The opening weekend of the Wisconsin 2005 deer season was very snowy. This is often a good thing but the fog and snow on opening morning was so heavy that most of the day we could hardly see a thing. I was sitting in a stand I had built the previous year west of the Blueberry Swamp, up the hill in the NW corner of Charlie's land. Uncle Charlie used to poke fun at me about that stand because I built it between two dead poplar trees. I didn't notice they were dead at the time. He said that only a city boy would build in dead trees. I suppose he was right. I did heed his advice though, and took it down the next year in favor of a new stand closer to the swamp. As he predicted, the trees fell over on their own accord shortly afterwards.
But anyhow, the 2005 season saw me deerless through the opening weekend. I then decided to stay another day, Monday, and see if my fortune would change. I remember that Skip and I had gone to a pizza joint, Coops, in Hayward for supper on Sunday night.
Monday morning I got up early to make breakfast as is my custom. Then Skip and I jumped in my truck and drove down to the SW corner of Charlie's property and parked in what the Warners call the Allen place. There is the foundation remains of an old cabin there, apparently Mr. Allen's cabin.
We then walked along the fence line in the dark. I dropped Skip off at the old tree stand on the west fence line that is south west of the Blueberry Swamp. I then continued on to my new stand in the dead popals, about another 100 yards through the woods. Climbed up and settled in to wait for the sun to come up.
I was primarily watching to the west that day because that was the direction of the wind. The theory is that no deer will come up behind you when you are facing the wind because they will smell and avoid you before you would ever see them. That's the theory, but that's not what happened that day.
I had set there for a couple two or three hours when I heard a “snap” behind me. I looked back there and saw nothing and was about to turn back to my windward gaze but thought to myself; “Hmm, things don't just snap in the woods for no reason” (duh). So I keep looking back and down there and soon I noticed movement from behind some brush. There was a deer!
As he slowly moved through the brush I got my body turned around on my swivel seat, raised my gun and noticed the antlers, a nice rack. “Oh boy, oh boy!” He stepped into a slight shooting lane as I centered the cross hairs behind his front leg. “Boom” and he went down. I levered another shell into the magazine as I watched him laying there, about 40 yards away. Then I noticed he was starting to struggle to get up so I targeted his back and shot him again through the spine. No more movement after that.
I watched him for a little while before climbing down just to make sure he was down for the count. Then climbed down, walked over and started counting the points. Nine! About then Skip came over because he had heard the racket. He was sure that this was the same deer he had seen on opening day but didn't have an opportunity to shoot at. We field dressed him, then went back to borrow one of Charlie's tractors for the drag out. A nice deer, a nice end to a weekend of Wisconsin hunting.
