The last day of the 2013 muzzy season and light is falling fast.
Official sunset is 5:38 so I can shoot till 6:08 quick look at the phone and its 6:04. I take out the binos and do a quick scan of where I think the deer will be and have been coming from exactly 150 yards away. They have been coming out of a draw at sunset to the middle of a green wheat field and dining all night going back in between 7 and 8am.
Nothing and now it has started to sprinkle 6:05pm and I look to my left where the I put out deer corn and a camera and I see his rack only coming to the deer corn 49 yards away and the base of the power pole.
I pick up the gun and turn it 90 degrees to my left off the laid down mat. 6:06 PM tick tock tick tock, I look through the scope and can't see a thing I still had it on 10X for the 150 yard shot I was expecting. Check the binos again and he is all the way over the ridge he is there broadside standing still waiting for me to harvest him. I turn the power down to 2.5x and find him in the scope start taking up the slack and boom.
Flash back 5 years ago to wheat field right out side of Lindsay OK and I'm taking my then 7 yo son to the deer stand with me for the first time. It was closing day of muzzle loader season and I was on the edge of a wheat field waiting for the deer to come out and start eating. I can hear some deer in a thicket behind me about 30 yards. Finally about 2 min of legal light left and 2 does pop out I only have open sites on the rifle then so I line them up take a shot a huge blast of fire and smoke come rushing out of the barrel and my son starts jumping up and down "you got him, you got as the smoke clears I see the 2 does look up at me and casually walk back into the thicket?
Back to present day, I hear the round go over the top of the buck and whiz off into the. I did not have a good cheek to stock weld and I was to close to the scope. So I got scope eyed, and I pulled up to fast to see if I got the deer. I see that all to well know look as the deer peers at me and casually walks back into the evergreens, and the end of another Muzzle Loader season with a miss?
I am a very good marksman when it comes to punching holes in paper, but that is not the measure of success when it comes to hunting. I have very sound fundamentals that I learned in the Army and years of shooting but can not seem to translate those to the field. I have missed 5 deer in 5 seasons of ML. I can't control the rush of adrenaline I get when I'm about to drop the hammer on a deer. I over analyze everything prior to taking the shot and I outthink myself!
Now I think I have a solution to this problem If someone will kindly go disguise my deer as range targets and tell me I'm at Banner rd range everything will be fine. As I clean my muzzle loader and prepare to put it away for another year I'll try to swallow this bitter pill that is my hunting skills!
Official sunset is 5:38 so I can shoot till 6:08 quick look at the phone and its 6:04. I take out the binos and do a quick scan of where I think the deer will be and have been coming from exactly 150 yards away. They have been coming out of a draw at sunset to the middle of a green wheat field and dining all night going back in between 7 and 8am.
Nothing and now it has started to sprinkle 6:05pm and I look to my left where the I put out deer corn and a camera and I see his rack only coming to the deer corn 49 yards away and the base of the power pole.
I pick up the gun and turn it 90 degrees to my left off the laid down mat. 6:06 PM tick tock tick tock, I look through the scope and can't see a thing I still had it on 10X for the 150 yard shot I was expecting. Check the binos again and he is all the way over the ridge he is there broadside standing still waiting for me to harvest him. I turn the power down to 2.5x and find him in the scope start taking up the slack and boom.
Flash back 5 years ago to wheat field right out side of Lindsay OK and I'm taking my then 7 yo son to the deer stand with me for the first time. It was closing day of muzzle loader season and I was on the edge of a wheat field waiting for the deer to come out and start eating. I can hear some deer in a thicket behind me about 30 yards. Finally about 2 min of legal light left and 2 does pop out I only have open sites on the rifle then so I line them up take a shot a huge blast of fire and smoke come rushing out of the barrel and my son starts jumping up and down "you got him, you got as the smoke clears I see the 2 does look up at me and casually walk back into the thicket?
Back to present day, I hear the round go over the top of the buck and whiz off into the. I did not have a good cheek to stock weld and I was to close to the scope. So I got scope eyed, and I pulled up to fast to see if I got the deer. I see that all to well know look as the deer peers at me and casually walks back into the evergreens, and the end of another Muzzle Loader season with a miss?
I am a very good marksman when it comes to punching holes in paper, but that is not the measure of success when it comes to hunting. I have very sound fundamentals that I learned in the Army and years of shooting but can not seem to translate those to the field. I have missed 5 deer in 5 seasons of ML. I can't control the rush of adrenaline I get when I'm about to drop the hammer on a deer. I over analyze everything prior to taking the shot and I outthink myself!
Now I think I have a solution to this problem If someone will kindly go disguise my deer as range targets and tell me I'm at Banner rd range everything will be fine. As I clean my muzzle loader and prepare to put it away for another year I'll try to swallow this bitter pill that is my hunting skills!
