Crazy Treestand Stories

[backwoods07]

I'm sure everyone has their fair share of weird sightings or funny stories from the woods, so lets take a minute and share our best ones!

No matter how many hours we spend in the woods, I guarantee no one's seen it all...This thread should prove it

[Tominator]

I've had plenty of things happen to me while in a stand.

Had a chickadee land on me a couple of years ago.

I've had squirrels try and share a stand with me at times.

I've been attacked by screech owls on 2 occasions.

I hunted about 3 miles from where a tornado hit one night. A small tree next to the one I was hunting in snapped and bonked me on the head once.

Watched the happiest rabbit in Delaware county one night. He would race out 10 yards, race back, and repeated the process a few times.

[backwoods07]

Saw a squirrel fall from a tree into a river, and struggle to climb onto the ice for about 30 minutes.

Hunting partner hunted on public land once and saw a guy perform a 15 minute stalk on his decoy.

Pretty entertaining on both accounts

[Ethan Givan]

One morning me, my brother, and my cousin were all going bowhunting here at my farm. My cousin and me were hunting together in a ground blind and my brother was taking his climber to hunt about 300 yards from us over the ridge. We went our seperate ways and my cousin and I got settled into the blind a little before daylight. Just when it starts to get light enough to see, my cousin's cell phone starts vibrating. He answers it and we here only a couple words from my brother before we lose signal. We didnt know if something was wrong so we started walking to where he was hunting. We get over there and he is about 8 foot up the tree and he has his arms and legs wrapped around it like he is giving the tree a hug. When he put the climber on the tree he didnt get it tight enough so as he went up, the tree got smaller and the climber started leaning away from the tree until he couldnt stand or sit on it anymore. It was ready to fall down the tree. We finally convinced him he wasnt that high and he jumped down. It was really funny afterwords and we still pick at him about it.

[MichiganHunter]

1. LOL ok so I went in with a climber on some state land before sun rise had not found a tree yet. I walked into the area I wanted to hunt and then found a tree and climbed it, it was a DARK cloud covered a bit of wind and a no moon night, i got up in my tree and waited till sunrise then started looking around then behind me I heard some one softly say HEY. I about crapped I leaned around the tree and there was a guy sitting in a fixed position stand he had gotten in just after me and i didn't hear him climb up...not sure how I didn't' hear him but we ended up like 20 or 30 yards from each other. We sat till about 12:00 noon no deer but not sure what we would have done if we would of saw one. This was on state land so lots of hunters and it's very easy to walk in on someone but it's hard to end up in trees that close then to make thing even funnier there were about 4 parking lots within walking distance and we had parked in the same lot right next to one another.

2. It was gun season I walked in and climbed up my ladder stand got sitting down then I kept hearing little plops hitting the leaf litter on the ground and I could not tell WHAT was going on, then as day light broke i looked up to see a flock of turkeys looking back at me, the plops i was hearing was there...poop hitting the ground, the only thing i could think of was...well i don't need to say it but it was, "I REALLY HOPE I DON'T GET CRAPPED ON".

[crazylegz70]

These arent the greatest, but here we go:

1) I was hunting a stand that bordered a corn field and I loved to take my buddies with me in High School. My second year of hunting I take my friend derek and he is sitting right above me in another treestand. At about 9:00 am we hear a gunshot from across the field and I look up to see 4 does running directly at me. I pull up my shotgun only to find out that the one limb that I didnt cut is blocking the gun from coming all the way to my shoulder. So i do the only thing I could think of as a 15 year old boy hoping to shoot his first deer....I START SHOOTING FROM THE HIP!!!!....LOL I proceed to unload 3 shoots and empty my gun. Two of the four does run within spitting distance of my tree and I'm out of ammo....I couldnt believe it and all my buddy could do is laugh his butt off...

2) Out of the same tree stand a year later it is early morning and I keep hearing what I think is someone walking through the woods whistling a song....You know how it is when your young and in the woods and its dark....my imagination was going crazy I kept thinking that my dad has some secret call that he uses where he whistles, or maybe it is a good luck thing. I am stuck hearing this crazy whistling tune for about an hour until BANG...I hear my dad shoot....I thought to myself OMG his crazy whistling call works...how did he do that...well, come to find out....it was the deer breathing through its nose and dad watched it for a long time until it got close enough for a shot...Needless to say I felt a little dumb....LOL

[Guest Mark_85]

I was in my cousins woods before daylight sittting up against an old hay rake ready to muzzleloader hunt. I hear a quad pull into a woods behind me and its breaking daylight. I hear somthing approaching me fast so i sit and wait. Then finally I see an image that doesn't look like a deer. Its another hunter with no blaze orange on stops right beside me and says "Don't shoot im human". Man was I upset he walked in the brush chased a couple deer off then left.

