I had been hunting hard all week and had yet to get a single shot opportunity on any deer, let alone a mature buck! Dustin and Steve tagged out earlier in the week and I’ll feature their stories in a later article. I had been seeing good bucks at the beginning of the week but they were all out of range for a shot. The 12 hour, all day sits with little deer movement over the past few days started to wear on my morale and hopes of putting my tag on a mature Kansas buck.

On the second to last day, I decided to pull the plug on an area I was hunting and move to a new area in closer proximity to where Steve and Wendell had been hunting. They were seeing a lot of does running around and a few good bucks so they told me to come try out this spot. At this stage of the hunt I didn’t have much to lose!

Setting Up For The Evening Hunt

Dustin and I decided to hunt together on Thursday evening so we brought two tree stands with the anticipation of hanging a double set. Upon entering this new area, it was really tough to find the right tree because of the thicker brush and the lack of suitable trees to hang a stand. We ended up walking around for over an hour before finally finding one that had some shooting lanes and was large enough to hold the both of us.

By the time we had all of our gear at the base of the tree, we were exhausted and drenched in sweat from the 60-degree temps and sunny skies. Since we had trounced around the area in every direction making all sorts of noise, neither of us had high hopes for the evening hunt.

After finally getting settled into the stand about 3:30pm, the winds died down and we enjoyed the view from 25 feet up. To the West was a river that ran North / South and to the East was a CRP field. We were positioned in a 100-yard wide strip of thick woods that ran between the field and the river. Without having stepped foot in this area before, we didn’t know what to expect for deer movement but it looked promising because of the abundance of rubs and scrapes in the immediate area.

As the light faded we had 2 does come behind us at 50 yards but did not make their way in for a shot. They ended up getting down-wind and slowly walked off back to where they came from. Even though we didn’t see much movement, it was great to be in the same stand with my good hunting partner again!

The Morning Hunt – November 20th

My alarm rings at 5:00am and I dread crawling out of the sheets but I know I have to keep pushing. Dustin decided to sleep in so I went out solo for the morning hunt with the anticipation of sitting the entire day. I parked the truck and began the walk to my stand; bumping a doe in the field but made it the rest of the way unscathed. I finally settled in about 20 minutes before first light and prepared myself for, hopefully, an exciting and successful day.

Shortly after first light, I catch movement to my left and notice two does moving slowly through the understory. I stand up to position myself in hopes that they come close enough for a shot but they slowly graze for a few minutes and walk directly behind my stand at 40 yards where I am not able to shoot. After standing directly down-wind for 5 minutes they push off to the North without offering up a good shot opportunity. Once again, I was bummed!

10 minutes goes by and I catch more movement to my left but this time, it’s within 30 yards. At first glance, I thought it was a lone doe but as it came closer I was able to make out two small spikes on the top of his head. He closes the gap to 10 yards, hits a scrape and walks off in the same direction the two does traveled just minutes prior. If only he was a little bit bigger!

The Moment Of Truth

At approximately 7:25am, an hour after first light, I see a bigger bodied deer moving out in front of me at 60 yards but could not yet determine what it was. A few moments later he clears the thick brush and I immediately determine he’s a shooter and my heart begins to race!

He moves his way in closer, alone and oddly enough, with the wind at his back as he funneled off to my right at 70 yards. Knowing he was too far for a shot and would likely move past me out of range, I reached for my Quaker Boy Bleat-In-Heat and let out a nice long doe bleat. It immediately caught his attention and fired him up enough to work a scrape that was close by. After he finished working the scrape he started walking my way, but once again, I had no shot opportunities as he paralleled my tree at 35 yards!

I let him move past me which gave me some time to reach for my Quaker Boy Brawler Buck Call and I let out a soft, quick buck grunt. In an instant he wheeled right around and made a bee-line right for my tree; quickly closing the distance to 10 yards! I don’t know if he picked up my human scent from the night before or if it was because he didn’t see the buck that should be standing in front of him but he got spooky and made a quick, 180 degree turn directly away from me. I used this to my advantage, immediately drew my bow and began looking for an opening to get a shot off. After holding for 10 seconds he made his way into an opening and I stopped him with a mouth grunt at 20 yards broadside.

I settled my pin on his chest, let off the shot and watched as my arrow flew directly into his chest cavity! The shot placement was absolutely perfect and upon initial impact, blood was pouring out of the entry hole so I knew I had hit him hard. I watched him run off, blood pumping from his heart and he started to do the “dizzy dance” as his run slowed to a walk. He stumbled out of sight behind a large cedar tree and moments later I heard him crash. In an instant, the woods were silent again.

