Preparation

So to start off, I procrastinated big time on getting everything i needed for hunting. I needed to order stuff from Wyndscent — some tanks for my uncle and me, as well as e-thermal stuff. Orderd that a week before I was to leave for hunting, thinking if I pay for 2 day shipping through the post office, it’d be there by the Monday or Tuesday before I left. The shipment didn’t leave until the Monday before, but luckily enough it got to my home by Wednesday. I had to go to Dick’s near my house on the Monday before I left to get my hunting license so that I could actually hunt. I ordered some tanks and other things from Rack Getter Scents and Lures as well; the owner lives right down the road from my house. I ordered a new binocular harness as well (so that it matched my camouflage) and extensions to be able to fit over my bigger clothing. I also ordered some new camouflage from Scentlok during their 50% off sale of all Realtree Escape gear, but that arrived over a month prior. On the Thursday before I left, Rack Getter let me know he had all of his Wyndscent scents in stock and I ran over to his house to get a couple doe in heat scents. I wound up not really packing alot of clothing except for a few T shirts and alot of underwear because that was the one thing that I knew I should swap out. And to make this all even better, while yes I had a crossbow I could use for this hunt since my shoulder was still recovering and getting better, I decided to go get my SR350 set up with 40 to 50 pound limbs because my left shoulder could handle about 45. Luckily I started the process back in September and the bow was ready to be picked up by the beginning of October. I only shot it a couple times but I also decided to get a whole new bow sight, the Trophy Ridge React 4, because I didn’t want to have to futz with the slider and ranging. I knew in the heat of the moment based upon two years ago, I wasn’t going to have the time to range and change it, and to have something fixed and ready to go was the better option. For everyone to understand, the React 4 has 4 fixed pins. You set your 20 yard shot, then you adjust your second pin for your 30 yards and your 40 and 50 yard pins are automatically set up for you and there isn’t any guess work for you to do.

Saturday

When I finally left the house after packing up the truck, I hit the road at about 7am and got my usual Dunkin’ coffee and bagels. As I’m getting down 78, two hot air balloons appeared on the horizon. Now if you follow me on this, you know that hot air balloons and hunting go way back, to one of the first memories I have of experiencing them while hunting with my dad. The trip was smooth and uneventful. Then I got to the house, unpacked, and got made fun of because I bring a lot of stuff and have a lot of gadgets for different things.

Sunday afternoon comes around, and we both go out. I decide to sit in a new stand that was set up about 20 yards behind the main mock scrape. Nothing is really moving until close to 5 pm when I start to watch does walk up and down the runway, chewing on whatever they can find. All of a sudden a little spike buck comes running in, and starts sniffing a doe and gives chase to her. She runs around and he keeps going after her until the rest of the herd moved on. Almost 7 we both head in.

Sunday

Woke up and decided to try to do a little coyote hunting, since the last couple of weeks the coyotes have been running around like crazy. Unfortunately, since we got there they have decided to disapppear and move on. I took the time to set up the React 4 sight on my bow and was content with the fact that at 30 yards I had a good group. We clean out the house a little bit and put stuff in the hangar, before we go and chill out for the evening watching football. At 4 pm we noticed something big in the field outside the orchard. It was the big buck that Dan found a shed to in the spring in the back field, just now he was bigger and definately a shooter. And of course, it was a day I couldn’t hunt deer.

Monday

In the morning, I decided on using the old water tower stand, since it had been a cold night. I barely saw a thing in that stand. At about 8 am, a spike came running by me and that was it. Nothing else happened.

We headed back and when Dan was getting ready to close his eyes for a nap, my Aunt who owns the property we hunt showed up in that moment. We helped her unpack, and talked to her for a little while before getting ready to go back out.

In the afternoon, I went to the water tower stand, thinking that the buck that I saw on Sunday would be there. Unfortunately, that was not the case. A doe and buck were in the orchard, and that’s really all I saw.

