Well, this has been my best season to date with my 2nd buck in the 120's. I got permission to hunt a farm last week, and had checked it out from the road and knew I needed S, SW, or W wind to hunt it. Stayed out of there until I got a SW wind tonight. Got there about 2:30 with climber and rifle in hand, first time I'd had boots on the ground. I started in through a fallow field with 3 large ponds to the South. The ponds dump off into a swamp head that I'm assuming is the bedding area. I decided to find a tree to climb that I could see the pinch point on the back side of the ponds and into the fallow field, and be upwind of the bedding area. Once I found my tree, I trimmed my way up and got settled in. After getting to about 30ft, I was very excited about my spot. I could see a very nice "community" scrape under a holly about 80 yards from me. I call this style scrape a community scrape because in my experience, when there are 4-5 scrapes in a circle around a holly, it's a melting pot of bucks that visit. Fast forward to 5:20 and I haven't seen a deer. Pretty discouraged considering rut in full swing, wind is perfect, and I'm on a farm that hadn't been hunted this year. I do as I always do this time of evening, I get out my binos. I've seen more deer than I can count through binos at dusk that the naked eye would've never seen. As I'm scanning, I catch a glimpse of him easing up out of the swamp head to the South. Coming in upwind, good to go. He was in thick cover, but heading to my holly so I sat still and let him work. It's getting pretty dark at this point and I'm fairly certain I'm going to have to shoot this buck at 80-100 yards with my scope dialed all the way back. He finally makes it to the holly, and I couldn't help but wait for the shot so I could see him throw his horns up and paw the ground. I appreciated the moment, and at last light I shot him quartering to hard. Shot felt good, and I heard him take off. I got down, called several buddies saying it wasn't the best shot situation, but I felt good about it. Took me about 20 minutes to find him, not a spot of blood that I could find. Sometimes, a climber and some good instincts can get it done!
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