Mocha: My Champion

I know it was difficult for my dad to let this pup go, but I cannot believe how much I love this dog. She has been really antzy lately and I just couldn't for the life of me figure out what her deal has been. I decided it may be a good idea to try my luck at a rooster with Mocha. I had permission from Nick to hunt the dove field and I figured with what snow we had melted off, there may just be a bird in there.

When I got there, the vibe was anything but optimistic. It was patchy and thin, and with it being mid December I wondered if it was worth the gas. Once we started walking, I could see this was a good thing. The pup needed to run!
We pulled a loop around the field along the fenceline and came up with nothing, although there is a significant amount of fox and coyote activity out there. As we came to the end of the loop I figured we would walk our way to the old dove blind. About halfway there Mocha gets birdy.

She takes off like a streak and I am off to the races. I knew that if I kept up with her I had a chance. She kept quartering back, and then would take off again. I then watch as she sees what she is after. When she wants to, that dog can BOOK IT!

I see a rooster running about a foot from her face before he flushes. He cackles when he flushes and Mocha stops. Surprisingly, I took my time for Mocha's sake and I drop him with one shot.

Mocha takes off again. I knocked him down but Mocha was off to the races again. It took her 20 yards to catch up with her rooster.

We were on cloud 9!
After our only pic (forgot the damn camera at home), We stood up and walked around a bit more. About 20 feet from where we dropped the bird, Mocha flushes another one. I did not get a great view of it so I let it sail away.

We left this spot more successful than I could have even thought.
We did end up trying our luck at another spot near home. Again, Mocha took off and it was all I could do to keep up. This bird however, was a public land bird and flushed at about 40 yards. I threw some haymakers but did not pull him down. We did flush another hen on our way out but with a magnitude of snakegrass, we were beat.
At home I tried my best to get some pics with my pup.

Thanks Dad. I love this pup.



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The Great Squirrel 'Hunt'

After enough deer madness, I had made mention to Micheal Parker that there were too many squirrels at Coleman's and we needed to thin the herd. In all honesty, I believe there were too many.

The day after Thanksgiving we headed out and I was able to bring alone my nephew Ryker. We bundled him up and did our best to find a squirrel in the woods right off of the road.

We were out for a little over an hour and were unable to find one. It baffled me as the place looked like a golf ball with squirrel tracks. Ryker was cold and done hunting. He sure did enjoy himself and I guarantee he will be back in the woods in the future. 

After dropping Ryker off back at the house, Michael and I headed back out to solve this puzzle. I sat near the road with Mocha and Michael walked farther back into the timber. I finally found one splayed out on a tree branch and I let the .17 bark. Mocha of course retrieved it without hesitation. Again, I looked up into the crotch of a tree and there was another. As I was standing to move elsewhere one flies down a walnut tree and crosses the creek. I got a quick flash as it crested a log on the opposite side of the creek and I cracked off a shot anyway. When we crossed the creek it laid on the log it was on. We tried on the other side for awhile and were able to put a few down there. Between the two of us we managed a 5 total. As we were calling it a day I decided I wanted to squirrel nest with my new shotgun before we left. As wrong as it may be, we were out to manage numbers. They were eating tree bark by the end of the winter last year. Of course, one came spitting out of the nest upon the shot to which Mocha helped finish it off.

 We then looked around to see this section of woods was covered in these nests. We proceeded to manage our population... It didn't take long to fulfill our limit.

To appease my father, we did indeed clean these critters, or I should say a coot related hunt made it so Michael owed me one, so he cleaned them. We will not let them go to waste.


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Management Deer

November 20th, the Thursday before I harvested Eagle Bait, Nick took me down to Guthrie Center for a day hunt in hopes I could put some bone on the ground. There were also 3 doe tags to be filled and I was not about to let that opportunity slip away. I sat in the wet noodle walnut like last year, only the weather cooperated and was gorgeous instead. I had a group of does work into my set and I was at full draw, ready to shoot when the doe busts... There were 8 behind me, one of which was a small buck. Finally, one VERY small doe walks in and I can tell this deer is going to walk right to me. When she was at 5 yards I let 'er rip. The arrow hit way high but I was so far up this tree I knew it was a good hit. I watch as she ran 40 yards and crashed into the small ravine behind me.

There. 

