Well here we go the much anticipated buck for the wife. The 257 safari style sighted in ready to go. The setup is an ancipated oat patch (weather isn't helping we need rain!!!) that is lined by our spring feed creek so it usually holds allot of doe/yearlings and you'll see bucks pass through for water or does depending on rut activity. Shots can range up to 300 plus. We do have one feeder setup and that shot will reach the max distance. Well we were greated with a nice overcast morning making visibility very difficult we knew we had a bunch of deer scattered thorugout the field and probably 12-15 over by the feeder area. Wasn't until about 7:40 well past legal shooting light before I caught this buck we've seen many times and let him go last season to gain another year. I told the wife he's already here in the field - not sure how comfortable you are making that shot and maybe he will work his way back towards us as they often exit the field back into our property as the creek is a boundary. If he does that will cut some distances down, he finally worked his way out into the opening and we were preparing for a shot she was safety off a couple of times at 275 yards and he would turn or something you know being a deer right?
After several minutes of this he actually started trotting back towards the middle of the field (basically we are setup on the middle of the field edge and left to right it will go 300 plus to about 250 plus yards at the furthest point. Ok this is good hes going to follow that doe we will have a nice 150-170 yard shot - well getting her on him as I would grunt to stop him those stars do not always align just right! What turned into this is going to work out perfect and would in a now or never opportunity for this particular morning most likely. The doe would enter the tree line at the creekside on our far right him still on her tail I was able to stop him for the final time and with a quartering away shot I said if your comfortable take him. The 257 roared throughout the creek bottom and our target buck would lay hidden in the tall grass. She hit him with the 92 grain hammers high shoulder and it exited base of the neck. Small entry and I would say just under a nickel exit wound. The shot was right at 200 yards and she knocked him down like a pro! Tickled, we looked back and she hasn't harvested a buck on the property in over 4 years.
The deer would live weight 160lbs - typical 8 point his distinguishing mark would be his left side G3 is shorter than his right.
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