theoldguy
Member
That's a great story. I could picture the swamp that we used to hunt when I first began hunting. Brought back many memories and a tear to my eyes.My most memorable rut was one I posted about back in 2013 on here as the story of my first deer. Here's my story.
I believe it was 1982 when I was 11 years old. My dad, grandfather and I had built a stand down in the river swamp of the Oconee river not far from Glenwood, GA. I recall we didn't have enough lumber to finish it so we cut down an "ironwood" tree as my grandfather called it to finish the last 3 or 4 steps. We had built quite a few stands in the swamp just before the season started. This one was in a small slough off the river that was probably covered in water most of the summer.
My father had bought me a Winchester 1200 20 gauge shotgun the year before from Otasco. I had killed quite a few squirrels with it but was still too small to pump the action without setting the butt of the gun down on my knee and pumping it.
The season started and I was still sitting in the stand with my dad. We ran off a buck one morning climbing down from the stand in the slough so he said we'd hunt it again the next morning to see if it tended a small scrape it had started. My brother Nick was hunting with us that next morning. I remember it was fairly cool because I was wearing the warmest clothes I had at the time but Nick had on his old hole filled tiger striped camouflage. I always thought those were the coolest camo. Nick always seemed to have the coolest stuff. I rarely got to see him back then so it was a big deal for him to be there hunting with us. He and my dad were carrying their Remington 742 30-06's. I had the 20 gauge that was nearly as tall as me. I was wearing one of those vinyl red vests they made back then before the quiet mesh ones came out. That thing made an awful racket. After what seemed like a walk of 10 miles into the swamp in the pitch black, Nick detoured off to a beaver pond. My dad and I continued on for another 20 miles or so it seemed to my short legs. We finally came to the stand with the ironwood limbs as steps. My dad asked if I wanted to sit alone and he'd sit on the ground a couple of hundred yards behind me. Of course, I jumped all over the idea. I climbed up, he handed the shotgun to me and I loaded it up with three number 3 buckshot. The last thing my dad said was, "if you shoot one, shoot it twice to be sure". He walked off behind me and disappeared into the swamp. After a while, the sun came up and I started recognizing things around me from when we sat there the previous day. Squirrels were doing their thing all over the place and even running up and down the tree I was in. Giant great horned owls were winging their way through the swamp back to whatever tree holes they lived in during the day. I can remember it almost seemed primeval back in those swamps. They hadn't been cut since my grandfather had been a child and the lumber company came the very next year and clear cut most of it to the ground. To me, it almost seemed like the swamp was underground and the lumber company had just uncovered it like it was a hole waiting to be found.
But not that morning. The sun had to get up pretty high before it was very light at all. The trees blocked a lot of the light and it stayed pretty cool because of it. Finally, I could see fairly well. I was trying to remember everything my dad and Nick had taught me over the past few years. Move your eyes before you move your head when you're looking around. Move slowly and don't jerk around or fidget in your seat even though that plywood I was sitting on was not the least bit comfortable and the blood to my legs was getting cut off by it. Keep the brim of your hat down so your face doesn't shine. Keep your head covered. (I had platinum blonde hair as a child). While I was trying to remember everything they had said, I looked over to my right and saw a 6 point buck about 50 yards away. Strange, but I wasn't that nervous. I had seen deer before plenty of times in the pastures and woods so seeing this one didn't make me that shaky. He was feeding on acorns and slowly walking a half circle of a path that was going to lead in front of me. My dad had pointed out a few trees to remember on our previous hunts in the stand. "Don't shoot one if they are farther than this" he had said. It was about 30-35 yards to those trees, but it might as well have been 30 miles as well as I could judge distance back then, but it didn't matter. That 6 point kept plodding on, eating acorns and stopping every 10-12 steps. I had eased off the plywood torture seat and was sitting crouched on one knee on the platform of the stand. Right on queue, he stopped in a clearing right in front of the stand next to one of the trees my dad had pointed out. I eased the safety off between my fingers so it wouldn't click, just like dad and Nick had showed me. I pulled the shotgun up tight and put the bead just above his shoulder. When I pulled the trigger, he dropped like he'd been hit by lightning and started to flop around. Remembering what dad had said about shooting it twice, I sat the butt on the stand platform and racked another shell into the chamber. By this point, any calm feelings I may have had left me completely. I had a deer on the ground and I was determined to keep him there if it meant throwing the gun at him. Aiming as best I could, (which wasn't so good at all I discovered later), I let fly another dose of number 3 buckshot. Again, I racked the slide on the Winchester and tried to steady the bead on the deer. Boom! (It's funny, I don't recall hearing noise at all) I fired my final shell at the flopping deer and was terrified that he might get up and run off before my shaking hands could load some more shells into the shotgun. I figured the best thing to do was to yell for help before the deer took off, so I hollered as loud as I could. "Hurry up before he gets away Dad, Hurry up dang it!!!" I'm sure I ruined the hunting in the surrounding counties by yelling so loud.
