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12th Hour Buck
By P.J. Reilly
The Pittsburgh Steelers were losing 7-6 to the Oakland Raiders in a 1972 playoff game with just 22 seconds left on the clock. It was fourth and 10 — the Steelers’ last chance to make something happen — when quarterback Terry Bradshaw heaved a pass that bounced off two colliding players and fell into the hands of legendary running back Franco Harris. Harris sprinted into the end zone as time expired and the Steelers won 13-7 on a play that has since been immortalized as The Immaculate Reception.
Several sports magazines and websites have called The Immaculate Reception the greatest last-second, winning play in NFL history. It epitomizes the axiom, “The game ain’t over until it’s over.”
I was thinking of that saying at precisely 10:30 a.m. on Nov. 22, 2015. It was the last morning of Illinois’ first shotgun season, but my day was done. My feet had just touched the ground after getting down from my stand in a Hardin County woodlot, and I had just enough time to catch the flight home to Pennsylvania.
My hands were still on the rungs of the ladder when a doe rushed over a hill 60 yards to the right. I peeked around the tree to watch, and saw a rack over the crest of the knob. A buck was chasing that doe!
My unloaded shotgun still hung from the haul line, and the shells were stuffed deep in one of my pockets. I knelt down, and my mind started racing: I can’t leave now. What if that buck gives me a shot? But I can’t stay. I have to get out of here or I’ll miss my flight.
One of the greatest thrills of deer hunting is the unknown. You never know what is going to happen from minute to minute, hour to hour or day to day. Maybe the buck of your dreams will walk in. Maybe you’ll see nothing.
Every year for the past several years, I’ve traveled to Southern Illinois to hunt the Land of Lincoln’s first shotgun season with Doug Doty of Illinois Whitetail Services. Doug runs just the kind of low-key, family-style hunting camp that I love.
He’s got access to some killer properties that hold great bucks. His wife, Becky, keeps everyone well fed with her delicious cooking, and Doug’s primary rule is to have fun. That’s a recipe that keeps me and a few other guys coming back year after year.
The past couple of seasons, I’ve asked to hunt the same property and have gotten to know it pretty well, not just the lay of the land, but how the deer use it when the guns start blazing.
The property is basically a long wooded draw running east to west with steep ridges rising up from a creek bottom. I’ve done pretty well sitting smack in the middle of the property, about 150 yards above the creek on the northern slope.
Deer seem to cross there all day long as they feed on acorns and run off surrounding properties after getting bumped by hunting neighbors. This is rural Southern Illinois, and every piece of woods gets hunted by someone.
Waves of anticipation carried me and my Summit Titan climbing stand down the ridge from the road to my usual spot well before daylight on opening day, Nov. 20. Beads of sweat trickled down my temples by the time my stand was set and all my gear was hauled up 20 feet for the day’s sit. It was still pitch dark, so there was plenty of time for my body and mind to cool down.
It was a clear, cool morning — perfect for the gun-season opener. I could hear deer walking through the crisp leaves around me as daylight slowly crept into the hollow.
Compared to previous years, the deer sightings were thin on this opener. But then, so was the acorn crop. Doug had warned me about this ahead of time, telling me not to expect the usual steady flow of deer.
“When the acorn crop is bad, the deer don’t pack in there like they usually do,” he said.
He was right, but I saw enough deer to keep my interest piqued through sunset. Several bucks passed by, but none tempted me to take the safety off my Remington 870 slug gun.
Day two was rough. I climbed the same tree before sunrise, getting situated barely a minute before rain started. It poured for hours. And as soon as the rain quit around noon, the wind picked up to a steady 30 mph. My tree was swaying, but I stayed put until big branches starting falling around me. I didn’t feel like getting knocked out of my stand by one of them, so I got down.
I spent the last couple hours of daylight in a ladder stand at the very bottom of the valley next to the creek where the wind wasn’t nearly as bad. Deer seemed to have the same idea, because I saw quite a few that evening, but no shooter buck.
The last morning, I moved to the extreme southeast corner of the property to a hanging stand where Doug said he’d seen the best deer activity during bow season. It was a farther hike, but I didn’t have to carry or set up my climbing stand.