At this point I completely lost it and was celebrating beyond belief; shaking uncontrollably in my tree stand. I could not believe it came together on the last day of my hunt and I was ecstatic to finally have a beautiful, mature Kansas buck on the ground!

I texted the guys and waited for Dustin to arrive so that we could track him together and allowing extra minutes of caution for the buck to fully expire. 20 minutes later Dustin shows up and we follow a blood coated trail to my buck that looks like someone dumped a can of red paint on the ground. I can’t say enough good things about Rage Broad Heads , they sure make easy work out of tracking a whitetail deer. I was using a Rage Hpyodermic and they are absolutely devastating, leaving a blood trail that you can run down if you wanted to.

It Can All Change in a Matter of Seconds

Bowhunting is a constant game of “cat and mouse” and the majority of time, I’m the cat who can’t catch the mouse. This year was filled with many highs and lows, multiple close-call encounters with mature bucks and one successful hunt to end my 2015 season in Kansas. You can go from zero to hero in a matter of seconds as long as you never give up and put in the time.

I’d like to thank my good friend, Dustin Campbell for telling me to keep grinding and for helping me with the long drag to the truck. Also, thank you for taking all of the great pictures; you certainly know how to capture my good side! I’d like to give big thanks to Wendell Trowbridge and Steve Trowbridge for pointing me in the right direction and putting me into a good area! I couldn’t have made it happen without you guys so thanks again!

These are the moments I live for and will cherish forever. I love deer hunting

-Adam

After a six-hour drive to my hunting lease in Kansas, I arrive at the farm around 11pm and quickly set up my tent in the gusting wind and darkness. I unpack my gear and settle in for a night of restless sleep as my mind races in anticipation of tomorrows hunt. Although I’m not planning on hunting in the morning, I plan to wake up at sunrise and drive the area to scout for deer movement.

My alarm goes off. I am tired from the work week and the long drive but I jump out of bed in excitement and anticipation of the morning scouting session. Its a cool 40 degrees, which is unseasonably cold for the morning low in mid-September so I am expecting decent activity. After three hours of driving, glassing and scouting from afar, tiredness sets in so I head back to camp.

It’s getting close to 10am so I decide to stop and check trail cameras in the immediate area surrounding the farm. Thinking to myself, “It might be too early in the day to check cameras and I should probably wait a couple hours” did cross my mind but the temptation was too much. After running a trail cam through the latter part of the Summer, I wasn’t getting any pictures of my target buck in this particular area of the farm so my intention was to pull this camera and move it to a different location.

As I close the distance to within 100 yards from my camera, I see a doe and fawn have picked me off. I don’t really think too much of it because there always seems to be a doe in the area no matter what time of day it is so I push on without stopping. As I get closer to the camera she starts to circle in front of me instead of running the opposite direction. At this point I stop and watch her run to another low area with thick cover, littered with willow brush and small trees. In an instant my heart sank as she alerted five does and three bucks from their beds not more than 100 yards from where I stood.

I am in utter disbelief! One of the bucks is the typical 12 point (pictured above), who is my number one target buck for the season on this particular farm and he is accompanied by the second biggest buck on the property which is a heavy 9 pointer (pictured above). None of the deer in the group spotted me or knew what was causing them to run but were alerted by the running doe that I had spooked minutes earlier. I watch them trot across the road as I shake my head and mumble a number of curse words for blowing these deer out of the immediate area.

Lessons Learned

You may remember from one of my earlier posts that I had laid out an exact strategy to hunt this deer throughout the early season. Read the full post: My Exact Strategy For Western Kansas Early Archery Season

The spot where I bumped them from was less than 400 yards from where my tree stand is located, overlooking the waterhole where I have numerous pictures of my target buck. The wind was perfect that evening for him to move during daylight but all bets were off because I had ruined the hunt before it even began. I sat the stand anyways hoping that they bedded up in the milo field to the North but all I saw were does and fawns.

Hindsight 20/20 I should have waited to check that camera until at least noon but I’m not sure if that would have made a difference. I think regardless of the time of day the same scenario would have occurred but I will never know for sure.

One of the main takeaways from this excursion was the realization that I didn’t need trail cameras anymore because they had already done their job. Because of my pre-season scouting, I knew there was a shooter in the area and I knew he was coming to the water tank on a regular basis. I positioned my tree stand accordingly so that he could not wind me on his approach, I put in the necessary work but all was lost because of my excitement and trying to nail down his exact bedding location. For what??

