Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Do you remember your first deer............

My "first" was in 1975 I was 17. Hunting near a scrape, a nice buck walks up & I shoot him, he falls stiffins up and goes limp. I'm very excited and get up, start towards him and while I'm reaching for my knife the "dead" deer jumps up and takes off never to be seen again. No blood no nothing. I spent the rest of that day and the next several, while hunting, looking for him.
I still turkey hunt around that area & re-live that moment every time I'm around that spot in the woods.

yes!
1959..My uncle Jack had taught me to hunt.
In a homemade treestand platform made of ash limbs on the Potomac river bootoms near Poolesville, Md.

Nice 5 point whitetail buck heart-shot arrowed with a wood arrow and Bear two blade b-head down and at about 18 yards first light.52# Bear Kodiak recurve bow.Still enjoy bowhunting.Jim

I was sitting on Dad's knee, shooting his .308 Mohawk 600 with 150gr Ballistic Tips. A heart shot on a button-head at a little over 100 yards. I was 10 years old and it was only the second time I had ever pulled the trigger on a centerfire rifle. I knew it kicked more than my .22, but I didn't care.

1970 sumthin'....

Thanksgiving afternoon...

My Clan never ate Thanksgiving dinner until after dark and after chores, couldn't waste a day of hunting season was the logic.

But, we did start to head back home, usually, prior to sunset and hunt on the way down....

Dad and I were hunting together and as we approached a creek crossing I picked up on what looked to me like fresh tracks in the snow. I asked Dad if I could follow them for a bit and see what it was doing. He said he was gonna continue on, but as long as the tracks didn't take me back up I could follow them. He wanted to get chores done.....

The tracks went down into the hemlocks that lined the creek and meandered around but kept in line pretty much with the creek, heading down stream. With everything in the world to prove to Dad I really wanted to get that deer. I had about an hour left to find it...

Down in along that creek are several places that back in the day were built up for the use of saw mills. There are dirt berms and channels constructed to channel the water so that water wheels could drive the saws, ect. The 15 to 20 foot tall burms are now covered with thick hemlock...

The deer climbed one of those berms and of course I followed....

Can't know who was more startled, me or the deer but there it was, bedded down at the top of that berm under a low hanging hemlock. As I poked my head up to look over the top, we were just about face to face...

The deer, which was a doe...busted loose and ran. I just about [bleep] myself.

Inspection of the bed found a small amount of blood there in the center of it. Someone else had gutshot this deer and it had got away from them. The deer had headed further down stream and I felt obligated to catch up with it and put it out of it's misery....afterall it was a large doe and we were after meat anyway.

It took a lot of cat and mouse and I can't claim to have known a thing what to do at that age but I was determined to get a shot at that deer. It seemed like this deer was never going to give up but I noticed each time I jumped her, I was closer and she didn't run as fast or as far as she did the last time.

Unbenounced to me, Dad had come looking for me and was keeping step observing what was goin on...on the other side of the creek.

Finally after hound dogging that wounded deer for so long I finally got a shot and ended it. I couldn't have been prouder of myself for both gettin' a deer and for cleaning up someone elses mess.

Dad came across the creek in his usually nonchalant manner and congratulated me in the closing darkness with a swat on the shoulder and a grin....I think he knew what I had just been through.

We were late for supper that night.........................

I remember it like it was yesterday. It was a whitetail doe. Killed her with a Rem. Model 742 BDL chambered in 30-06 that I had borrowed. Got her on a cold December afternoon in the Texas Hill Country.
Them memories are good ones.

DT

1977, 13 years old.

My dad and a few buddies put on a drive for me and another guy. A whole bunch of does, along with a couple small bucks, came barerelling past, followed by a nice (18" or so) 8 point. He hit the far edge of the little opening I was standing at the edge of, saw me, and hit the brakes. He was staring straight at me, head held high. I was shooting a scoped (4X) Ithaca Deerslayer, and put it on him. I couldn't see anything but out of focus hair, cause he wasn't more than 15 yards away. Figured I was looking at nothing but neck, with body straight behind it, so I pulled the trigger. He hit the ground and a stream of blood as wide as a 12 gauge slug poured out. He never moved. As I took my first steps towards him, I heard shooting back along the ridgetop that they were pushing towards me. A few minutes later, my dad came through to me. He saw my deer, we had our "father-son hunting moment", then he told me that when I shot, it apparently turned what was left of the herd trailing my buck back along the ridge, back through the drivers. He had killed a 6 point with his 44 Mag pistol as they came back past. How cool was that??

BTW, that is the only buck I've ever had mounted.