Tuesday

We woke up and headed out to our stands. As I was getting to my stand, I heard the distinct sound of a doe or five snorting and running off as I got to the stand. This stand is a new one that we put up this past summer. It overlooks the initial food plot that I created in 2021, and the mock scrape that I have so many pictures of bucks and does visiting. As the sun came up, two fawns got close to my Wyndscent that had Hot Doe lure in it. One of the fawns must have been a buck because as they went towards the orchard, he started humping the other fawn. No more than 10 minutes later, the big 8 point with no tines starts to walk across the runway. I slowly grab my bow, and didn’t move. He kept walking towards me and was probably 70 yards out when he jumped and turned to the west and stomped his feet. He walked cautiously for about 10 yards before he took off back to the orchard and hit the wire fence making a loud noise. As the day went on, it got hotter and hotter before Dan and I got down.

I went back into the water tower stand at around 2 pm. Since it was so hot, we didn’t think we would need to be out until later. About 4:20 pm the does start walking out from the cover and eating around. An 8 point comes walking out and looks at the does before grunting and starts chasing them but at 60 yards from the stand. At 5 pm, a big 9 point with a high and forward rack comes walking out, and starts chasing after the 8 point that’s chasing the does to mark his territory. Again though, this guy is well out of my range and I’m just watching these bucks chase the does and fight each other for supremacy. As things quieted down I got down and headed in.

Wednesday

I decided to hunt the water tower during both sits thinking there was some sort of activity going on. Neither in the morning nor the afternoon was anything moving. One little six point walked around the fields, but that was it. It was a very warm day for hunting, so much so that Dan didn’t go out for an afternoon sit. As I started walking back to the house as it got dark, 2 bucks were in the field by my dad’s grave and where the old barn used to be. But as I got closer, they took off into the woods.

Thursday

In the morning I decided on sitting at my father’s stand, as it seemed like it was the place for the deer to go. Dan kept texting me updates in the back since a nice big 6 point walked by him, and he was thinking that the buck was heading my way. He went towards our neighbor’s property, and by 9 am I get a text that he shot that 6 point.

For the afternoon, I went back to the clover stand where there’s the mock scrape by it. At first I thought I had bumped a few does, but then at around 4, they started moving again. By 4:30, they were in the field, seeing the Wyndscent stuff and trying to figure out what to do with it before heading towards my dad’s stand. A couple more does came from across the runway from the orchard side as it got closer to dark. I finally got down at 5:30 because I couldn’t see anything any more. As Dan came back up to meet me, he told me that he saw a lot of bucks including a big one in the orchard.

Friday

All day sit time. Final count down until the end of our little hunting season. I decided on the water tower being the choice for the day because of how it always has activity. It started out cold, which was good because a 8 point and a spike came up from the crossroads, and went towards out neighbors property right in front of my dad’s stand. Another small buck started walking towards the stand, and all of s sudden got scared and ran off.

It wasn’t until almost 4:50pm that movement started up again. I started seeing does moving around, and

All day sit at the water tower. Wyndscent battery died. 8 point came up from the crossroads and a spike. Both went towards Rozanski. Another spike came down the logging road and then got scared and ran off.

Saturday

Final stretch. An all day sit at the crossroads.

It started off great to my left with deer movement but just some does. Snacks were eaten and movement was very slow and unfortunately nothing was moving.

We spent the evening cleaning up the house, and getting it ready to be winterized since my uncle had a long drive ahead of him.

Reflection

Based off of how warm it was, we determined that this might be the second to last year of picking this particular week for hunting because the rut truly wasn’t on. We also determined that our food sources at the farm were quite large including me putting bags of corn out caused a massive influx of does and not enough bucks. We made plans for new treestands to be installed, as well as the main stands getting only little food plots that are close to the tree stands due to us mostly using them for archery now and not for rifle. Most our stands were set up for my father and uncle hunting the week after Thanksgiving for rifle week, but now that I’m involved there, the stands have to be tweaked.

Here’s to 2025.