Thanksgiving Hunt

As many of you know, I travel to Pennsylvania to hunt with dad and Jeff just after Thankgiving each year. We spend some time together and ultimately hunt deer. This year was a new experience for me, as I had the opportunity to hunt New York for the first time. While we were in New York, Jeff and I hunted on Saturday, harvesting one Doe before being joined by dad and two of his friends for a hunt on Sunday. On Sunday, I harvested 2 more Does. These two days were a great experience with wonderful views of spectacular country.

Monday was the opening day for Pennsylvania. With 5 people in our woods, we had people in new places that we haven't covered before. I chose to be in a tree stand that I was familiar with and had shot deer from in the past. Around mid-morning one of dad's friends got too cold and requested dad's help getting to the truck to warm up. Nearing noon, I was brought to full alert by the sounds of deer moving through the woods. While I was quickly looking over the deer I could see, a large buck moved into an open lane that dad, Jeff and I had worked to clear over past years. Recognizing immediately that this was a legal deer, I made a shot on this buck. It ran back down into the gully that it had come from before popping back up into the lane a few yards further from where it had previously been. I made two more shots before harvesting this grand buck. After the deer was down, I asked Jeff to come help with this deer, as I did not have the proper tools or a camera. When he showed up, we both were filled with excitement to have such a magnificent animal as part of our many hunting experiences. While on his way to help me, Jeff called dad to let him know that I had shot a buck. He was only able to tell dad that it had at least 8 points as that was all I told Jeff before got to me. We kept dad in the dark on how big this deer was until he could see it himself. He was nearly speechless when he looked on this 12 point buck. Dad's comment was a question to me, "Why do you always have to come and shoot the largest bucks in our family?"