Kids and hunting

[Texan_Til_I_Die]

I haven't posted much lately, so I thought I'd share some stories and pics from last weekend.

I took a friend's 11 year old boy Zeth out to the ranch I hunt in West Texas. He had never hunted anywhere except around his house, so this was a new experience for him. He had a hard time accepting the fact that it takes a solid two hours to drive from the camp house to the far side of the property and then back. He also had never shot a deer over 70 or 80 yards away.

We got there Friday afternoon and he was wound up tighter than a 3 day clock. I drove around to the north side of the ranch and we approached a stand I had set up there from the north. The wind was from the south and the stand was on the far side of a little ridge that looked down into a thick brushy mesquite flat. As we topped the ridge I spotted a doe standing on the edge of the flat below us, but before Zeth could get in position for a shot, the deer saw us and bailed out.

We worked our way on over the ridge and got set up in the stand. It didn't take more than 5 minutes and either that same doe or another one worked her way out of the brush below us. We watched he for about a minute and then an eight point came out and ended up chasing her off. We didn't see anything else for about an hour until a group of four does wandered out of the brush to feed. I picked out the biggest and Zeth got his 243 ready. I fired up the video camera and told Zeth to shoot when ready. I hear him breath out and then WHAM, the 243 goes off. That doe dropped in her tracks! Good shot and high fives!

We walked down to the deer and I asked Zeth how far he thought it was from the stand to where the doe was? He looked and said 60 yards.

I told him it was exactly 148 yards to the tree line! Obviously he had fallen victim to that "wide open spaces" syndrome where everything looks a lot closer than it really is.

So Saturday morning rolls around and Zeth is still all fired up about hunting. I put him in another stand about a half mile away from where he killed his doe. This morning it was very windy, but not very cold. After the sun comes up he sees four does, but no horns. He waits a bit and then spots a group of five turkey gobblers. They look to be pretty close so he launches a round at the biggest one. Oops! A swing and a miss. Turns out those "close" turkeys were actually about 150 yards away. Again, distances can be very deceiving if you aren't used to hunting in that country.

Saturday afternoon we decide to try for another doe, so I set Zeth up in a tripod overlooking a 200 acre wheat field. Every afternoon there are 20+ deer in that field, so I figured it would be a sure thing to bag another doe, maybe even two. I head over to a different tripod that's a mile or so away and on the way over there I jump a big razorback looking boar out of a wallow and drop him with a shot from my 7 mag.

OK, one hog down before I even get to my stand. I leave the boar where he lays since he's much to big to eat, plus he's covered from head to tail with fresh mud. I get into the tripod and basically sit and stare at nothing until right at dark when a whole passel of hogs come running by. I line up on a medium sized sow and drop her at 90 yards. Sorry, no pics but let me tell you that hog backstrap was some fine eating that night! :eat:

After I backstrapped that hog, I headed back over to the wheat field to pick up Zeth. I had heard him shoot twice and figured he had a doe or two on the ground for me to gut. Well, when I got there he was a bit dejected. Yep, missed again. Twice. That darned old distance thing had gotten him again. A quick query told me that he had been flinging at deer 250 - 300 yards away. He thought they were 150 or less. Oh well, one more morning to hunt.

Sunday morning we awoke to a brisk north wind and intermittent rain. We decided to head back to the north side where Zeth had killed his doe on Friday. It was late, just after 8:00 before we saw anything move. First there was a couple of does, and then right behind them the 8 point that we'd seen on our previous trip. I told Zeth that 8 point looked like a good one to shoot, so he squares around and squeezes off. The buck kicks like a mule, runs about 20 yards into the brush and falls over dead as a hammer. Perfect shot! Suddenly those three misses didn't seem so bad after all.

All in all, it was one of the better hunts I've had recently.

[wtnhunt]

Cool story Mike. Congratulations to Zeth on his doe and buck. Very nice buck.

[Tink]

Best story i have read in ages and ages

Great yarn

tink