[extreme01]

Many moons ago my father had the nerve to place a 30-30 in my hands almost a full decade before I was eligible to get my driver's license. LOL! Heck, I was driving before that. Dad placed me behind the wheel on some dusty back roads here in MN and I never looked back. No, really, I never looked back. I was too scared to take my eyes off the road in front of me. LOL!

Back then we wore red flannel long sleeved button up shirts. Not these hi-vis fluorescent orange requirements they have today. He was at my side as we left the pickup and started still hunting down an old logging road. The Winchester 94 felt like a solid piece of steel for those little hands at the time. Dad always either followed or was at my right side. As we crested over this rise over-looking this over-grown clear cut, we still made out the outline of a deer... a Big deer! He pointed to it about the same time I spotted it. He didn't have to say a thing. My instincts kicked in.

As I raised the rifle to my shoulder, I recall seeing only a dot at the end of my gun as I was using open sights. This buck was about a hundred yards away as the crow flies. I pointed the rifle and yanked the trigger. The buck did a 360° spin, then a 180° spin. Suddenly my dad pulled the gun from my hands and emptied the gun at him as the buck hopped away into thicker brush. He yelled to me to go back to my uncle, who was with us on this hunt, and get more shells. Don't know why, but as I came jogging along, my uncle knew what I needed and started digging in his shirt pocket before I even reached him. LOL! You know what? Honestly, this just hit me and I NEVER thought of it until now... my uncle knew because of the many successive shots! Duh!

My father pursued with the Winchester 12 ga. with slugs. About half way back to the spot where I made the shot, I heard a shot echo in the distance. I knew what happened. As I got closer, I could hear him yelling for me. I saw where the buck ran and the blood trail was nothing like I've seen even to this day. Even Ray Charles could have followed it. When I caught up to my dad, he was drenched with blood from following the trail. He told me he caught up to the buck which was down and he finished it off. Like I didn't know. LOL! He was excited too I guess!

It took years for me to realize I really did get that buck. I had thought, being a kid and all, that HE is the one who killed him, not me. I know now though. When I fired, I hit the buck's neck which was why there was so much blood. The unbelievable part was his gutted weight, so I'll leave that out. Let's just say it was a very very heavy buck! LOL!

On a special note, this was an 8 point buck and thinking back and looking at the pic, he was in the upper 130's to lower 140's. You know what we did with that rack? Threw it away. We weren't into big racks at that time. Can't believe he/we did that. Back in the day, all the rage was how heavy a buck was and not his headgear size.

That was my first buck, shot off hand a 100 yards away in the neck. I can still remember it. Dad is gone now, but he's still alive in the memories we shared in the hunting woods!

So, do you remember your first deer? Let's hear it.

[shortbus]

Good story.

[oucorry]

I enjoyed reading this story!!

[extreme01]

thank you so much for reading my story, lets hear your story..

[spe1737]

I'm not the story teller you are, but here it goes... I just shot my first buck this year 09. It was my second time to go out ever!!! The first time i went to this stand at my friends lease with a black powder rifle and did not see a thing, well a couple turkeys way out of range. I still loved the feeling of being out in the woods by myself, it was very peaceful. The next time I went hunting, I went with my AR-15, I know some people say this is not the best deer rifle, but it is all I had. So we get up way before sunset and ride 4-wheelers to the other end of the section. My buddy points me toward the tree line and says go find the tree blind. Yea, it was pitch black and that thing was camo! So after about 20 min of searching the woods I found it. I perched myself up there and watched the sun rise. Three hours later I was like "crap not again" I had not seen a thing. Suddenly I see a deer. It walks down this path in front of me, but then it goes out of the woods to the clearing blocked by trees from my view. My buddy had already given up and I hear a HEY LETS GO! on the radio. I'm like oh crap and turn it off as quickly as possible. My buddy is coming up the road on the other side of the clearing and sees the deer too! It finally comes to a clearing about 100 yards away from my stand and I don't hesitate. I shoot right for the heart with my open red dot sight and the deer jumps about 10 feet in the air. I am like dang I missed. My buddy got to watch the whole thing. The deer ran behind me, so we waited a while then started tracking it. It only made it about 50 yards and fell over dead. I had shot it right where I was aiming. It ended up being a small yearling buck but dressed at 107lb and had a little 6pt rack. Most would pass on this as I probably would now, but I had to get my first kill.

[spe1737]

P.S. The meat was delicious!!!

[D Winkler]

Originally Posted by spe1737

P.S. The meat was delicious!!!

Did you already eat it all?

[spe1737]

Not all of it, I have a few pounds of hamburger left and the Jerky still is not ready!!!

[chronicent]

A very nice story...

The first time we went for hunting, we went for a no hunting zone

[boltman13]

In 1974 I joined my father and a friend of his on a combination deer and antalope hunt in northern Campbell County, WY near the tiny town of Recluse. I had managed to get my antalope on about the third day and had missed a shot at a big doe . There was a huge 4 point buck I had seen on two ocasions, but haden't gotten a shot. Every morning when I was going up this draw that lead to a school section we could hunt I saw does and fawns on the side of a hill. They would scatter and I never tried a shot at them as they ran. We hunted a total of 10 days and had 3 goats and 2 deer. We got up on Saturday morning and planned to pack up and begin the drive back to Indiana. I decided to take one last spin down the path leading to the school land. Just as before a few does and fawns got up and began to move up the hill. As I was tring to find them in my scope a small spike buck suddenly stood up right where I was lookin. I flicked the safety off put the cross hairs on him and fired. The 180 gr bullet from my 30-06 hit him square in the shoulder and knocked him off his feet at a range of about 75 yards and so steeply up hill, it was more like a 65 yard shot. When I shot I didn't honestly know if he was a buck or doe. I scrambled up the hill to gut him and saw he was a spike with one of his horns still in velvet. I had the horns mounted and still have that mount in my reloading area as a reminder of my first deer. Dad is gone now, as is his friend, but I still chase deer elk, and the occasional antalope around western Colorado.