ was surprise to see a couple does walking his way.  Then behind the does was a buck.  LJ got himself ready for the shoot.  He let the does walk by and then the buck started to walk.  LJ drew his bow put his twenty yard pin on the deer chest. He shot.  His was shocked to see half of the arrow was sticking out of the deer.  He had hit the shoulder. 

He sat in the tree for any hour before he got down. He was very frustrated with him self.  After all this he got his shot and hit the deer shoulder.  He found some hair but no blood where he hit the deer.  He texted the guide before he went after the deer.  He walks for a hundred yard before he found first blood.  He would find very little blood for the next three hundred yards.  As he walked along the gully he heard something at the top of the gully.  He was looking up to the top of the gully thinking that the nose could be his buck.   He moved down the gully being very silent.  He started to smell a rutting buck.  As he look up the ridge looking for what was making the noise suddenly smell got very strong.  He looked to his left and there was his buck.

We would drag the bucks by his self to the field.  LJ felt that this was a tough hunt.  His guide did his job but for LJ the hardest part was trusting the guide.

Congratulation LJ.

Sean