I follow a number of hunting shows where they are constantly running cameras to locate the exact travel pattern and bedding area of a hit list buck. Although this information is extremely benficial, it can also be high-risk, resulting in bumping deer and jeopardizing a hunting area. In this particular scenario, I was caught up in the mentality that I HAD to keep running cameras in order to kill this buck. That would be like me as a salesman getting a person to say “Yes, I’ll buy your product!” and then continue to explain features and benefits for another 10 minutes even though they have already committed to the sale. Ludicrous, right?? How much is too much? Sometimes less is more.

All things aside, it was a wonderful opening weekend and it felt great to get back into the stand with my bow in hand. As hunters, we are constantly putting together the pieces of the puzzle and trying to wrap our heads around these elusive animals in hopes of filling the freezer. After all, this is an entirely new property so I have to expect certain things like this to happen because of my lack of local knowledge. I came away with lessons learned and memories made, and in the end that’s all that really matters. I love deer hunting!

-Adam

Unfortunately I was not able to hunt on the opening day of Kansas archery season but I am able to hunt this weekend. Kansas archery season opened up on Monday, September 14th and I have been chomping at the bit to get into one of my tree stands for Saturday evening! Fortunately, I have been able to spend three weekends on the property scouting, checking trail cameras and hanging tree stands which is not an easy task when you live 5 hours away. Am I 100% prepared?? … No, but I do have a pretty good handle on the situation and have confidence that it will be an exciting season.

Strategy fo September 14 – October 15

My early season strategy while the weather is hot will be focused around water and how the deer access that water. See the below illustration for an overview map of what this scenario looks like on the piece of property I’m hunting.

My tree stands locations on the map are circled in white and are positioned approximately 50 yards from the water tank represented by a green star. One stand is located Northwest of the tank and the other being pretty much directly East and as you can see from the aerial view, these are the closest trees to the water. The red trails are what I believe to be general deer access routes to this water and the white trails are my entry / exit routes to the stands. I will sit in the NW stand for Southernly wind directions and the East stand will be used for Northernly wind directions. Another great reason why a SW is an ideal wind for me is because the farmers house is directly South so I know deer won’t be coming from directly behind me unless they are pretty close.

Looking at the weather report for Saturday, September 19th,  the wind direction is saying South East for the area I hunt, which is pretty much ideal for the NW stand. Although this is an ideal wind for not getting busted by deer, I don’t believe that this is an ideal wind for mature buck movement. The reason being is that its not an ideal wind direction for him to move and feel safe if he’s traveling from the direction I have indicated on the map above. Check out this article and video from Wired To Hunt in regards to playing the wind in your favor as well as yours. An ideal wind for both myself and the deer would be a South West wind because at that direction its in his favor as well as mine.

I haven’t been able to check my cameras in a few weeks but the last time I pulled the card on my trail camera situated over the water tank, the main frame 12 point came out during daylight with a SouthWest wind. We shall see if my theory proves true this coming weekend. Below are a few pictures of the buck I’m after. The dates on my camera are wrong; they should be 09/02/15 instead of 10/02/15. Either way, you get the point why I’m hunting this deer!

Things I’m Not Doing During Early Season

1. Wind Direction – The wind will always be my number one priority and I will not hunt these stands with the incorrect wind no matter what.
2. Morning Hunts – Morning hunts are too risky because you can’t see whats in the fields and the deer especially can see a long ways off because of the lack of cover and open ground.
3. Over Hunting Stands – This one won’t be too hard to do since I am pretty much limited to hunting weekends but I will not hunt the same locations or stands too often.
4. More Hunting, Less Scouting – During early season a lot of my focus will still be put towards glassing and scouting the 7,000 acres of land I have access to. Less sometimes means more.
5. Spot and Stalk – Unless the scenario is absolutely perfect, I will hold off on my spot and stalking until we get to the end of October. The last thing I want to do is blow deer out of the area prior to the rut. Although, I do have a decoy coming in the mail from Heads Up Decoy for spot and stalk hunting! More to come on that in a future article.

Don’t Get Too Aggressive Early On

Its a long season so I want to make sure that early season is focused around minimal pressure and hunting smart. I have a plan in place to hunt the water source while its hot with the right wind in my favor and hopefully I’ll cross paths with that 12 point over the next few weekends. If I am able to locate a different buck or a better scenario, I have my Lone Wolf tree stand and Muddy sticks if I wish to hang another stand as a quick attack. I’ll let you know how I do for my opening hunt in Kanas for the 2015 season. Stay tuned!

-Adam