Deer Season 2016: Early Action

An Indiana five-pointer

Being a deer hunter is mostly about being in tune with the passage of time--the passage of time between hunting seasons, the passage of time from the start of the season until the end, and the passage of time from sunrise to sunset. Hunters obsess about time passing, and this hunting season for me was one of the shortest I've experienced.

Not hunting on the opening weekend of firearm deer season in Indiana is a fate I've come to accept. Due to work commitments that take me out of town, I suffer by having to wait a week to finally get into the deer woods; I'm fearful that I'll miss the peak of the rut and be relegated to watching the silent woods for hours and days on end. That my dad took an 8-pointer on the property on opening day added to my anxiety.

With these thoughts I climbed into my tree stand that overlooks the prairie on my family's plot of land in northwestern Indiana (Porter County). It was 5:30 a.m. on Nov. 18, 2016, and nothing was visible at that dark hour. The temperature was 55-degrees, certainly warm for that time of year, but it would rise to 75 by mid-afternoon. A rain storm was predicted for later in the day, with a 35-degree drop in temperatures by the next morning. I was hopeful that deer would sense the weather shift and be on the move ahead of it.

A few minutes after settling in my seat 17 feet above the ground, I heard a rustling in the dry leaves below and to the left. It was too dark to make out any detail, so I was left only with my ears and imagination: due to the steady and light gait, it must've been a coyote. And even if it were a deer, it wasn't yet dawn, which marks the start of legal shooting time. So I waited some more.

At dawn, at the first gray light, I heard a different noise: the splashing of feet through the creek that flows from the west (and my extreme left), flowing toward me until it curves behind me and meets the bigger creek that flows south to north. My tree stand, pointing north to overlook the prairie, sits in the crook of this confluence.

I looked down and, 30 yards to my left near where I heard the first rustling, there was a buck crossing the creek from the north. It was slowly creeping by in the same footpath used by the buck I had shot last year. Only this buck was heading south; last year's was heading north.

I shouldered my Savage 220 bolt action slug shotgun and centered the sights on the buck's vitals. Thoughts of how I missed the first shot on last year's deer--shooting high over its back--flickered in and out of my mind...

I fired and the buck ran south toward the tall swampy weeds and woods that border the main creek. I thought I missed, again, an easy shot. But, as I strained to peer into the weeds seconds later, I saw the waving of a white tail. Normally, this means a deer is running away with the raised and waving tail a flaming white warning to any other deer around. However, the tail wasn't moving away from me. It was waving in place, as if the deer was just standing there. Then it disappeared.

I waited a moment, thinking that if I had mortally wounded it, it would be better to let it lie down and die in peace, as opposed to chasing it wounded. But I was too anxious and knew the circuitous route I'd have to take would give the deer plenty of time for peace. I could not take a direct route through the creek and into the weeds, but would have to walk through the prairie, across a farm field, down a hill and into the weedy, wet and woodsy patch where the deer disappeared.

When I got to the spot where I saw the white tail waving, there was nothing. I walked a quick grid, searching the ground for blood. A few minutes later, I found a blood trail and despair over thinking I had missed the deer turned into hope. It was a steady trail in the browns, greens and reds of the ground vegetation. I found the deer about 50 yards from where I hit it. The five-point buck died a quick death due to the double-lung shot it had suffered. The slug also passed through the liver and exited the other side.

The third buck in three years taken from the same tree stand.

I hadn't missed, and the suddenness of the season's end washed over me with relief. It was only later after I took care of the deer that disappointment set in: disappointment in that I would not be sitting in the woods anymore practicing the hunter's zen of quietly being in the moment, attuned to my surroundings in the deepest ways possible--ways not achievable for me in any other activity.

But that was only a small disappointment that I could not let be a distraction as I had much work to do after finding the buck. Once again, just like the year prior, I had to drag the deer from the  weedy, swampy edge of the creek, up a wooded hill and across the farmer's field. After that would come two days of processing and butchering. At least I had ample time to get it done, thanks to an early arriving buck on my opening day.

Snow would've made this task easier.