My November 2006 deer.


TravisM

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Just thought I would make a post about how my November went.

I was concerned that I wouldn't get to hunt much at all this November because my wife and I were expecting baby #3. The due date was the 26th, but she has been known to go early and FAST!!! So I thought I should stay close to home.

But I did take a vacation day from work on Friday, November 3rd. Last year on the first Friday in November I took off work and killed my personal best bow kill buck, so I guess out of superstition I decided to try it again on the first Friday in November. And it paid off again!

The hunt was awesome. I was able to rattle this 8 point and another smaller buck right in to my decoy. The young 4 pointer did everything under the sun to try and get the decoy to move, while the 8 point stood 35 yards away and rubbed up some trees. It was awesome to watch. Long story short, the 8 point gave me a perfect 20 yard broadside shot and dropped dead within 60 yards!

He isn't the giant Illinois whitetails you read about, but he is my new personal best again and I was super proud to take him.

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I didn't go hunting again until November 11th. My boss invited me out to his place for an afternoon bow hunt, so I decided to go. I Can called this doe to within 6 yards but with no shot. The cool thing was she was grunting with every step when she came in. She got to 6 yards broadside, but there were limbs in the way. She busted me and ran out and turned broadside at 20 and I double lunged her.

Sorry for the bad picture, recovered her in the dark and didn't take the picture until right before we butchered her.

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Then my brother Trevor took his very first bow kill the very next morning out of the stand I killed the above 8 point out of. It was just a button buck, but I was pretty proud of him for getting one with a bow on only his second time out!

Then on November 13th, I got the best trophy I could get this year. My new son Caleb Alexander was born.

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I didn't go out hunting for our Illinois shotgun season because we just had the baby. So Trevor asked if he could sit in my stand and I said "sure..knock yourself out." Man did he ever!

He tagged out for the season on bucks in 30 minutes! He shot a nice weird rack 9 point right at first light and then a nice heavy racked 8 point 30 minutes later!

9-point 170 lbs field dressed

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8-point 177 lbs field dressed

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I didn't go hunting again myself until Thanksgiving morning, November 23rd. I went out hoping to fill another doe tag. At about 8:30 I got a nice big doe to come by at 25 yards. I made a perfect shot on her and she went 95 yards and I heard her pile up.

When I got on her trail and found her, I got quite a suprise. It was a 1 point buck!! It was a little spike with the rack completely busted off on the left side and the one point on the right side was 2 7/8" long. Luckily, here in Illinois you can use a doe tag on a deer that has a rack 3" or under!

I felt kind of stupid for not seeing that, and I looked at that deer quite a few times as it was coming in. I was just concentrating on the shot. And that 1 point was no where near as tall as its ear and the same blasted color as its ear. Anyway, that may sound like a bunch of excuses, but believe me....if I had seen that point I would have let it walk. But it worked out pretty good in the end.

Can you see that big point???

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Before this season, I had never killed more than one deer a year with my bow and I only had 4 bow kills ever, so to get 3 more in one month was pretty awesome for me.

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Re: My November 2006 deer.

Congrats on the baby and the deer. Great story. Trust me on this every time you let your brother hunt your stand he will kill something. I gave up one of my good stands last year so my brother could kill a doe and he missed a 170" deer at 10 yrds. Could have killed him. The good thing was i sat up at a spot i never hunted before and shot a nice 6 pointer with a 14" spread. Bad jeans. Had to get him out of there. Congrats again.

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