Larry A. Smail's Blog

My step father, Bob, and I, spent half a day pursuing whitetails! And the day was wonderful!

Bob walked down n old right-of-way while I circled to push out some deer. I sent a couple past him, but a shot was possible. I walked up to him to discuss what had just happened. I told Bob,  “I see movement!” I felt certain I saw a part of a deer. Field glasses were worthless for we were facing the early sun.

  Bob remained in position and I walked back the same route he recently walked down. I spotted two deer bedded down. I believe these deer allowed Bob to walk past and remained tight. I looked back and made some motion of deer bedded. I continued on. I should have motioned Bob to come forward to see if the deer would have held their position. the shot would have been reasonably close…approximately 35 yards. Bob has trouble seeing deer in those conditions, so I continued up, and over, and walked in behind them. The deer got up and stood. Another great shot for me if I would have been hunting. Bob held off for he wasn’t sure where I was at. I was seeing an ear moving.

I backtracked and circled again and watched as the deer walked to me.  I went back and motioned Bob to come back up to me, and we walked along a field’s edge. Bob repositioned as I tried to move the deer around.

I walked backwards and entered the woods, and immediately saw a deer leg. The deer moved out. I played tag with these deer. I saw them four times again in less than two acres. Finally they moved past Bob. He didn’t get a shot. Again, I was getting unbelievable chances for close shots.

We walked side-by-side as we walked along. Suddenly, a deer crossed in front of us, and she was only about 25 yards. She looked at us, and began feeding. Bob wasn’t sure if he wanted to shoot the small deer, so he hesitated.

After a few minutes this deer turned back towards the way it came and started to walk. Bob decided he was going to shoot, but he missed. I played the sceneraio  out searching for any sigh of a hit. Bob must have pulled the shot for the deer was very close.

We had a lot of deer sightings before heading back to mom’s for brunch!