Within a few minutes, Dad came walking up. Smiling, he asked, "Did you get him"? Grinning back at him, I said "Yeah, he's laying on the ground over there". We walked up to the deer from the blind side and poked it in the eye to be sure (something they never do on the hunting shows, and one of my pet peeves!). Grave yard dead he was. I felt like the greatest hunter who ever lived. For just a few minutes on that glorious morning in the swamp, maybe I was. I then discovered the bad part of deer hunting. Dragging the deer. In the days before 3 wheelers, 4 wheelers, golf carts, and Kubota’s, deer required dragging. Its a delicate art, make no mistake. I understand now why so many hunters die of heart attacks in the woods. Finally, after dragging the 6 pointer for 20 miles or so, Nick took my place and dragged it the rest of the way for me. They sent me ahead to get the truck, but I couldn't get it started. Not much of a driver back then I guess.
While cleaning the buck at my grandparents house, we found that someone had shot the buck the previous year in the hind quarter with what appeared to be bird shot. It didn't penetrate the meat, but was all stuck in the hide. Proof that there were idiots in the woods back in those days too! Dad found where I had hit the buck with 6 number 3 buckshot in the shoulder area. One of the shot had gone through the heart. Obviously those insurance shots I took were wasted money, but they certainly made me feel better at the time! Pictures of me and the buck were taken and festivities ensued.
The next year, the swamp was clear cut. I recall my dad saying, "You'll be my age before it looks like it did again". A few years later when I was a much more mature 14, we found the old stand while scouting the clear cut swamp. The ironwood steps were nearly rotted away but the lumber company had left the tree with the stand, I suppose because of the nails in it. Despite being too rotten to use, I was glad it was still there.
Well, 31 years (38 years now!) have passed since that morning. Dad was right, the swamp did eventually grow back. Not the same swamp I remember, or at least when I saw it last, which was about 8 years back. I still have the Winchester 20 gauge, but I couldn't tell you the last time I shot it. I even still have some of the number 3 buckshot my dad had bought at the Otasco. I graduated up to a rifle a few years after my first buck, so the 20 gauge didn't get used much. My nephew Warren used it for a while when he was little, which he didn't stay for long. He was probably the last to shoot it, but I keep it clean and oiled in the safe so it's ready to go at a moments notice in case a squirrel dares to run across the roof of my house.
I've killed quite a few deer since that morning, although it took nearly 8 seasons before I killed my second buck. After that one, there was a whole bunch I killed when I had access to a lot of fraternity brothers farms. Since then, I've hunted heavy some years and not at all others, but every year about this time, I think about that first buck and how much more fun hunting was to me back then. If I have my way, my wife and I will be buying a new house this year with some acreage attached. I believe I'll take up hunting and see if I can't make it fun again like it was back then.
It's been 7 years since I shared that story on this forum. As luck would have it, 3 years after I wrote this my wife and I did find a little piece of property with a house on it and I enjoy hunting my little 15 acres every year. This little place has really brought back the passion of hunting to me after I lost it from bad experiences with hunting clubs.
I've let dozens of does and several small bucks walk on this property and haven't pulled the trigger on a single one of them but this year, that's going to change. I've decided the free passes are over. I'm craving some bacon wrapped grilled backstrap. I'll be dropping a buck or doe soon and it will be a deer of many firsts, just like the story of my first deer. It will be the first deer on my property and my first with a muzzleloader. I'm hoping it will be tomorrow morning!
Hope y'all enjoyed my story.
RT
