Worth the Wait - Ohio
Jill and her Ohio buck
Hunter: Jill Garrison
Cameraman: David Wozniak
I had two goals going into the 2008 Archery season here in Ohio. First, I wanted to take a few does for the freezer and help manage the properties we hunt. Second, I really hoped to get a crack at a big buck. Since I started hunting eight years ago, I have taken three does and a 1-½ year old 8-point, all with a crossbow. I have passed up many small bucks the past few years, but like many hunters, just haven’t had the chance at a monster. I knew my hunting time would be limited to just a few weekends this fall. I missed opening weekend, but would be getting a chance to hunt the second weekend of the season (October 3-5). My brother David Wozniak, would be filming my hunts. On Friday evening, we decided to hunt a farm David has permission to hunt, where he had been seeing a couple nice bucks. We had a mature doe within range, but she never presented a good shot opportunity. Then right before dark, a 135” 8-point came out into the field we were watching, about 125 yards away.
Saturday and Sunday were slow and before I knew it, it was Sunday afternoon and the weekend was almost over. The temperatures were quite warm, so we figured most of the activity was occurring at night. David had a stand in mind for Sunday evening’s hunt, overlooking a secluded food plot tucked up right against a bedding area. It was one of the only plots he had put in this fall that had managed to flourish with the extremely hot and dry weather we have had. It had just enough shade to keep it moist enough to grow, and the deer were hammering it. We also had a few pictures of a decent 9-point that had been hitting a scrape at the edge of the plot during daylight hours. I had high hopes as I dressed for the evening’s hunt. But we noticed that the wind was out of the southeast, which was completely wrong for that stand, especially being so close to the bedding area, so we decided to hunt a secondary spot nearby. It was also overlooking a food plot, but the plot had barely grown due to the harsh conditions. Still, it has always been a prime location, as the deer really seem to funnel through there due to several “edges” that come together. We saw a few does and fawns well out of range and a yearling 7-pointer that fed past us at 30 yards, but overall it was pretty slow.
At 7:15 pm, David thought we should probably wrap things up, as he was almost out of camera light. We still had 18 minutes of legal shooting light left, but I knew it would take us some time to lower all the camera gear down, and I was ready to call it a day. I was pretty disappointed in how slow the weekend had been, and knew I wouldn’t be able to hunt for a couple weeks. We started doing our closing footage when David happened to glance over his shoulder in the direction he’d been facing all afternoon. Suddenly, he hissed under his breath, “Jill, don’t move, big buck coming in!” The stand we were set up in is in a cluster of three huge trunks of a cherry tree. One of the trunks was right between me and the buck, so I couldn’t see him at first. But as he fed closer, he cleared the tree and I got a good look at him. Another buck, this one was an 8-point, and was following the big buck. As I watched the big buck move closer, David asked, “Jill, it’s up to you, do you want to take him?” (what kind of a question is that…) “Yes!” I immediately replied. Due to the buck’s location from me, I would have to turn and shoot over my right shoulder. I whispered to David to move his legs against the tree, so I would be absolutely certain the limbs of the TenPoint crossbow would clear his legs when I fired. The buck was at 25 yards, quartering slightly towards me. I tucked the crosshairs tight against his shoulder, and fired. Based on his reaction, I knew I had hit him and I thought it was a good shot. I was pumped. After the shot, David said he recognized the buck as an 11-pointer he had seen a number of times during the summer.
We lowered our gear and slowly climbed down. I walked over where the buck had been standing and found my arrow. At this point it was almost dark so we decided to back out until morning. It was the longest one hour drive home I’ve ever had. And needless to say, it was a sleepless night.
We returned early the next morning and immediately found blood. We had tracked him about 70 yards when the blood stopped. After a few minutes of searching, I noticed an area where it appeared something had slid down a steep hill about 20 yards. I went down the hill and found more blood. I looked up, and there he was, laying 20 yards in front of me. I ran up to him and was overwhelmed with emotions. As it turned out, I had made a good shot and the NAP Spitfire XP had done its job. I finally had my big buck. It was worth the wait!
I would like to thank my Dad, who introduced me to hunting, and my brother David, who has worked very hard obtaining permission on various properties, spent countless hours improving the habitat and putting in food plots where we hunt, and prepared many stand locations for us.