This hunting season marked a rare opportunity for me. As a high school teacher I don't have the option of taking extended periods of time off during the hunting season due to my fixed vacation times. I took the first semester of the academic year off without pay (leave of absence) with three primary goals: 1) paddle the Wind River in the Yukon, 2) trek to Mount Everest Base Camp in Nepal, and 3) Hunt as much as could in the November/early December time frame. My trips to the Wind River and Nepal were both amazing, which just left the hunting.
First up was the two week rifle season in Ontario in early November. I hunt an area of Crown Land in Eastern/Central Ontario that is classic "big woods". Thick cover, hardwood ridges, swamps - seeing (much less shooting) 100 meters is unusual. It is "up close and personal" hunting with most encounters lasting mere seconds and shooting ranges being typically 30 - 60 meters. I (as always) had been scouting the area of Crown land our group (3 hunters) hunts on extensively, with lots of "boots on the ground" and about 9 trail cameras running. Optimism was high as the trail cameras and scouting revealed that our deer herd is finally bouncing back after a series of devastating winters (2007-2008 being the worst) and huge number of additional tags that were allocated about the same time. In addition, the trail cameras revealed that we had several bucks regularly using our area, including this buck. While not a monster by some standards, it would certainly represent the largest deer we would have taken in 20 plus years of hunting this area.
Our hunting is a mix of stand hunting, still hunting, and small drives. I had the good fortune of taking a young 3 point buck on the second day of the hunt. One of our hunters was the primary driver, moving through a dense conifer stand on a ridge slope. We had another hunter positioned at the end of the ridge to cut off that escape route. My role was to silently parallel the primary driver on the ridgetop in the event a deer broke from its bed and ran up and over the ridge. The drive was nearing completion when this exact scenario unfolded. The driver heard the deer leap from its bed and sounded the alarm. Almost simultaneously, I heard a deer crashing loudly up the slope toward me. It sounded as though the deer was cutting back behind me so I quickly reversed direction. At this point I saw a deer in mid leap as it soared over a deadfall. In a split second the red dot of my Aimpoint was on the shoulder of the running deer and a 7mm-08 bullet from my Tikka T3 was on its way. The deer disappeared over a small hill almost instantly. I quickly ran forward several steps and saw the deer was down, but still moving. I don't like to see an animal suffering so quickly sent a second shot on its way. As it turned out the first shot was a double lung shot and was obviously a fatal wound.
One of my hunting partners tagged the deer as he knew I had much more time to hunt (party hunting is legal in Ontario). The hunt continued for us and one of my other hunting partners shot an almost identical young buck late in the second week.
Up next after the end of Ontario rifle season was a hunt in New York's Adirondack mountains. I am very familiar with these mountains, spending a lot of time climbing, skiing, and hiking there. The wilderness areas within Adirondack Park are huge - the High Peaks wilderness (no roads, no motorized vehicles) I was planning to hunt is 235 000 acres. My plan was to hike into a lean to (primitive camping site) about 5 km from the access road and set up a base camp to hunt from. I had all the gear necessary to hunt in (relative) comfort for several days. Unfortunately, after hiking in I discovered that I had brought the poles for my three season tent along with my four season tent. Left shelterless, I had no option other than to hike out and get a motel room in a nearby town (a 20 minute drive from the access road trailhead). For the next three days I parked at the trailhead and then hunted areas within 5 km of the road. Winter had hit with a significant snowstorm the week before and temperatures were unseasonably low. In the Northern Zone of New York a general deer tag is bucks only. I was able to spot three antlerless deer (one doe, one doe and fawn) during my three days of hunting - but no bucks. There was no shortage of buck sign (similar to last year when I hunted a weekend in the same area), but no sightings. Regardless, it was a great hunt as there is basically zero pressure in these wilderness areas once you venture a short distance from the road/main access trails.
After my abbreviated Adirondack hunt I was still eager to spend more time in the woods and I still had my unfilled Ontario tag in hand. In my region there is a 7 day muzzleloader season in early December. I had been thinking of adding a muzzleloader to the arsenal and this year seemed the logical year to do so. With my new T/C Pro Hunter Fx in hand, I ventured forth for my first ever muzzeloader experience. Temperatures in Eastern Ontario were below seasonal and we had also received quite a bit of snow. This meant tracking deer in the snow was an option and that was my primary method of hunting for the week. In addition to the "core area" my group hunts during the rifle season, I ranged widely taking advantage of the fact that hunting pressure was near zero. It proved a very successful week as I saw more deer during the muzzleloader week than I did in the two weeks of rifle season combined. I came agonizing close to filling my tag on a buck that would have represented both my first muzzleloader deer and my biggest buck to date. On this day, I had been on the move for close to an hour when I cut the buck track heading northeast. I had been exploring an area a few kilometers away from our usual haunts. I trailed him 1.5 km in a dead northeast direction until the track went past a trail camera I had on a buck travel route. This is when I knew what he was (3.5 year old deer likely, nice 8 pt rack) and that I was 50 minutes behind him.
For the next few kilometers the buck travelled from doe to doe group, searching for one of the last remaining estrous does. Finally, I heard a loud snort ahead in heavy cover, heard a heavy crash, and a caught a flash of a big deer. This was the buck - I had finally caught up. I waited 30 minutes for him to settle and then took up the trail. He was heading directly into our “core area” and I felt that my familiarity with the area was beginning to tilt the odds in my favour From the top of an oak ridge, the track dropped onto a small ledge overlooking where the topography dropped off. I caught a flash below me and my binoculars confirmed a deer. What unfolded next was real drama. I saw a doe and fawn moving left to right below me, probably 50 - 70 meters away. I saw another two antlerless deer do the same thing and then caught a fifth figure. The binoculars picked out the white rack on his head and I knew it was the buck I had been tracking for 5 km. He was "bird dogging" the does and fawns, walking behind them with his nose to the ground. The trees were pretty thick below me, but I did have two shooting lanes. When the buck entered my second shooting lane, he stopped and I fired (I was braced against a tree - solid rest). Smoke obscured everything so I could not see the buck's reaction. It was about a 70 meter shot. I searched for an hour for a sign of a hit - but nothing. I even returned the next day to search again to ensure I had missed – and I had. I hunted the final remaining days of the muzzleloader season, but I sensed my chance at a mature buck had come and gone.
Regardless, it was a wonderful season. I was able to spend 22 days in the woods after whitetails and enjoyed every second.
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