I texted Nick and he was moving around a bit as there were not many deer where he was sitting. Not ten minutes later he calls me and tells me he arrowed his first deer from the ground. Smoked a giant doe off of the access road between fields. I had more deer coming when he calls again saying he shot another but the shot was far and she jumped the string.

Nick came to get me so we could deal with the labrador I harvested.

After getting my what ended up being a button buck into the truck we went to track the second one Nick hit.

We would track this doe for 400 yards with GREAT blood, only to have it completely stop. We would not find the deer.
The first one went 20 yards from where he hit it.

 I would sit in the famed cherry for the evening sit, where I saw an absolute toad on the other side of the fence, but I would not shoot one.



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Coleman's Eagle Bait

The evening of the 21st we hauled home so I could get in the treestand at Coleman's. With snow on the ground, I figured it would make for a beautiful sit. I sat in the stand close to the road as I was still getting in a little later. There was a group of deer bedded across the creek from my treestand when I got in. They did not completely bust out of there, but they got up and walked directly away from me when I got it. I later saw a buck pushing a small doe around in that same chunk of timber and I knew there was still a little rut going on yet. As shooting light waned I was bombarded by giant pytadactyls. Six bald eagles decided that they wanted to roost in the trees around me for the evening and they were not going to be quiet about it. With the weather being snappy cold, I was ready for a break. I don't know how many more of these hunts in the teens I could handle.

The next morning was much milder with temps in the upper 20s and 30s. I worked my way into the prairie stand on the north side of the creek. I ended up busting a group of deer at the corner but it was still early and I got in quietly.

45 minutes after legal a small doe appeared about 200 yards into the field. Right behind her was a buck. she was only about the size of a border collie at best, and he was chasing her around the field. At 80 yards, they stopped and looked at the prairie corner I was in. A very small buck we have seen multiple times was making his way towards the pair. The two bucks proceeded to spar while the doe slipped away passed the creek away from me. After she was out of sight the buck that was with her would not let her escape. At 45 yards he came through a shooting window but do not stop. At full draw I opted to not shoot.

I sat for another hour watching the bald eagles swoop around and the pheasants bounce around in the corn field to the west.

A flash along the creek.
I immediately stand up as I know this is the same small doe from earlier. She blasts back from whence she came.
I see her again and this time she s running full bore at me along the prairie edge. She comes to a complete halt when she gets to my boot prints. She sniffs but never busts. I was hounded earlier for not using some sort of scent control, and before this trip I prepped everything I had

I look up and I hear him coming down the trail. Grunting the whole way, he came to about 20 yards and stopped. There is a stem to the maple blocking my view so no shot opportunity. I don't know if he will left or right.
The doe for whatever reason busts and runs to the field edge. I knew the buck would follow her every move. He pivots a little and comes to the prairie edge at 12 yards.

I come to full draw and wait for him to take one more step to give me a broadside chip shot.

Instead I slip the arrow through two small trees while he is hard quartering too...

I watch as the buck takes off into the prairie and then cross the fence to the west.

He stands in one spot for 10 minutes before bedding down in the corn field.

I watch him try and get up and lay back down 3 times before he finally makes it to his feet. The whole time those damn eagles are pulling loops around him. For an hour he was in the field and I honestly believe that it was because of the eagles he got uncomfortable enough to get up and get into the timber line. He walked closer to about 70 yards and bedded down again. I could see him clear as day before he got up once more. At this point I could no longer see him. I figured he couldn't have gone far because I never saw him walk the creek edge.

I backed out as slowly and quietly as humanly possible and then headed for Dad's place.

We had gone over the scenario many times, and it was reassuring that my hit, and his body language indicated a fatal hit. I was even able to enjoy a late breakfast with Michael and Dad. We waited until 1pm before heading out to see if we could find this buck.

When we arrived, the four eagles I saw earlier were perched in the trees above where I saw him last...

 We walk a total of 80 yards before I see a large hairy rock about where my buck is. He went ten feet from when I saw him last before he bedded down for good.

We eventually dragged him out of there, all of 50 yards, and brought him to the Freeseman Farm where Jerry prepped the skid for me.

Michael said it was cheating...I disagree and now I want one.

