Mike: August 30. I Never saw or heard him. I looked down and he was 10 yards away broadside. I knew the mass was awesome, but thought the drop was bigger (just kidding). My stand was only 8 feet up. Thank goodness he was looking south into the wind. I couldn’t sit that stand on the opener due to wind direction. Glad I got to the next day. The entire hunt was a half hour long.--MDT
North Dakota has one of the earliest archery openers in the country (noon on August 29) and hunters are putting down the bucks. Thanks to Derek for the first buck story of 2014 on BIG DEER blog: Hi Mike: I went to our farm to check my trail cams and do a little scouting, and found out that neither of my cams had worked. I was bummed out but saw plenty of deer sign so I decided to sit in a stand rather than scout from a distance. I watched this buck and 3 others for 3 hours inside of 300 yards before they came down the trail toward me. A 28-yard shot hit the mark just a bit low but definitely in lungs. He ran [...]
I have not read many hunting regulation booklets in the last 10 years. In fact I can’t remember the last time I read a state’s regs cover to cover. I doubt you can either. That’s stupid on our part, because every state has quirky little rules and regulations that might never cross your mind. But ignorance is no defense. You and I could get our butts in a sling over some technicality if we don’t know the rules and follow them to a tee when we hunt deer. This year before we go to any state to hunt and film, I have made a commitment to go online and read the regulations cover to cover. It’s boring, but necessary. First up Kentucky, where I [...]
This is a picture of the Mini-Beast Buck last night, which means he stripped the velvet clean off his rack one day last week in late August. The bottom picture is of Mini-Beast with growing velvet antlers in July. The best description of the velvet-shedding ritual I have ever read comes from the research book Way of the Whitetail by Leonard Lee Rue III: Usually in the last week of August and the first week of September, the bucks begin to peel the velvet from their antlers. Mature bucks often peel four to five days earlier than the younger bucks, but I have seen younger bucks peel first on many occasions. Whereas up to this point the bucks have done everything possible [...]
Here's another look at "Mini-Beast" that a hunter in the Midwest has had on camera for a couple of months. I thought this was a great image, with the other smaller buck hiding in the background. The sight of this velvet giant has the BIG DEER TV Team fired up as we hit the road for Season 4. We are starting super early this year, with teams hunting and filming from Colorado to Kentucky next week. Next week... I can hardly believe the season got here so fast! I'll be archery hunting the opener in the Bluegrass State, where there's a 50-50 chance that if I see and get a shot at a big deer his rack will still be in velvet. Or maybe half [...]