A
Apatkelley
Guest
This was my first year as an Idaho resident and my first Idaho deer hunt. It was an OTC tag on public land. We made a base camp in some lower country but didn't see many deer at all. I started glassing some of the highest ridges and ended up glassing up a nice buck. Then one ridge away, we glassed up another buck several hundred yards away from the first. Both bucks were about 1.5 miles away and we thought we might have a chance at one or both if things worked out. We grabbed enough gear to spend the night and hiked up to a bench that would put us into position. We made a quick spike camp, then made our way over to where we'd last seen the first buck. We found him bedded right where we last saw him and my buddy made a great 205 yard, one shot kill while the buck was still bedded down. After we took care of his deer, we went to try to find the deer I was after. After almost three hours glassing, I was getting discouraged and thought he may have snuck out on me. I looked below me one more time before dark and there he was. It was like he just suddenly appeared. He was right below me at 225 yards and had me pegged. I shot and hit him, but he didn't go down. He ran about 80 yards and was almost into the trees when I hit him with my second shot. I thought he was down for good as he tumbled down the steep slope. After I packed up my tripod and exchanged hi fives with my friend, we started to make our way down to where he was. Suddenly, the buck was up and vanished into the thick trees. It was too dark to follow him, and hope to get another round into him, so I decided to back out and wait until morning. After a long sleepless night, I found him not far from where he entered the treeline. It wasn't easy, but It was an awesome first hunt here in Idaho. I messed up with the camera, so I don't have any field photos of my friends deer, but I'll get some and post when I can.
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