Not my kind of day

[huntwriter]

Went out on a hunch today – I really should have been sitting on my computer finishing a few articles – and sure enough I saw plenty deer movement right at dawn and up to 2pm when I went home. I spotted a big buck with my binos about a mile away dozing under a bush in the wide-open prairie like country . It took me the better part of two hours to stalk within shooting range, using every little feature in the landscape to hide my approach. Finally I was less than hundred yards away from the buck. Slowly I crested the small elevation that separated the buck from me and lined up the rifle. Looking at him through the scope I counted five heavy tines on the left side and four on the right side. The crosshairs found the vitals and the gun went off almost instinctively.

The buck jumped up and bounced across the field, poing, poing, poing like a kangaroo. I missed him completely!!!! That is only the third deer I ever missed and the first I missed with the rifle. I’ll be back there on Friday.

[todbartell]

sounds like a nice buck. You should check your point of impact with your rifle tomorrow or Thursday to make sure everything is ok. A few shots will give you some confidence, or reveal a problem. good luck :D

[Johnnybear]

Great story Hw. Love the stalking within 100 yards (I shoot M/L's and Marlins and know about the stalking) what a rush. Sorry to hear about the miss. That sounds like Bartell said and go to the range fella and figure it out. Were you shooting from a rest(pack etc.)? Go get him:D!!!!

[huntwriter]

You should check your point of impact with your rifle tomorrow or Thursday to make sure everything is ok. A few shots will give you some confidence, or reveal a problem. good luck :D

That is exactly what I had in mind to do. The zero may have shifted when I dropped the rifle two days ago.

[Johnnybear]

That is exactly what I had in mind to do. The zero may have shifted when I dropped the rifle two days ago.


:shock:!!! Not being a mother figure here but you should have gone to the range after the drop Hw. What were you thinking?

[hunter1947]

To bad you didn't get him HW ,I would put up a target just to make sure the bullet is still where you want it.

Next time you will get him.

[sawmill]

:shock:!!! Not being a mother figure here but you should have gone to the range after the drop Hw. What were you thinking?

No shit!I think I would have kept that little tidbit of info to myself.

[Stone Sheep Steve]

I, for one, applaud HW's honesty. Stuff like this does(or at least "has") happenned to almost all of us. HW's job is about education and there is definitely a lesson for others to learn from.

"Dropped" to some is a "bump"to others. Sometimes a rifle's POI is easy to bump out of whack and sometimes it takes a serious impact.

It would have been ideal to check the rifle ahead of time but sometimes life is just a little too busy. I even know one member of this forum that missed a 6 pt bull elk and an immie this fall:tongue: before he realized it wasn't him....and he is someone that usually pays attn to details like this.

While I like to keep things simple and I can't afford everything I want, one thing that would have helped HS's situation is a laser bore sighter.
I know it has just moved up the ladder on my priority list. Would be very handy to have on a backpack hunt where tumbles are a fact of life.

Maybe HS can use this event to get a new sponser:smile:.

Now go find him again!!

SSS

[rishu_pepper]

Well, the silver lining is that it was a complete miss, and not a wounded animal which might've ended up coyote fodder or something.

Go get 'er on Friday! :biggrin:

[1/2 slam]

Good luck Friday.

[BlacktailStalker]

You'll connect, he'll be back.

[Ron.C]

sounds like a good topic for an article HW. Probably more people have done this than care to or will admit! No harm done and lesson learned,

[doubled]

Rule #1 for ANYBODY, you drop your gun, you fire it before you see animals. Pretty simple. Tough lesson to learn on a beauty deer but I am sure that will not happen again.

[Alpine Addict]

Thats what makes hunting, hunting! What fun would it be otherwise?! Good luck friday

[NaStY]

I, for one, applaud HW's honesty. Stuff like this does(or at least "has") happenned to almost all of us. HW's job is about education and there is definitely a lesson for others to learn from.

"Dropped" to some is a "bump"to others. Sometimes a rifle's POI is easy to bump out of whack and sometimes it takes a serious impact.

It would have been ideal to check the rifle ahead of time but sometimes life is just a little too busy. I even know one member of this forum that missed a 6 pt bull elk and an immie this fall:tongue: before he realized it wasn't him....and he is someone that usually pays attn to details like this.

While I like to keep things simple and I can't afford everything I want, one thing that would have helped HS's situation is a laser bore sighter.
I know it has just moved up the ladder on my priority list. Would be very handy to have on a backpack hunt where tumbles are a fact of life.

Maybe HS can use this event to get a new sponser:smile:.

Now go find him again!!

SSS

Took a friend out for spring bear and when he put his gun up to his shoulder i noticed a HUGE bend in his scope. He said that he had dropped it last year and forgot about it. We didnt see anything that time but when he did, he missed the animal completely.

I am usually up at the range 2-3 times a month to sharpen my skill and make sure poi is right on. Im sure though this kind of thing WILL happen to me one day. Not a matter of if, just when.....

