I feel like I got poached out of my first buck.

[Pointdexter]

I'll try to keep this condensed as much as possible. I still don't know how to take it.

I'm 35 and have been trying to bag my first deer for 7 years with no luck. I have no guidance and literally no time to "just get out there". So a friend from work to gets his buck every year invited me to his place near princeton with the sole goal of helping me get one. Perfect.

On thursday the 10th, we were surprised by a 2x2 buck, and through my noobishness I couldn't' get him lined up in my scoped to pull a clean shot. He ****ed off in a small hill with his harem. We spent the whole day trying to flush him out and waited past the hour of sundown with no luck.

On friday we decided to let that group chill out and went north of tulameen looking for other bucks based on a locals sightings. No luck.

On saturday we get up a 530, and head back out to where we KNEW the 2x2 buck was and was met by a slow moving SUV. He eventually went down another spur and we got to our spot. I had 4 hours of****ing around left on my vacation for the year, and god dammit I was close to getting my buck.

We start to walk towards to hill where we saw the buck, and eventually spot the does. My friend goes down the road 200 yards and is trying to find a way to cut in. I'm looking at the old skidder track we went up, but I want to see that buck first.

The hill with the buck is on my left, and a road 200 yards away is to my right. Then that grey SUV rolls onto it. The driver gets out and glasses me with binos. I have my binos on him, and I wave trying to get him to leave.

But he doesn't. He looks at the mountain that we're walking towards and glassing, and he hops in and drives further. The whole time he has his window down, and hes creeping real slow. Then he stops,and I see a spotting scope rest on his window.

****. He's spotted our buck. My buddy is already making his way into the valley that begins at the base of this hill, and the driver and his friend get out with their rifles and a bag, and a shooting mat and set up at the front of their vehicle. It's too late now. So I start to frantically wave at my friend to let him know about whats going on and then I hear a shot ring out, followed by another roughly 5 seconds later. I use my binos to look at the grey SUV and the guys are getting back in a backing up.

They drive up to us and asked if the road he's on goes around to the other side, and my friend calmly tells him and asks the driver: “What size of a buck was it?” and the driver says: “A nice 3x3. Thats all I want” and my friend says “well, we were hunting a 2x2 we were knew was on that hill. Good shot I guess.”

I’m so pissed I don’t say a thing.

Then the driver says “yeah, that was a 420 yardshot...the other hill (he points to the one beside the buck hill) has some does, we haven’t gone there yet” My friend tells him that we’ll check out other spots. We didn't stick around to see if it was a 3x3 or not.




So that’s it. I can’t help but feel like I got ****ed somehow. Granted, the buck he shot was on the other side of the hill, but weknew there was at least a 2x2 buck there.


I guess I’m just trying to figure this whole scenario out. I’m pretty frustrated here. Do you experienced guys have some advice?

Sorry for the long read....