This was the buck that I almost couldn't remember. But, it came back to me. I had built a tree stand a couple of years before in the “plateau” area west of the Pine Plantation and east of the Blueberry Swamp. The first year in that stand I shot a small fork horn there on opening morning. And I think a doe another year.
That stand finally got too old and I took it down last summer. A good thing too, I think. It gave out beneath me as I was unscrewing the deck boards because the lags into the trees had rusted totally through. I found out that the only thing holding it together were the deck boards. Thank the Lord, I was holding unto a screw-in step as it gave way and I was left hanging there by one hand! I was able to then easily climb down. If I hadn't been holding that step there is no doubt I would have went down with the contraption. Who knows what the result of that would have been. Moral of the story: be careful in those tree stands!
Anyhow, back to 2002, I think it was opening day, but am not totally sure it may have been Sunday. I was sitting there a few hours and suddenly saw movement to the north of me. There, about 40-60 yards out were some deer moving west to east, and I could tell that at least one of them was a buck.
I started to get my gun up to watch for an opening when the closest deer, the buck, suddenly laid down into a slight indention in the ground. I was surprised, to say the least. I could still see his head clearly as he moved it back and forth scanning the woods. I also could see the top half of his back from his neck to his tail as he laid there, legs folded under him.
What good fortune, I had plenty of time to plan and take my shot. I was able to slowly raise my gun, rest my left elbow on my knee and decide what my course of action would be. At first I thought about trying to shoot him in his head but decided that I could take him with a spine shot and not have to worry about a moving target. I centered the cross hairs on his back just behind his neck and pulled the trigger. At the shot his head fell over and he never moved again.
The broken spine killed him instantly. I was elated over the fast kill and the nice buck!
