David Wolfersberger’s Whitetail Deer Hunt in Howard, NY

November 17, 2004

This was our first year at a new place to hunt, so after the scouting we became very excited about the upcoming season. We were offered a new piece of property from a farmer in bath. One of my family members already hunts a different piece of the farmer’s land and he showed us a lot of good deer they had taken over the years. We went with it, and our choice to hunt this property was the best we’d ever made.
We got together with my brother in law and son in law, hunted all through bow season and passed up many deer because the farmer has trophy managment on the property. The rack has to sport at least 6 points and be wider than the deer’s ears, so this was all new to us and very exciting, because we had to pass up many deer we would have taken under mormal conditions.

The last weekend of bow season I was in my stand and saw this brute chasing a doe and my heart went in still for a moment, but he was more interested in the lovely lady than me. I watched him with a smile as he just walked away, and hoped to see him another day.

There was some snow on the ground and I didn’t sleep well the night before opening day of gun season. I think that’s normal for most hunters. I got in my stand about 5:30 in the morning, coming in quietly from the top down because they had been feeding in the fields at night. It’s a long way to walk but worth the hike.

At first light I saw some movement and saw a deer. As I waited for him to come closer he stepped out onto the logging road, and I almost died when I saw it was the same deer from two days ago. The big thing was when he turned his head and looked my way it was very hard to stay calm and make the good shot. He turned and started walking away from me and then stepped back onto the logging road and gave me a perfect shot looking back at me. I took his heart out with one clean shot with a Lightfield slug. He went about 50 yards after a shot him and I watched him fall.

I got down from my stand, and as I walked up on him the horns got bigger instead of getting smaller like a lot of racks do. When I got to him I went about nuts. That was the best day of my life while I was hunting. One other thing is that my brother in law took a very nice 8 pointer and my son in law took a very nice 6 pointer. We also took 4 doe that day, so it was a good year for all of us and that was just opening day.