Yep,,, Was 9 and shot a small spike on the last day of my 3rd deer season,, not many deer here in the hills now and a heck of a lot fewer back then,,,the day before I had fell coming outa the woods in the dark and had bent my scope so I was hunting with my uncles real light weight single shot 12 gauge, nick named buttkicker due to it's rather vicous recoil,,the sun had gone down and the shadows were getting dark, heard the deer coming for what seemed like hours before I could see them,,, It was a good thing that a small buck was the first out of the brush,,, as soon as It stepped out I raised the single shot 12 ga and shot with a 3" 00buck,, deer flopped then started dragging its hind legs fast, I don't remember reloading but after the deer went 40 feet or so I hit it with a slug through the ribs and it flopped for good, I had a bloody nose from the stock smacking me on one of the shots, the deer had buckshot in the spine, upper shoulder and lower neck, and a slug through the ribs,,,back in camp that was the best tasting TLoin ever,, my uncle and his hunting buddies really made a fuss over that deer,,I was one pumped up kid,,,

Shot a blacktail forked horn buck age 13. 37 years ago. I was trying to hit the buck in the chest and shot him in the neck, another hunter was there in the woods at the time and he helped me get my buck to the country store we called my dad and he came to down to pick me up I was mighty proud as can be standing there with that buck. I had walked from home and my dad had given me 3 shells for the 30,30 he was as proud as I was. Seems like yesterday..

November 11, 1984
Marlin 336C in 30/30
Reloaded 170gr. Speer's on top of 37grs. of H414
150ish yards, broke his back.


Damn I miss my hair.
Did I actually want glasses like that back then.

I was 12 years old shooting a Remington 1100 with a short smooth barrel and rifle sights with the stock cut down so I could reach the trigger.
A doe came up over the hill and stopped at about 5 yards from me. She looked back and just as I was about to shoot her, I saw what she was looking at. The two bucks came on the same trail and butted heads for a few seconds. The larger one then stopped about about 25 yards broadside. I shot him right behind the shoulder and the second hesitated and gave me that split second chance and he took a slug at about 45 yards as well.
By 7:20 opening morning I had filled my tag as well as Dad's. He was awfully proud but made sure I knew to never fill his tag opening morning again.

After this, we started a saying in our group "20 is plenty".

This is a great thread!

Way better than arguing ballistic gack and minutia...grins

Dober

Day after Thanksgiving (November 29?) 1991. I was 14 at the time.

Five point (Eastern count) buck in Lewis County, WV. Shot was around 75 yards through the neck/chest junction and exited behind left shoulder, dropped in it's tracks. This was a couple hours after missing a smaller buck (twice) by using aiming low..way low on a dowhill shot. Didn't think I'd see another legal buck as I had that day and Saturday to hunt only. Savage M110 243 with 100gr Remington PSPCL on top of 46gr of H-450. I still have/shoot/hunt with this rifle.

Here's the story of how I got my first:

The shaman's first deer


Yes, that's right, I got caught in a deer stampede and had to shoot my way out. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it!

Here is a picture of my first deer and my late dad and myself. It was 52 years ago. I shot it in the neck as it peeked around a tree at about 180 yds with my .222R M722.

Interesting stories. Its strange though how a bunch of folks shot the first deer they ever saw. It was basically before management when I started hunting, circa 1970s... but the rancher was adamant that I only shoot a certain deer. Either a spike or a mature doe. And NO nubbies. I actually thought it was fun to watch deer looking for the right one. It never dawned on me to smoke the first one.

I also hunted with a friend that to this day shoots meat. He tagged out one morning before the sun was up. 4 deer and he was done and happy.

I know its different in each place you hunt, but I've always had trouble shooting the first one I see. I've gone home empty handed too. But even as a kid it would have stopped the hunt and ended the fun/experience.

I'm well aware that to even see a legal deer in some areas is a major success. Was like that on our personal property for years. So much so that I figured if it was that tough I didn't need to be shooting anyway...

Am not flaming here, just noting observations...

Jeff

Starting to see a pattern here.
Shotguns with buck or slugs and "old" rifle calibers.

18 years ago this November, and I still remember it like yesterday... It was the last day of the season, last afternoon, and to be honest the only deer hunt we went on that year. To many elk tags to fill and not enough time to hunt deer. we did ok though.

The shot was about 150-175 yards, missed the first time, hit him the second. One shot with my M700 243win, and the rug was pulled out from under him. I still remember running as fast as I could to get to him. LOL

My first one was a little 4 pointer. First season I could legaly hunt deer in New York state. Got out of the truck walked about 200 yards and sat down under a white pine. 3 deer walked out of a thicket about 5 minutes later, 2 does and a buck. 20 yard shot with a Marlin 30AS 30-30 and it was over.

I plugged this dude when I was sixteen....
It was 1983 or 84....My first good buck...I mowed a bunch of lawns to pay the taxidermy bill...

I was 16 and she was 15. It was on a beach in Boca Grande, Florida, she was quite the dear....