You know there are many odd things which may happen on a deer hunt. "There's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip" and a hunter never wants to start eating his deer until he has it dressed and hung up.
I could tell you of many such cases, some of which happened to me, others which happened to other hunters. Since I want to keep this as accurate as possibleas near truth as is possible without taxing credibility, always bearing in mind that truth is often stranger than fictionI am going to tell you of a hunt where I was present, but one in which I did no shooting.
I was hunting with several men, including a man with whom I had often hunted. I will not reveal his name as it might cause him embarrassment, even though I am quite sure that there is a statute of limitations on game-law violations.
When quite near this man, I heard him shoot twice. He was using an automatic shotgun and when he pulled the trigger, anything he was aiming at would usually end up dead. He was one of the best wing shots I ever hunted with. Sometimes he would shoot twice at a particularly big deer, and I supposed that this was what he had done in this case. I waited for a short time, on the off chance that he had missed, for any deer that might be coming my way. I then went over to his position where I found him standing over a nice doe.
Two other men, strangers to me, had arrived there before me. Now this man and I were used to each other's hunting mannerisms, and were close mouthed among strangersa Yankee habit which gives us an undeserved reputation as rather cold individualsso that when he maneuvered to a position where the others could not see, and gave me his signal, I knew he had shot two deer. Glancing in the direction of his pointed finger, I could see nothing; however, I made no investigation until after the strangers had gone their way.
Later, when he had the opportunity, he told me of shooting two deer and of having the disappointment of watching a big buck pass by and not daring to shoot at it because of the possibility of being caught with two in plain sight. We dressed out the doe, and then went towards the spot where the other deer had been lying. Before we reached the place, a fawn jumped up and bounded away into the thick woods. We were both so surprised that we stood rooted and watched it disappear. That fawn had been slightly wounded and when it had recovered from the initial shock, it had reverted to babyhood and stayed hidden and quiet until we approached its hiding place.
The big disappointment for this man was that he had not waited for the buck, but he had a good alibi. The buck was a long, long minute behind the doe, and when you think of the distance a deer can travel in that time, you can see that he was wise in taking the doe when he had the chance and not waiting for a buck which might not come.
Most of the time, the opportunity doesnt come twice. And this also happen with the hunting. Use the opportunity in the maximize way; this will make the bigger chance for the hunter to get the result. |