[jrjonesy]

Good post SSS. 'nough said.

[moosehunter16]

sounds like a nice buck. hopefully you get it on friday

[TIKA 300]

Like said,go getum on friday.Good luck

(now ill have to take mine and sight it again this weekend,just to be sure)

[Stone Sheep Steve]

Took a friend out for spring bear and when he put his gun up to his shoulder i noticed a HUGE bend in his scope. He said that he had dropped it last year and forgot about it. We didnt see anything that time but when he did, he missed the animal completely.

I am usually up at the range 2-3 times a month to sharpen my skill and make sure poi is right on. Im sure though this kind of thing WILL happen to me one day. Not a matter of if, just when.....

Funny....I also had a friend that fell and bent his scope so bad that the thread juumed off. I told him to throw it away.
Next time I saw him he siad he took it all apart and fixed it.....again I told him to throw it away.
He didn't and next time out it cost him a 7' blackie.
Took a look through the scope and saw two sets of crosshairs.

He threw it away:smile:.

Next time out he borrowed a friend's rifle. The friend had just missed a bear that was 7' and my buddy had already missed one.

I made him stop and sight it in.

8" high at 100yds.:?

He finally learned.

SSS

[huntwriter]

:shock:!!! Not being a mother figure here but you should have gone to the range after the drop Hw. What were you thinking?

You’re absolutely right I should have but didn’t and paid the price for it.:smile:

[Hagen]

good to hear about stalking to a decent distance, hopefully a clean miss. check youre sights and good luck!:smile:

[huntwriter]

It would have been ideal to check the rifle ahead of time but sometimes life is just a little too busy. I even know one member of this forum that missed a 6 pt bull elk and an immie this fall:tongue: before he realized it wasn't him....and he is someone that usually pays attn to details like this.

While I like to keep things simple and I can't afford everything I want, one thing that would have helped HS's situation is a laser bore sighter.
I know it has just moved up the ladder on my priority list. Would be very handy to have on a backpack hunt where tumbles are a fact of life.

Maybe HS can use this event to get a new sponser:smile:.

Now go find him again!!

SSS

Thanks for the kind words SSS. I always believed in honesty, lying to my self and blame the gun or bullets or whatever some hunters blame for messing up a shot will in the long run backfire in form of self-defeat and loss of confidence.

I should have bore sighted the gun but as things were I didn’t plan on going hunting. In a split second I decided to go. Sometimes, for lack of a better word, I get intuitions to grab the gun or bow and head out on a hunch, and that is what I did and paid a price for it. Lesson to be learned mistakes always come with a price tag attached.

The tragedy, or stupidity if you will, is that the bore-sighting device is in my desk but I never take it along with me. It’s a small put very handy device that doesn’t take up much room but can make a world of difference.

[huntwriter]

sounds like a good topic for an article HW. Probably more people have done this than care to or will admit! No harm done and lesson learned,

I am at it as wee speek.:wink:

[huntwriter]

good to hear about stalking to a decent distance, hopefully a clean miss. check youre sights and good luck!:smile:

I love stalking game it’s exhilarating if you can outsmart the keen senses of an animal as alert as a deer or elk. I know it was a clean miss I heard the bush scramming “watch were you’re shooting fool” as the bullet clipped several twigs about ten inches above the bucks back.:smile:

[huntwriter]

No shit!I think I would have kept that little tidbit of info to myself.

It’s okay Sawmill. Jonnybear meant well, sometimes I need a mother figure telling me “I told so.” Don’t we all sometimes?:redface:

[Everett]

This is the reason for owning several rifles:biggrin:

[huntwriter]

I went to the range today. The scope was one inch off to the right and two and half inch off high at 25 yards. No wonder I missed the buck a mile at 130 yards.

It’s all fixed now. The gun shoots 2-inch groups at 200 yards where it’s aimed at and 3 ½ inch groups off hand. That buck better watch out because tomorrow morning I am heading in the direction of his home turf. :smile:

[6616]

I would expect an incident like what happened to Othmar has happened to every hunter at one time or another, or will happen at some time in the future. I'd also suspect that O.V. probably has more hunting experience under his belt then the average hunter and knows full well that a gun should be checked at the range periodically throughout the hunting season, even if one isn't aware of it getting knocked around. Time, work, deadlines, etc don't always allow the perfect scenario to occur and I'm sure O.V. will not be the last veteran hunter (who really knows better) to allow this to happen to him. $hit happens..!

[hunter1947]

I went to the range today. The scope was one inch off to the right and two and half inch off high at 25 yards. No wonder I missed the buck a mile at 130 yards.

It’s all fixed now. The gun shoots 2-inch groups at 200 yards where it’s aimed at and 3 ½ inch groups off hand. That buck better watch out because tomorrow morning I am heading in the direction of his home turf. :smile:

Good luck on trying to get another poke at him HW ,hop you see him again.