Ready to get out after the ducks...

tod osier

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Gus was able to get it done Tuesday in the deer woods after the storm that hit the Northeast passed through.

This fall has been great with a lot of youth duck and deer openers and regular openers, so we have been having a great time. This is his first legal deer season here and one major goal of the fall was to get him a deer (really THE major goal of the Fall).

He had a gut-wrenching scope failure early in the season that resulted in a miss on a nice buck. We have been out a lot and have seen quite a few deer - including a couple mature bucks that did typical mature buck things and gave the new hunter trouble getting a shot. Even though we were seeing good numbers of deer, he had few solid shot opportunities. He was also seeing enough rack bucks to make it hard to choose to shoot a doe for his first deer. He put his time in with multiple all day sits and lots of early mornings.

This deer came by cruising for does and caught us picking up to leave the woods for the day (Gus' school was on a 3 hour day to get cleaned up from the storm). The buck thought he was sneaky enough to slide into a terrain feature and escape rather than bolt out of there the instant he made us. The cover from the little crease he dropped into ran out putting him right in front of us broadside... his luck ran out with Gus hitting him perfectly with his .308 at 75 yards.

I have a few more sits in the woods in me looking for a wall-hanger for me, but I am pretty much ready to get out on the water now.

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Great job Tod, congratulations to Gus. That's the best first deer I can recall seeing, heck, I never got a better one ever. I love hunting deer in the snow, what a perfect day and nice photos to remember it by.
 
Outstanding!!!
Gotta love it when patience and putting in time in the woods pays off.
Well done Gus!!
 
SJ Fairbank said:
Great job Tod, congratulations to Gus. That's the best first deer I can recall seeing, heck, I never got a better one ever. I love hunting deer in the snow, what a perfect day and nice photos to remember it by.

Thanks! I was really pushing him to get out in the woods for the first snow. It was really a magical day with the snow. Deer were moving really well.
 
Carl said:
Outstanding!!!
Gotta love it when patience and putting in time in the woods pays off.
Well done Gus!!

Thanks Carl!

One thing I forgot to add was if you look over Gus' right shoulder in the pic you can see where the deer apparently ran in to that tree full tilt trying to leap over it during its death run (looks like someone sat on it).
 
Dang tell Gus great job. I may have to brush up on my Photoshop skills in order to compete with Gus's hunting skills.
 
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SJ Fairbank said:
Great job Tod, congratulations to Gus. That's the best first deer I can recall seeing, heck, I never got a better one ever.

Shoot, Gus's first deer has more mass on his head than all the buck's I've ever shot combined!
 

Outstanding !!! to you and Gus. The lack of ducks in my area,you might
want to stay in the woods looking for that wall hanger.
 
Does Gus realize some people go their whole life without shooting a big 10 point buck like that. What a deer, what a first deer. Congrats.
 
Beautiful buck Tod! Congratulations to Gus for keeping steady and making the shot. Proud moment for both father and son, well done.
 
Eric Patterson said:
Does Gus realize some people go their whole life without shooting a big 10 point buck like that. What a deer, what a first deer. Congrats.

He is a total lucky punk, but he did put in some serious effort. I don?t have the right constitution for mentoring him hunting, so it has been a struggle to keep it fun and light. He passed up on a couple of easy shots at does and small bucks where my head was about to explode with me just wanting him to succeed and get something on the ground. To top it off This deer was shot on borrowed time, it was likely the last trip of the season and we were supposed to be packed up and headed out for school at 8:30 and this was at 8:38. After all the trials and tribulations it was probably the best hunting day I have had. Really great to work up a sweat dragging the deer up and over the mountain about a mile to the truck with him joking and taking about the dinners we were hauling out of the woods.

I?m hoping for some good late season ducks and brant on the coast. I?ve spent so much time alone on the coast over the years doing my own thing the idea of being able to get some good shooting with him sounds pretty good.
 
Chris H said:
Outstanding !!! to you and Gus. The lack of ducks in my area,you might
want to stay in the woods looking for that wall hanger.

That is how it seems to be every year with the ducks, hopefully we can find enough to keep interested.
 
Troy Fields said:
Beautiful buck Tod! Congratulations to Gus for keeping steady and making the shot. Proud moment for both father and son, well done.

Lots of ups and downs, but the ups have been pretty great! Thanks.
 
Carl said:
SJ Fairbank said:
Great job Tod, congratulations to Gus. That's the best first deer I can recall seeing, heck, I never got a better one ever.

Shoot, Gus's first deer has more mass on his head than all the buck's I've ever shot combined!

Same thought crossed my mind.
 
I don't care how many deer you've killed, that would be a nice one any day of the season.
Congrats, always great when a youngin is successful, did you take a picture of Father and son together? It's one thing I regret is not having pictures of my dad with me in the picture when we did stuff like that together.
 
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