On another ocassion I was at another cousins house watching a cornfield on the back of his property. I see two deer and somthing following them looks like a beef cow. Im in the treestand puzzled as to what this is. So I grab my binoculars and start checking out this "cow". The cow turned out to be a piebald doe. I was so excited I called everyone that day and told them about what I had seen. Then after all this happened my transmission went out on my truck. Some of the luck I have.

[backwoods07]

Last year's shotgun season we had about 5 guys hunting on our farm. Four of us left early in the morning to get to our stands, and one decided to sleep in for another 45 mins. When he woke up, he stepped outside to put his shoes on and noticed about half a dozen deer about 100 yds away against a treeline about 2 minutes after legal shooting light. He abandoned his shoes and stalked a little closer to them. Took one shot at a buck and downed him. I guarantee that was the first deer shot with a gun in Illinois that year. He sat down on the porch and had a beer while 3 of the 4 hunters still out there returned. We decided to pull a joke on the last guy in from his stand. We perched the buck up against a ridge on a treeline so that only his rack was visible from the clearing. When we picked up the last hunter, we "spotted" a buck bedded down on the treeline. He proceeded to load his gun and put a stalk on a deer that was already down. He got within 40 yds or so until we couldn't hold in our laughter.

After my buddy shot that buck, he got a call from "girlfriend" and had to pack it up. His shotgun season lasted about 4 minutes.

[preacherman]

Hunting partner hunted on public land once and saw a guy perform a 15 minute stalk on his decoy.

I would have loved to have seen this! I don't know if I could have kept from laughing out loud.

[herriman08]

couple years ago i was in my stand and some guy that was bird hunting shot my bait bucket while i was in my stand and proceeded to stand on my bait pile and tell me that it was un sportsman like to leave my bucket in the woods. i have never left the bicket in the woods..

and i was hunting down state near lapeer, when out of nowhere some guy talking on his cell phone just starts hanging a tree stand about 60yards in front of me:mad:. So i waited till he got in the stand and then told him i was there:p. he got so close that my camera took a picture of him!

[Dawg]

About 13 years ago, my dad and I were making some deer drives on some Type 2 government land on the Neches River, when we were walking back to the boat we walked right up on this guy who was leaned up against a tree and about 20 yards in front of him was a huge pile of corn. He wasn't bowhunting either, I never have figured out why the dude was hunting so close to a pile of corn with a high powered rifle..................needless to say my dad and I still laugh about it till this very day!

While hunting the same land on the same river, we(my dad, some of his friends, and I) were sitting in the boat next to the river bank eating some lunch when this guy decked out in some OLD camo walks up.....chewing on a bullet, asks us a few questions about hunting and the terrain and then turns and walks back into the woods.......we nicknamed him "Rambo".

I've walked up on several people before, not on purpose they just had good camo on, have had folk walk by me, even had a guy shoot a deer that I shot at and missed, it ran about 200 yards when I heard the shot, didn't even know the guy was there.

[MichiganHunter]

I forgot one, I was not born yet but this is a family story that will live FOREVER........ My mom bless her heart was trying to deer hunt for the first time, my dad had set her about 30 yards from him self and was watching a different direction and he was setting in a tree stand so he could keep a better eye on her. Well she had about 3 deer run in on her 2 does and 1 VERY nice buck he could see the deer coming but i guess she didn't..... when she had realized the deer were about 9 yards behind her she turned so she could be face to face with the three deer which were to scared to run she raised the .410 slug gun she was using and proceeded to fire off several rounds from her hip at about a +85% angle successfully killing NOTHING accept for maybe a deer in the neighboring county......even though my dad and mom have gotten a divorce since then it's still funny as all get out to hear my dad talk about it.