He was by no means a monster buck, but there is a special meaning for me to harvest any animal off of this property. The last buck to come off of Coleman's was from 2010, so this was a long time coming. He will look good on the wall next to my wife's. 2014 is turning out to be a real dream season.



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Hook: "Better to be Lucky than Good"

A moniker that is often used by a good friend of Nick and I, Ethan Shetler: "It is better to be lucky than good".

This would later become the scenario after the tracking odyssey that was from a buck we now call 'Hook'.

On the evening of the 14th I am sitting in the Boxelder stand that Rachel shot her buck with a slew of turkeys out in front of me. I feel my phone in my pocket buzz... I knew Nick and Dad were in Guthrie Center for the evening. I pick up and Nick tells me he hit another brute from the same stand as last year. Last year the buck went 40 yards and tipped over. This time it went a bit differently.

"I hit a big one. Another big 8 but this one has a lot of trash. The shot was back...Way back."
- Poindexter


"What happened?"- Me

"It was a 45 yard shot and he was kinda walk running and I didn't blat him to stop..."- Poindexter

"Seriously. You are an idiot." - Me

"Yup. I know. It's a dead deer and we will have to come back in the morning."

We have come to learn that gut hits, though far from ideal, are fatal 100% of the time. You just have to play your cards right and either hope they bed down, or know what they are going to do and where they go.

Being that Nick is a deer killing machine, I had to razz him as much as possible. Never hurts to humble him a little.

We came up with a game plan and head out from Nick's place at 4:30am.

I told Nick I would find that deer.

Nick, Dad and I pile into the truck at 4:30 and head out. It was a long cold drive without a fan in that truck. Upon arrival at the field, Nick was just short of a complete mess. It was still too dark, so we waited in twitchy, anxious, darkness.

When light finally came we wasted no time getting to first blood. It took a few minutes but we eventually did find blood. It was very sparse, and on open field with a lot of exposed ground, it was difficult to find. We finally found the trail as he went around a finger of timber to the back side. The blood was surprisingly good as we enter the timber. We did however follow to a fence-line...

Down go the bows and over we went.

We tracked for another 200 yards before we came to another fence. We knew he was hurting when he 90-ed the fence and followed it straight up to a gate opening. At the gate he crossed into a vast prairie on a ridge...

It took us almost 15 minutes to find blood from that gate. At that point the mood was rather disheartened. We followed blood for another 200 yards for roughly an hour.

When we found the first bed we knew it would get tougher, and with only smears and flecks it was all we could do to not go cross-eyed. We were yet again at the crest of the prairie and we found the arrow. This deer had carried the arrow on a 600 yard loop and it was intact except for the broadhead which had twisted off cleanly. The blood after that was borderline impossible to follow.



"Gentlemen. We have a dead deer."

Dad's words were music to our ears that almost didn't seem possible. At the edge of the wood-line and prairie was a gigantic buck laying on his side.

As we walk up on this beast is when it takes a dark turn.
Yes he was down, but he was not done. Chest heaving and a head that tries to come up when we get close. This is the unfortunate part of making a poor shot. There are too many unknowns and poor circumstances.
We proceed with caution as the set of head gear on this thing would ruin someones day in a hurry. I handed Nick my knife and we finish off the large buck.
The whole ordeal was humbling for all three of us, but in the end we have a magnificent animal harvested by our hands.

Nick's shot was as poor as we thought. It enter just in front of the left rear flank and exited out of the center of the right flank. Now I am not one for product placement, but if it were not for the large 3-blade Rage broadhead, this saga would have been written far differently.

 I told Nick to smile and at least pretend like he was having fun, but he was still a little in shock from the whole ordeal.

When we turned him over, as this fall's trend seems to show, someone else tried their luck at harvesting this buck.

 Later inspection would show that this was LAST seasons wound. The shoulder blade grew around the arrow shaft and it appeared to have dissolved and absorbed the broadhead.

Even though the drag was 90% downhill, this thing was a mammoth. Nick and I were gassed by the time Dad took these photos:

 Once we got him to where we could drive the truck right up to him, we set up for real pics.

It is always a gift to be able to harvest such a majestic animal. We strive to make the cleanest and most humane kills, but that does not always go as planned. What we have done when things do go poorly is everything possible to find and retrieve it. We owe it to the animal as we have taken it's life in the process.

Congrats Nick.



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