THE LAST DAY - Part two

Author's note: This is part 2 of the series entitled "The Last Day. It details observations I made while spending 7 1/2 hours in an open treestand on the last day of the 2008 rifle season for deer (Sunday, November 30). I used no bait for this hunt. I wanted the movements I watched to be as natural as possible. I did do a lot of calling and rattling antlers to try to attract bucks - and I saw bucks. I was surprised at the amount of rut-based movement this late in the season.

Beginning of part two of “The Last Day” series.

A light snow has been falling for the past hour or so. If I sit very still, a dusting of the powdery stuff starts to cover me. I feel this is a good sign since deer tend to move more during periods of light snowfall. It is almost as though they sense that the new snow may cover up more of the stuff they feed on, and that they should feed more heavily while the opportunity exists.

10:48 a.m.: Three big deer cross from the north and trot toward another stand I have, “Birch Hill”. I almost hunted that spot today, but decided at the last minute to take this place instead. I’m glad I did. Birch hill is a ground blind made from brush and logs piled in a roughly circular formation. It is a great little spot where I can watch a small clearing surrounded by heavy woods, but it does not offer a panoramic vista as the Owl Stand has.

Anyway, these three deer are all does and I wonder where their fawns are. Any doe from 2 ½ years and older normally has from one to three of them tagging along. They have probably stationed them in nearby heavier cover since bucks are still chasing the adult does at this time. If the fawns were present with the adult does, bucks might injure them by driving them off during this phase of the rut.

11:18 a.m.: Three more large deer come running out of heavier timber north of my stand. They too, are traveling east toward Birch Hill. One of them gives out a loud bleat as it crosses the opening I watch. I go on “high alert” at the sight of these does and fully expect a buck to show at any time. Few reasons exist for the does to be running unless a buck is chasing them or a pack of coyotes have taken up their trail.

11:19 a.m.: Sure enough! A buck comes out of the woods where the does emerged. He is dogging them, nose down in the snow and zig-zagging along. Since the three does all ran on slightly different paths, the buck is crossing all three sets of tracks out repeatedly, trying to sort out where they went and how far ahead they might be.

I can see small antlers on this deer and I am confident it is just a six-point buck, meaning that it has three antler points on each side. It is possible that this one may have two additional brow tines near the antler bases, making it an eight-pointer. Even if this is true, I would not take this deer. It has some potential to grow into a considerably larger buck next season. Also, this is the last day of this rifle season. I don’t think this buck will be killed by anyone else who might still be hunting north or south of here. I know at least part of his home territory from the observations I made today, and I’ll be back next year.

11:30 a.m.: Two fawns come out of the woods northeast of my stand, followed by a spikehorn buck. Looking at this small two-pointer, I figure it is the same one I saw earlier in the day. They amble along, heading toward the Powerline #2 stand. They seem to have a specific destination in mind because they are not taking time to browse along the way. Most of the time, deer are almost constantly nipping at various types of plant growth or pulling leaves from trees and picking them up off the ground. This is especially true during the early winter time frame when they need as much body weight as possible to survive the lean times to come.

Note: All of the deer I have reported so far have been within range of this stand, from about fifty to one hundred and fifty yards away. I have seen other movements slightly inside the heavier cover, but have not counted them as deer since I could not be sure they were actually whitetails.

The final installment of this series will run tomorrow. Stop by then!

Copyright Ray Hansen, 2008