[Grizz]

1. I was 12 years old, it was my first year I could hunt, and the first day of archery arrived. Typical first time hunter, I was overly excited, couldn't wait to get out there, and Dad was doing all he could to calm me down. We parked the car, got our gear together, and headed into the woods. We were hunting a new area and had found a treestand that we thought would see some action. Dad wanted me to get the full experience of the hunt, so once I was up in the tree and had my bow in hand and safety harness attached he went another 100 or so yards and jumped into another stand. My excitement quickly turned to fear as I sat there in the dark listening to things I couldnt see. I'd been in the tree maybe 10 minutes or so, completely scared out of my mind when right above my head an owl let out a series of hoots. I completely forgot about all that my dad had told me about being as quiet as possible and keeping still while in the tree. I immediately jumped to my feet and let out one of those "you scared the crap out of me" screams. After that the woods got real quiet and still, and I could then hear my dad trying his hardest to contain his laughter. After we got down out of the tree he then told me that he had seen the owl in the tree, with the flash light, as I was climbing up, but didn't want to say anything to me b/c he wanted that "full experience" for me. I wasn't too thrilled about all of it, but today we can look back at it and laugh.

2. If it could go wrong it did go wrong. Another morning hunt, this time on familiar hunting ground. First off I wake up a bit later than I wanted to, so I hurridly get my stuff packed into the car, grab a quick bite to eat and head out. I get to the farm, start getting my gear on, and the sun hasnt come up yet, but its starting to get lighter out. I grab my stand and my bow and quickly, but quietly make my way to my tree. I dont even get 20 ft from the car and a doe jumps up and runs off. Great!!! The deer have already started coming out of the fields. I slow down and try to sneak to the tree. Half way there I come within a few feet of a raccoon. I think I scared him just as bad as he scared me! I get to my tree, set up my climber and begin to make my way up the tree. I get to my position and bend over to strap the bottom half of the climber to the tree. Out comes my rattle bag from my cargo pocket, falling all the way to the ground. And guess what?? The sound of it hitting the ground spooks another deer that was headed my way! At this point I just wanted to get my safety harness secured to the tree and get my bow up in the stand. I finally get settled in and knock an arrow to my string. Just as I do that, the sun breaks and its go time. About 5 minutes later I've got a doe and triplets coming my way. They don't quite get in range, but they don't know I'm there and casual mill around eating acorns for another 10 or so minutes. This is good news b/c I thought I had scared everything away within 5 miles after all my clammering around to get in. Another 20 or so minutes pass and things are buzzing. Squirrels are running around, a groundhog is searching for something to eat, and the bluejays are cackeling away off to my left. Then I hear that all too familiar crunching coming my way. I look up and see movement, thinking its another deer. I get ready and see something coming from behind a tree! It ends up being one of the Coon Hounds that romes around freely on the farm ! By this point I was in disbelief over how this morning was going. The dog went on his way and I settled back down. Don't know how much time had passed, but I again heard the familiar crunching of leaves, this time behind me. I thought it was the dog, coming back through and turned around to see where it was going to be headed, to my surprise its a buck !! It's only 10 yards away on the back side of my tree. I was unable to stand up b/c I didnt want to spook him. I keep an eye on him and wait until I see him duck behind the tree next to mine. I then slowly stand up and attach my release to the bow string. So far so good, he didnt see me do any of this. He comes around the front of my stand, 5 yards underneath me. A beautiful 10 point!!! Not real wide, but tall and good mass. He keeps himself busy eating acorns as I can hear my heart beat growing louder and louder! He's right under my stand and I'm doing all I can to keep from him hearing my knees bang together! I calm myself down and wait for him to present a shot. After what seemed like an eternity he's 10 yds away and quartered away from me. PERFECT!!! I draw back and......CLANG, TINK, TINK, TINK, TINK!! The arrow comes off the rest?!?! I couldn't believe it! I look up and the buck had paid no attention to it and was still eating. I regroup and start to draw back....CLANG, TINK, TINK, TINK!! UNBELIEVABLE!!! I look down, at full draw, and the arrow hasnt fallen off the rest, its too short and has come through the rest?!?!?! This time the buck looks up, looks right at me and gives me the whitetail salute. After sitting there thinking about it I realized I had grabbed my dad's arrows and not mine and he's got a shorter draw length!! After that mishap, if I ever woke up late I didnt even bother going, it just wasnt worth it!

