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4 December 2007

The Kevlar Coated Whitetail Deer Of Central Texas

Posted by Darrell under: Hunting Stories .

 

Some stories are probably better off left untold. Some stories are so far fetched that only eye witnesses will ever believe them. This is one of those stories - and I swear it’s true.  

I spent last week in central

Texas visiting some good friends – Thad and Michelle. My family, my friend Jeff and his wife, and my friend Zach and his wife and kids (including infant) all piled in to a big bus of a van and made the road trip from Missouri to Texas. The day before we left, Jeff called and told me to pack my bow. “Thad just bought a new Mathews Drenalin and he set up a target in his back yard. We’ll do some shooting and he might even try to set up a hunt for us”, Jeff told me.  So, my bow was loaded into the van along with 10 people and enough luggage to service 15 or 20 more people.

Thad is a General Contractor and his wife is a Real Estate agent. They live an hour or so out of Austin in an incredible rural subdivision. Incredible because in addition to houses in the $1 to $3 million dollar range and immaculately landscaped lawns there are deer running everywhere. The first morning there I went for a jog and saw maybe 150 whitetails and several axis deer. Yes, I said ‘axis’ deer - running wild, not inside a pen. The axis deer looked like polka dotted Elk and they were tromping through the yards of these million plus dollar homes - everywhere.

At breakfast that morning a beautiful 8 point whitetail came into Thad’s manicured back yard along with a couple dozen does and smaller bucks. Boy, was I excited! I was in deer heaven.

Thad had arranged for us to take a guided fishing trip for big striper bass later in the week. Unfortunately, the weather had turned bad and it was cold and rainy. None of us dumb Missourians had thought to bring cold weather rain gear. We decided to hit the Cabellas in Austin for the appropriate attire.

Did I mention this was on Black Friday. Every hunter, fisherman, and wannabee outdoorsman just happened to show up at Cabellas at the same time we did! Anyway, as we walked through the front door and past the service counter, my buddy Thad said “Darrell, you can buy your fishing license there and grab a deer tag if you want”. Talk about music to my ears!

Well, $372 later ($65 fishing tag and $307 general hunting tag, plus archery stamp) I was all set for some whitetail hunting.

When we returned to Thad’s house we decided to play some poker. As we were sitting at the table a magnificent 10 point buck walked by the kitchen window. I didn’t know he was a 10 point because I was purposely not concentrating on his rack. Unfortunately, I never got a picture of him, but I can assure you that he makes these bucks in the pictures below look like his little nephews.

This is where the story goes down hill and becomes quite unbelievable really fast. Needless to say, I shot that beautiful buck with my bow - which is set at 70lbs. I was using Montec G4 fixed broadheads which are the best broadheads I’ve ever shot. My arrow took him right directly in the shoulder. I thought it was a perfect hit. We found out later that it wasn’t.

That buck high tailed it out of there. After giving it 30 minutes we went out to trail it. There was no blood. Not one single speck. The arrow had passed through and had blood on it. I mistakenly thought my shot was good and that the lack of blood was just a fluke. An hour or so later, we jumped him up again, about 1.5 miles from where I initially shot him. He had blood on his back leg, opposite the side I shot at and he was limping lightly. We gave him another 30 minutes and started after him again. Still not a drop of blood that we could follow!

We basically spent the entire day looking for this buck. We saw him several times and each time he’d run away like nothing had ever happened to him. I was terrified that I had fatally wounded that beautiful creature and he’d lay down and die somewhere I couldn’t find him. I shot at him two more times. I couldn’t get a standing still shot. Both times he was running. Both times I hit him. Yes, I hit him with my bow while he was running at a good clip. I have witnesses!

Both of these arrows deflected off him. They would hit and then deflect off in some crazy direction. I know arrows aren’t supposed to bounce off deer, and not one person I’ve told this to that wasn’t there believes me. But, I’m serious! These arrows just glanced off the deer like no big deal.

We saw that deer the next day and the day after chasing does like nothing was wrong. We knew for sure it was him because of the dried blood on his back leg! The next evening I shot a nice 8 point. Again, I thought the shot was perfect. It wasn’t. It was a little high and a little far forward. It hit him square in the shoulder and bounced off.

The second picture below is that deer. I marked on the picture where I hit him. I know it is tough to believe. But, my arrow, again, glanced off him. He was completely OK. I took this picture of him 2 days later!

As you can imagine, I endured some serious ridicule for a few days! My friends couldn’t pass up the opportunity to point and laugh. Once they realized the deer were OK and anything but fatally wounded, they wouldn’t let up. They kept asking me when they could read about it on the ole blog. “What kind of spin you going to put on this?” they asked in a not so good natured way! Thad, bless his heart, finally gave me my out. He said “I guess you can just write that these Texas deer wear Kevlar” which sounded about right to me.

Fortunately, Texas wasn’t all misses. More coming soon.

  

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