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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lungdeflator" data-source="post: 166851" data-attributes="member: 5163">Meanwhile back in ND....My wife and I were able to get in some hunts during the rifle season out here.  I had a shot at a nice buck, but the string slapped my jacket sleeve and sent the arrow over his back.  That was really the only encounter with a good buck for me in ND.  Until mid December.  As all of you know, the winter started out tough and didn't let up.  The early snow and cold from Thanksgiving weekend, had the deer in their winter herds by the beginning of December.  Personally I think this is one of the best times to kill a big mature whitetail.  I had a spot down by Sak that is great for that time of year and that situation.  The first evening out, I sat in a ground blind we had setup earlier in the year, had to pull it back up after it collapsed after the snow.  The deer were coming from a big chunk of woods and moving out toward a standing corn field.  They started moving early with a lot of does coming first followed by the bucks.  They ended up moving on a trail about 80 yards away from the blind, but out of the 60 plus deer that moved by, none of them spooked or knew I was there.  In the group were 2 very nice bucks.  Both of them I had pictures of and thought they were going to be in the 150"s.   Driving back home that night, I couldn't decide if it would be better to move stands in the morning and hunt the evening, or just get in there early and catch them as them filtered back into the bedding area.  I decided to go in early.  I didn't want to move stands so I setup right behind a big pine tree on the downwind side of the trail, about 10 yards away.  I had a very small window to see the deer coming and was nervous about being able to see the deer, draw, and shoot at 10 yards before the deer spooked.  The first 6 deer came down the trail without issue, never knew I was there.  The 7th was a decent 10pt , that I probably would have shot if I had been more ready.  The 8-9 deer were both bucks.  I caught a glimpse of a nice rack through the small opening and was able to get in position and ready to draw as soon as he cleared the pine boughs.  He came through and I shot him at 10 yards, he never knew what happened.  I thought I had a great shot on him, so I waited for half hour before slowing following the trail to where I last saw him.  I should've known right away that it wasn't a great hit when there was hardly any blood in the first 150 yards.  If there was not any snow on the ground it would have been almost impossible to track with the amount of blood there was.  I ended up jumping him out of a bed 200 yards in.  So I backed out and gave him about 5 hours before taking it up again.  He ended up going almost a half mile and piled up in some of the thickest brush in the woods.  The shot ended up being about 5" back and a few inches high.  There was a lot of blood in him, but with the shot going through high and almost level, there was not a chance for the blood to drain out.  This ended up being one of the big bucks I had seen the night before and was easily the biggest I had ever shot.  Lesson learned for hunting on the ground, better to miss a little low than miss a little high.  The first pic is how I first saw him after the long blood trail.[ATTACH]12719[/ATTACH][ATTACH]12720[/ATTACH]</blockquote>

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