Target Buck
Mixed emotions about sleeping in during the late deer season
We’ve been living through a cold snap this week in eastern North Carolina. We’re really whiny about frigid temperatures here. We earn the right to complain about the cold by suffering in the 90-percent summer humidity that leaves us feeling like we have to breathe the air with a spoon. Heat we can handle. Cold, not so much. Bless our hearts.
It plunged into the 20s right after Thanksgiving, with overnight lows dropping into the teens and wind chills that sting your eyes and make you cry “uncle.”
But after enjoying mild 70-degree weather through October and November, this is the stuff deer hunters dream of — a serious cold snap during the late rut — the kind of weather that makes otherwise cautious bucks do crazy things during daylight hours.
But I have yet to wake up early and stumble by headlamp through the woods to climb a tree and shiver uncontrollably while praying for daylight in this frigid weather — even though that’s one of my all-time favorite hobbies.
I killed my target buck before the cold front moved through, so with zero buck tags left to my name, I’ve been forced to sleep in late in the warmth of my own comfortable bed.
It’s been terrible.
Not that I’m not happy about the buck. I am.
And also sad.
I tracked him, a ten-pointer that was a booner by Edgecombe county standards (even if he wouldn’t stop you in your Instagram-scrolling tracks), since before the archery opener, when he made his first midnight appearance on one of my trail cameras.
I sent the photo to my sons, who hunt the same property, with the caption “claimed.”
After that, he showed up on one of my cameras about every three days. Or rather nights, I didn’t catch him during daylight. Ever.
I had a pretty good idea where he was bedding and thought maybe I could catch him slipping in or out in the first or last dusky grays of shooting light. Or I figured I might wait for him to get stupid chasing does. Either plan was fine by me.
But it felt like the whole world had conspired against me, working in subtle yet nefarious ways to keep me out of the woods during the rut. Business trips, work schedules, and personal obligations piled up, demanding my attention when I just wanted to run away and sit in a treestand all day.
This buck showed up in my dreams as often as he did on my trail cameras. In my dreams, he was always a specter walking through the fog, and I always suffered some inexplicable dream paralysis that kept me from raising my arms. In other words, some of the worst nightmares I’ve had as an adult.
I almost didn’t go that morning. It was a Monday, and everyone was working or sleeping. If I shot one, I wouldn’t have anyone to help drag out a deer. But I hadn’t had the chance to hunt all weekend. I knew the rut was winding down. I thought maybe I could rattle him out of his bedding area at first light, so I set my alarm and decided to squeeze in a quick hunt before work.
I busted something on my way through the dark. Probably an old doe. She went snorting through the woods, alerting every deer within a ten-mile radius that I was on my way to the stand.
I got there just as the world barely turned that gray tint that says daylight is coming. I was late.
My rifle tapped the ladder stand ever so slightly as I climbed onto the platform.
“Damn it,” I thought. “Why am I even here?”
Nothing that morning had gone my way. I didn’t expect to see anything at first light, thanks to the doe alarm and the tinking of my rifle. I figured I would just sit still and quiet until the woods forgot I was there, maybe a couple of hours, and then see if I could get something to respond to a few calls on the grunt tube accompanied by some rattling.
But I didn’t get that far. Not 15 minutes after that metallic click of my rifle hitting the ladder rang through the woods, I saw his rack coming through the mist, straight from the suspected bedding area. It floated like a specter, looking so much like my dreams that I figured I had dozed off in the stand.
“This can’t be real,” I mouthed behind my face mask.
But he wasn’t a ghost at all. He was real, live flesh and blood. He turned broadside at fifty yards, and I raised the rifle as he stepped behind a big oak tree. I took a deep breath to steady my nerves.
“Don’t. Fuck. This. Up.”
I pulled the trigger as soon as his vitals peaked from behind the opposite side of that tree trunk. He dropped like a ton of bricks.
I cried.
I cry almost every time I kill a deer. It’s my body’s response to the surge of adrenaline, the build-up of desire, the release of stress, and the deep, deep feelings of gratitude.
But there’s remorse mixed in with it, too.
It’s always a weird cocktail of emotions that comes with pulling the trigger, especially on an animal I built a relationship with, even if only through the snapped images of my trail cameras.
I sat trembling in the stand, not from the cold but from the hormonal dump. I wanted to wait to make sure he was dead before I got out of the stand.
I was still trembling when I climbed down 15 minutes later, the sun slowly peaking its way through the trees at the slanting golden angles that come at dawn in the fall.
I called my husband, but he didn’t pick up. I snapped a photo of the buck’s rack and dropped it in the family chat, but everyone was apparently still sleeping. So I knelt down next to him and watched the sun finish rising, still trembling but slowly coming down off the high.
I called my husband twice more before finally getting a groggy answer.
“You should probably answer the phone when your wife is alone in the woods and 20 feet up a tree.”
“I knew you were fine,” was his response.
“Well, I need you to come down here and take some pictures for me. I just shot that ten-pointer.”
He was there about an hour later and snapped some nice photos. He’s getting pretty good with a camera. He even lent some muscle to help get the buck back to the truck.
So now, even though the weather is perfect for catching moving bucks, I’ve been sleeping in later than I’m used to this time of year. There is no reason to get up before daylight. And while I enjoy the slow mornings of sipping coffee with my dog and husband in the warmth of my living room, I miss seeing the sunrise from my favorite place in this county. I miss the noisy quiet of the woods at dawn. But most of all, I miss the wild anticipation that came with chasing this deer, the antsy wondering if today might be the day I finally get a glimpse of him.
I am beyond grateful for this deer. I am so, so thankful for the chase, the meals he will provide for my family, and for the memories he helped carve in my heart and mind.
This is one of those stories I’ll be telling around deer-camp fires when I’m old and gray. I feel blessed beyond measure.
And my chest freezer certainly now qualifies as “well-stocked.”
Feeding my family delicious and nutritious meals is one of the greatest joys of my hunting experience. I got to share some of that with Outdoor Life readers this month. Check out some of my favorite ways to prepare my favorite venison cuts.
The Best Deer Heart Recipes — Here’s how to prepare and cook this under-appreciated organ meat.
The Best Venison Backstrap Recipes — Elevate your venison game with three crowd-pleasing backstrap recipes
Right on! And I fully understand that mix of emotion after a successful hunt. Especially if it's a singular, targeted, animal. I had the permission of three dairies back home to hunt their land as long as I included coyotes in my hunts. their predation on calves and heifers can be very costly. With the ranches running from five to 800 acres and sharing borders, picking particular deer, blacktail and muley, some upland birds, ponds filled with bass, perch, and bluegill, managing, or trying anyway, the ever present coyotes was a plus. I remember two, one so black I wondered if she was a hybrid and another sort of brindle. It took weeks to cut those two from two different packs, and afterward there was a mixture of pride, sadness, and maybe a bit of grief.
But the views, the sights of watching the world wake up as the sun rose, or put itself to bed after twilight I consider some of the best times in my life. Even learning the habits of a particular skunk that never strayed too far from a particular pond was an education you just can't get anywhere else. time spent surrounded by wind, trees, rain, bright sunshine, rising or setting moons, and grasses that dance in breezes, there's just something so... well, it's hard to describe, but if you know, you know.
Congrats, Alice! Great buck. And I’m ashamed to admit I haven’t done anything with heart yet — so your recipes are a good reminder I need to try!