[OUTSIDER]

This on is on my buddy...I dropped him off maybe an hour before daylight in an area with the 4 wheeler, and shined the lights on a tree for him to climb, waited till he got on the tree and left ( i know it sounds dumb, but on the farm we hunt on the deer pay no mind to the farm equiptment and atv's) anyway, he forgot his light is why i shined the atv lights on his tree. well at about noon he calls me and says that he shot a mature doe, but he wanted me to see the tree he was in...puzzled i say, okay and i go back to his stand this time with the john deer. To my disbelief he is maybe 70 feet up in a yellow poplar!!!! he said he could make out some of the landscape features and wanted to be above the bench above him....well he wanted to be high enough to nott be seen by deer so he kept climbing and climbing. It was the highest i have ever seen anyone in a tree in my life!!1

[Chadwick]

I had a owl try and catch my hand 2 weeks ago while deer hunting! Luckly I saw him coming and used my bow to fend him off. He still flew up in the tree limb above me and looked down to try and figure out what I was. I liked to have fell out of the stand. Scared the mess outta me.

[wtnhunt]

Saw a squirrel fall from a tree into a river, and struggle to climb onto the ice for about 30 minutes.

Seen this happen a few times. Pretty entertaining.

Have had a few hawks and owls flying directly at me only to turn at the last second.

[elkoholic]

Back before there were tree stands, I was sitting on a limb with my bow across my legs when a red tailed hawk decided to land on my bow and almost knocked me out of the tree.

I have had a squirrel sit on my head and nibble on a pine cone. While sitting on the ground had a grouse come along and hop up on my knee. Had a chipmunk climb my leg and numerous little birds think that I made a good perch.

One year while perched about 15 feet up I had a spike buck under my stand and spent several minutes dropping pine cones on his head. It was quite amusing to watch how he reacted.

On one of my first deer hunting excursions I was sitting on a stone fence bordering a corn field and brushy draw and had a red fox come running down the fence and wondered what he would do when he saw me. Well, I don't think he ever saw me as he ran right over me.

After almost 50 years of hunting I have had way too many close encounters of the furry kind and have seen some amazing things. You have to love the outdoor world.

[slugshooter]

Well, I was a fairly late bloomer when it came to deer hunting. I didn't start until 2001 when I was 25, now I am almost 32. I started deer hunting with a buddy of mine from work. That first season I didn't have a tree stand so I ground hunted. The next year I bought a used stand from one of his friends. I can't remember the brand but it was a climber that faced the tree. Well, we are hunting one morning, and I misjudged the thickness of the tree, so the bottom part of the stand wasn't very tight on the tree. I was adjusting my feet when clunk, the bottom part of the stand slid all the way to the ground. So here I am, 20 feet up in the tree, with my feet dangling wondering how I am going to get down. Luckily, we had radios, so after awhile when we decided to talk I told him what happened. It was late in the season and a slow day, so we packed it in early. He came over and hooked my pull rope up to the stand and I pulled it back up so I could get down. Luckily, he was there that day. If he wasn't, I'm not sure how I would have gotten down.

[WiHunter813]

I was bow hunting with my brother in law on some public land. he set up a ladder stand and had gotten a doe outta it. had on problems so he wanted me to sit in it the following day. it was about 2 and through the brush i could see a nice 8. he got within 20 yrds of the stand. and when a went to draw back a nailed my eblow on a limb behind me. well the deer got spooked and i was ticked. see bein my bro is right handed he cleared out the limbs that he would of hit. And since im left handed nothing was cleared in my side

[Flintlock1776]

I was up in my stand then I heard drip, drip, drip. I looked up it was not raining. Then I heard to drip drip again. I looked down and saw one leaf moving on this very still day. Then I saw a dark drop hit the leaf. Then I saw my hand. I was bleeding! Seems my Outdoor edge knife got pulled a bit out of the seath somehow and had sliced my finger. Down I went and opened up my 1st aide kit (which early that morining I had wondered if I really need to pack it, go figure). I used all the bandages and boogies off to the Doctors. Blood was still going thru the bandages. When they asked me what I needed at reception I showed them my dripping hand and they rushed me in and put several stitches in my finger.

What did I learn from this adventure?

1. Always pack a first aide kit when you ago afield.

2. I have a high threshold for pain.