The Dark Knight

Like Cody said with his last post, usually every year hunters meet up with a buck that they can't get out of their mind. With Cody, this year that be Lefty as he has already told you he'll be doing everything he can to create a setup to take that marvelous buck. On the other hand, sometimes hunters meet a once in a lifetime buck that keeps their interest not only for one season but year round! Well, like Margaret's famous Socrates from the "Tree-Lounge" video, Cody, Dad and I have found that buck.

Last year Cody and I each had an "opportunity" to take this 3.5 year old 130 class buck, however, neither of us were presented with the perfect shot. We're both firm believers in taking a shot that we know we'll be immediately lethal and neither of was granted this shot. Cody's opportunity came one morning during early muzzle loading, the problem was that the buck was in thick cover and would never come into range. My opportunity came during rifle, and with Cody videoing, the buck was too interested in chasing does that he never slowed down long enough to present an ethical shot. In both instances we threw everything we had at him. From grunts to bleats to rattling, nothing worked on this smart ol' guy. Then we made our mistake.

Instead of giving this guy time and avoiding the areas in which we had seen him, we ventured into his domain hoping to catch him by sup rise. Big mistake! He quickly turned nocturnal (hence the name!) and we never saw him again except on trail camera pictures at night. This negative for last year quickly turned into a plus for the upcoming season. By him turning nocturnal, plus the general intelligence of this deer we feel strongly that he is still running around on the property. Now, take a 130 class 3.5 year old and give him a year, what do you have? A buck of a lifetime that may score close to 150!

With such an old, smart buck we have to be very smart in attempting to harvest this guy. Quite the opposite of Lefty, with The Dark Knight we will do everything we can to AVOID his areas. Instead we're going to try and let him make the mistake by hunting his possible travel corridors and other areas where 9 out of 10 times we won't see him in hopes of seeing him that one crucial time. With a buck of this magnitude running around, we'd easily sit "unsuccesfully" for weeks in hopes of even catching a glimpse of him, much less getting a shot oppurtunity!

Well, as you can tell Cody and I are both biting at the bit for hunting season to arrive. Once again its times for all of hard work in the woods to hopefully pay off. But hey, shot or no shot, deer or no deer, hunting to us is much more than the shot, its a passion for God, wildlife and the outdoors! We'd like to thank all of you for reading the blog, it'll really get busy here in the coming weeks with all of the hunting stories! Don't forget to post your comments, see Cody's post on how to post these if ya have trouble figuring it out!