Unforgettable: The final chapter of our South Dakota Hunt The next morning we made our way back to the north side that we had cased the night before and all split up. As I settled in I was quite surprised to hear voices of other hunters in the general area of my spot, a fact of hunting public land that you sometimes must deal with but a bit of a shock considering where we were. I decided to move out heading west till I reached the edge of the butte that overlooked the rolling grass far below. Within minutes I saw 4 doe. They would be easy to get to and I started to get excited for a morning stalk. Just as I was about to make my move they all lifted their heads and locked in on something approaching from the south. Hoping to see a large buck making his way in, I started glassing that way. Low and behold it wasnt a buck, but Sam standing still as a statue 80yds from the doe. I thought for sure he was going to make a move to get in for a shot and so I held up to watch things go down not wanting to interfere. The doe eventually ended up bounding off but Sam stayed put. I was confused and didn’t at that point understand why he still stood frozen. After several minutes he slowly moved down and set up laying flat on a berm to glass the landscape. What I didn’t know then, but would find out later, is that he was actually stalking a large buck and the doe had busted him on the way. The buck had vanished and he was trying to pick him up again. After a good long time glassing Sam started making his way back toward the butte. I was able to get his attention and he came up to my perch. We had a good laugh over the morning events and sat down to see if we could locate the lost buck. While we didn’t find the buck that Sam was originally after, Sam spotted two more bucks bedded down quite a ways out right along the property line. And not just any bucks…they were monsters. There was no doubt at that point that we were coming back to this spot in the evening to see if we could make a move on these big boys. We headed back to camp for some lunch and a brief photo session. Conversation all afternoon was focused on how much more action we all had that morning. As it turns out Will and Josh had also both been on deer. When the hour finally arrived to make our way back north the mood was very optimistic. This would be our last hunt and we all had a good feeling it was the last one we would need. Sam and I split off from Josh and Will to head out to the perch up on the butte overlooking where we had seen the big boys bed down that morning. Sure enough, there they were. Two bucks. Two hunters. Though unsure if they were on public land or not at that point, we liked that math and the stalk was on. Trying to learn what I could from the master I followed Sam’s every move down through the lows, constantly checking wind and belly crawling over any rise with the slightest chance of giving us away. The terrain and wind were both in our favor as we made our silent approach. I had a really good feeling about this. We slowly slipped in against a thick backdrop just one berm over from where our monsters were hanging out. As we had feared we then could confirm they were about 40yds over the property line. Private land meant we couldn’t take the shot. We were in perfect position though and that was better than nothing, so there we sat. All they needed to do was walk our way enough to cross the boundary and we had em. Quite some time passed and it got to the point where it was simply humorous. They were right there and we couldn’t do anything about it. As shooting hours expired, there we were with bow in hand staring at our big bucks. It just wasn’t in the cards for us that night, but man was it exhilarating. We made our way back to the butte to catch up with Josh and Will. As it turns out, both had similar encounters. Will had drawn on a doe waiting for her to step out from behind a tree, only to have her turn 90 degrees and head away safely guarded by the pines. While our week in South Dakota wasn’t a complete success given the coolers were empty, we all agreed that it was one heck of a hunt. Instead of heading back to camp we decided a celebratory burger and beer was in order. We climbed in the truck and drove to the nearby town of Buffalo to grab some brew and grub. The stories were plenty and the laughter was hearty. Unforgettable. The Will to Hunt Maven Badlands First Lite NEMO Equipment, Inc. WOLVERINE BOOTS & APPAREL hoyt archery Rage Broadheads Realtree Outdoors® Revelate Designs Adventure Medical Kits Thule BOWTECH ARCHERY REFUSE TO FOLLOW KUIU Xpedition Archery
Posted on: Tue, 11 Nov 2014 14:00:01 +0000