September 2008

Date: 9/29/2008
Location: Fairfield County, CT
Hours Hunted: Sunrise – 8:30am; 4:30pm – Sunset
Temperature: 70 degrees
Wind: NW at 10mph
Weather: Sunny
Moon Phase: New Moon
Deer Sighted: 4 bucks, 3 does

Monday morning I headed to my stand that overlooks a trail the does use to get to a bedding area from their early morning feeding area in hopes of catching a buck I have trail cam pictures of coming to bed. The deer didn’t show up like they usually do around 7:00am, but about an hour later I happened to look behind me – there’s only about 15 yards to a stone wall behind me and then about 5 yards past the stone wall is a fence so nothing really ever walks there, plus the wind was blowing my scent that way – and a single doe showed up literally 5 yards from my tree. I reached for my bow and then instincts took over and I drew on her, bleated with my mouth to stop her and took out her lungs – she died at the bottom of the hill and then I brought her down the road to donate her to the local food bank.

Later that afternoon I was running late and rushed to the woods around 4:30pm. I jumped a spike on my way to my afternoon stand in a spot I haven’t hunted all season – not a good start. Then as I’m climbing my tree I see a deer approaching from about 75+ yards away so I’m trying to climb and turn at the same time to put the tree between the deer and myself. I don’t know what happened to that deer, but about 45 minutes later I caught movement to my left and saw a doe feeding along a trail about 50 yards away. I thought she might come in, but she took a left and walked away. About 10 minutes later a forkhorn came out of the same spot and followed the doe.

Now I’m thinking I’m about 10 yards too far from where the deer are crossing and contemplating moving to another tree. I decided to stay put. About an hour after the forkhorn passed I saw a deer face about 40 yards away in the thickets behind me. All i could see was a deer’s nose to the ground looking for food and its eyes. Then there was a flash of antler, but I thought to myself its probably just another young buck. Then I see the first two points and think that it could be a nice 6 pointer and I might take it cause it has some mass to it. When the buck finally stepped out I saw 8 points and knew he was a shooter.

I got my bow ready and managed to stay calm. The buck continued feeding in my direction and was closing the distance. As he got closer he started to scare me because he was eating leaves off the top of a bush with his head facing up directly at me. Luckily the buck never noticed me. Then the buck turned and headed for the trail where the other deer had traveled earlier that afternoon. For some reason the buck took a few steps and stopped for a second giving me a broadside shot. I was unsure of the yardage so I put my 20 and 30 yard pins on him and squeezed the trigger.

The shot was perfect and I saw the arrow hit right in the center of the body behind the shoulder. The buck took off like a linebacker knocking everything out of its way and then I heard a loud crash and knew he was down. I found the buck and was super excited to get my hands on him. The buck was too heavy for me to drag out of the woods, so I quartered him and took him back to the truck in pieces. He’s my biggest to date and with the season ending at the end of Jan, I still have plenty of time to find his two bigger brothers!

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Date: 9/20/2008
Location: Fairfield County, CT
Hours Hunted: Sunrise – 9:45am; 3:30pm – Sunset
Temperature: 55 degrees
Wind: NW at 5mph
Weather: Sunny
Moon Phase: Waning Gibbous, 58% of Full
Deer Sighted: 1 buck, 6 does

Well my Saturday hunt proved to be successful as well. On Friday morning I took my first doe of the season. The deer came down a trail leading to a creek bottom, but I was on the wrong side of the trail and the deer picked up my scent. I was able to take the last doe and she ran about 75 yards before going down – she died right on a deer trail, one I didn’t even know existed. The section of the property the doe expired on was one I overlooked in past seasons. The wind was never really great for hunting this spot and it was rather open during the fall. However, during the early season this section has lots of undergrowth providing the deer with ample cover. At the far end of the cover is a heavily used deer trail that leads from the backyards of homes to a thick secluded bedding area.

I found a group of 5 trees that were rather close together and climbed up 25ft in one of them. This put me about 20 yards from the deer super highway and the wind was perfect, there was no way the deer would smell me.

As I sat there the first morning I started second guessing my stand set up as I had killed a deer the previous morning in the area and didn’t know how that would really effect the deer movement. Around 7:00am I got my answer as I spotted my first deer. Two does and a fawn, the same ones that had busted me the day before made their way down the trail directly in front of me. One of the does saw me in the tree, but couldn’t make me out so ignored me like I wasn’t even there. As she passed by infront of me she stopped broadside giving me the perfect shot. I slowly squeezed the trigger and watched the arrow hit its mark – the doe went down in sight.

I stayed in the tree until 9:00am to see what else would walk down the trail. Shortly after another doe passed by out of range and then a young buck came by. The big buck I was hoping to see never showed, but he did make a series of fresh rubs in the creek bottom 50 yards below my stand.

With plenty of meat already in the freezer, I went to a local hardware store in Connecticut to turn in my used tag for a replacement doe tag and then brought the deer to the meat processor for donation to the local food bank. It’s a good feeling when a hunter can be out enjoying nature, harvest a deer to help bring the population to a sustainable level, and at the same time donate that deer to the less fortunate. Hopefully, I’ll be donating a lot more deer this season.

I returned to the area in the afternoon to hunt a trail leading from a bedding area into a thick creek bottom loaded with fresh rubs. Around 5:00pm a doe made her way down the trail and then took a hard left and walked towards the backyard of a distant home. About an hour later another doe showed up on a different trail, but never gave me a shot opportunity. Those would be the only deer of the evening. There’s still plenty of more does to take off this property and its encouraging to see so many young bucks, now I just have to run into one of the big guys.

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Date: 9/19/2008
Location: Fairfield County, CT
Hours Hunted: Sunrise – 8:ooam
Temperature: 52 degrees
Wind: From WNW at 8mph
Weather: Sunny
Moon Phase: Waning Gibbious, 75% of Full
Deer Sighted: 1 buck, 3 does

This morning at 7:30am I shot my first deer of the season. It’s also the first kill with my new Mathews Drenalin. I had two does, a fawn and a nice six pointer come in. The wind swirled and three of the deer took off, but the doe stuck around for one minute too long. She gave me a quartering away shot and the Rage broadhead made sure she didn’t go too far.

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Date: 9/15/2008
Location: Fairfield County, CT
Hours Hunted: Sunrise – Sunset
Temperature: 72 degrees
Wind: From NW at 13mph
Weather: Sunny
Moon Phase: Full Moon, 99% of Full
Deer Sighted: 1 buck, 2 does

Archery season opened in Connecticut on September 15th. I was out from sunrise to sunset on a 50 acre parcel of private land in Fairfield County. The conditions for deer hunting were less than ideal – full moon, hot, humid weather, and lots of mosquitoes.

I hunted a creek bottom where I had captured several pictures of bucks working the area including a nice P&Y 8 pointer. Unfortunately, nothing showed up on opening day – although I later found out through my trail camera that a decent 6 pointer had been by at 6:30pm the evening before.

The evening hunt took place along a trail on the edge of a large swamp where I had used my trail camera earlier in the summer to watch deer use a break in a stone wall as an entry/exit route to the swamp. One picture showed a huge buck walking out of the swap around 6:30pm which was why I chose this stand for the evening hunt. Around 5:00pm a young four pointer walked by and stayed around my stand for about 45 minutes before going back into the swamp. Shortly after a doe walked by with a fawn, but came from behind my tree and caught my scent. Although they could not really figure it out, the doe knew something was up and the two walked off.

It was good to get back out into the woods and I have high hopes for this season. I’ll be at it again on Friday afternoon and hopefully all day on Saturday again. We’ll see what walks by next time.