Yesterday, when I saw this picture of Ethan O’Brien and his massive buck, I tweeted it out, to which Tommy replied: Great story. This kid should buy a lottery ticket now. (1) Remove sunglasses (2) Pee (3) Fight thru buck fever (4) Bang! Read about it here, quite a story. Never ceases to amaze me the things that happen in the deer woods. Great buck Ethan!
Matt Ornes tells the story of the giant he arrowed in Adams County a few days ago. Excerpt: Just down the trail, a big doe popped out in the open. My adrenaline now had me shaking bad. I had every intention of taking a shot at her but in the corner of my eye I noticed more movement behind her, further up the hill. I suddenly stopped shaking as I saw the bigger bodied deer coming towards the water. It walked slower and with more authority than any of the other deer I had seen that night. As it got closer I could see glimpses of antlers through the saplings. About fifteen yards out he finally cleared the saplings, and [...]
Not temperature-wise, but when a spot is “buck hot.” One afternoon a buddy drilled a 10-pointer with his bow from a lock-on near an alfalfa field. I drove our ATV over at dusk, and we looked around for 30 minutes. I was supposed to be looking for blood splatter, but I got big-eyed with all the trails and fresh shiny rubs (20 that I could see) in the grassy funnel between the bedding timber and the grain. Steve hollered, “Here he is!” We weren’t quiet as we dragged his 10-pointer, loaded it, and rattled off across the field. The next afternoon I stood in the same tree stand and drew an arrow on the third buck that slipped out of [...]
I asked that simple question of my friend, Dr. Grant Woods, one of the top whitetail scientists in the world. He told me: “Whitetails react incredibly quickly to either a positive or a negative stimulus. A lot of hunters fail to take that into account quickly enough. For example, if deer see or hear you in a tree stand near a food plot, they will learn to avoid that spot very fast. They will still go to the plot (positive stimulus) but they will circle your stand (negative stimulus). You might sit there, not see any deer and wonder what is wrong. Hunters, especially bowhunters, need to take into consideration how fast deer, and especially mature bucks, react and adjust [...]
The American Heart Association (AHA) recommends a target zone for aerobic exercise that elevates your heart to within 50 to 75 percent of its maximum rate. For example, 80 to 120 beats per minute for a healthy 60-year-old and 95 to 143 beats a minute for a 30-year-old. Medical researchers in Michigan fitted 25 deer hunters (average age 55) with heart monitors. The heart rates of those hunters who shot at and hit a buck soared as high as 118 percent of their max rate. Big time buck fever excitement! In a Wisconsin study of 10 men with monitors, the hunters’ heart rates went from 78 beats per minute with no deer in sight to 100 beats when they spotted [...]