The latter was key, since I wanted to hunt every minute possible before I had to head to the airport in Evansville, Indiana. By my calculations, that meant I could hunt until 10:30 a.m.
The day started out as the best of the three. It was very cold, low 20s, dead calm and clear. I heard deer walking all around well before I could see anything.
The stand was in an oak tree in a patch of open timber, about 50 yards from a dense thicket that doglegged around two sides of the stand. Doug had told me bucks like to move in and out of that thicket to feed, chase does and cruise. His scouting report proved spot on. As soon as I could see, a young 6-pointer slunk along the line where the open timber met the cover.
Several bucks cruised around the stand over the next few hours. While all were different, they all seemed to be in the same class — young 4-, 5- and 6-pointers that needed a couple more years to grow.
I texted Doug: “Is this corner the warehouse for all of Illinois’ 1- and 2-year-old bucks?”
Still, I get excited any time I see a deer with antlers, so it was a fun morning in the tree. I didn’t even notice the biting chill in the air.
My hopes remained high until 10:00. With only 30 minutes left, it started to sink in that it probably wasn’t going to happen for me this year. Hey, that’s hunting. These things happen, and I’ve certainly been there many times before. But it’s still a draining feeling.
At 10:20, I started packing up. Even though I was basically throwing in the towel, I moved cautiously and quietly, just in case.
After everything else was ready to go down the tree, I finally racked the slide on my shotgun to unload. There’s no way to do that without making some noise, and when the first “click” sounded as the shell in the chamber dislodged, I spotted two deer tails spring up and bound away in the thicket directly in front of me. They weren’t more than 60 yards out, but I never saw their heads.
Oh well, I thought. That’s my luck this weekend.
I continued to unload the shotgun, then tied it to the haul line and eased it down. It didn’t actually hit the ground, but hung suspended with the butt maybe 4 inches above the leaves. I was next.
My watch read 10:30 as my right foot touched the ground, just seconds before the doe burst over the hill. The doe looked at me from about 50 yards but seemed more concerned about the buck on her tail. She scooted back over the crest of the knob, and the antlers I had seen vanished in pursuit.
With no deer in sight, I had a chance to move, so I quickly untied my shotgun, pulled a single shell out of my pocket and stuffed it into the chamber.
I have to give this a couple minutes to see what happens, I thought.
I couldn’t have been kneeling there for more than 30 seconds before the doe bounced back over the hill and hit a trail that ran from my left to about 50 yards out. She looked at me, then turned and looked up to the top of the hill. The buck trotted over the ridge on her trail, his nose buried in the leaves.
My heart skipped a beat. The buck’s rack had a beautiful heart-shaped frame and looked to have at least eight points. I raised the shotgun to my shoulder and peered through the scope. That caused the buck to stop and look, but I could tell he wasn’t going to bolt. He wanted that doe, and nothing was going to deter him.
As I leveled the crosshairs on the buck’s shoulder, I remember thinking, “What am I going to do with this deer if I shoot? I have no time. . .”
That thought was interrupted by the bark from my Remington. My trigger finger took control of the situation, and the buck folded without taking a step. I knelt there in amazement for a couple seconds, still bathed in a cloud of disbelief.
“Hey, you gotta get going, man.”
My brain finally jump-started my body into action, and I grabbed my camera and phone and ran over to the buck. Steam was still rising from the slug’s entry hole in the buck’s left shoulder. I slapped my tag on a rear leg, grabbed an antler and dragged him a few yards to a nice spot for photos.
I set my camera on a log, activated the timer and jumped behind the buck for a photo. I did that five or six times — until I got the shots I wanted, and then called Doug.
“Doug, you’re never going to believe this, but I just shot a buck.”
“What? Don’t you have to leave?”
“Yes. I should have left about 10 minutes ago, so I don’t have any time to deal with this deer. I’m going to drag the buck to your ribbon trail to the stand, and you’re going to have to come get it.”
“OK. Good job! Way to wait until the last second!”
I made it to the airport on time that afternoon. Meanwhile, Doug took his ATV to the woods, hauled out my buck, cleaned it and gave the meat to a local family that had told him they could use a deer if he had an extra one. He saved the rack for my next visit.
How’s that for a good friend?
And for proving that deer season really ain’t over until it’s over?