Just got back from deer hunting (warning - dead deer pics)

[Skippy]

I had a pretty good fall as well.

My dad, cousin and I happened to spot a moose accross a long marsh, on a steep sidehill covered in hardwoods. Close to 500yds away from us. It looked like a cow but we couldn't identify it in the brush from where we were.

My cousin and I, were able to sneak way around the marsh and cross a beaver dam down wind where we could sort of scramble up a cliff and get on even ground with the moose, while my dad stayed where we'd originally seen it and sort of guided us onto him from the far side of the long marsh.

We crested a knoll in the bush, 25yds apart from one another, We came upon the moose, which turned out to be a big mature cow, but she had two smaller bulls strutting around for her.

We only had one bull tag and my cousin was closer (50yds or so) and had a good shot at one of the bulls, he fired, and the wounded bull took off, affording me a nice broadside shot as he trotted through a bit of a gap in the brush.I fired at about 110 yds and all I saw through the scope was his white legs pointing straight at the sky.

We recovered my .7mm-08, 150grn Hornady handload, it had passed through the heart and stayed just inside the skin on the far side of the bull. The other round (an identical loading in my cousins rifle) wasn't recovered, but passed through both sides and both lungs.





Then in November, my first day of the whitetail hunt (although it had been open for a full week,) my dad jumped a doe that I saw a glimpse of accross a pond... I snuck arround to where I thought she might go to get around the water(s) in the hopes of getting ahead of her as she sort of quartered in my direction. In a few moments she came crashing out of the bush at full speed quartering towards me at about 45 yds.

I had two quick shots at this big old doe, from my .7mm-08 BLR, and both passed through both sides and lungs. She moved about 15yds before falling about 15yds from where I'd first shot at her running.



Then, on the last full day of my hunt, I hunted my my way up to where we'd hung the doe to wait for my dad and cousins who were going to bring a canoe to get the doe back to camp.

About 15 minutes into my trek, I jumped this nice 8pt buck. He jumped up behind a thick wite pine and began down a brushy steep gully heading away from me. I'd just seen the tall, yellow rack in my scope before he was down hill and out of sight.

I basically sprinted full tilt out to the edge of the ridge I was one, where the gully opened up into a wide yelloe marsh, and I spotted him scrambling up the far side of the gully where it was more of an open rockface.
I found him in my scope and had to consciously pause to let my huffing and puffing from the run dissipate before I could make a clean shot as he at a trot, almost broadside to me.

I fired accross the gully once, at about 150yds and the 140grn 7mm-08 Nosler ballistic tip handload stayed just inside the skin on the far side of the buck, after passing through his heart. He only took one step before falling after I shot.





I crossed the steep, wet, gully, and waited for my cousins who heped me drag him accross it again to a pond we could get the canoe to. We were able to get both deer, and a third doe that my dad shot in one canoe load...



And despite covering miles and miles of swamp, and beaver ponds, and cranberry bogs , and brushy beaver dams, I was able to keep my feet dry inside my boots for all of moose and deer season.

Until the last day...



Not a bad hunt this year.