Predator Call

Last Saturday morning, I was deer hunting in the open desert country of Southwest Texas.  Daylight found me glassing the head of a canyon and surrounding hills looking for a mature whitetail buck.  Without success, I decided to walk westerly, taking advantage of the sun and glass a huge bowl where I have found bucks in years past.

I found a couple of does browsing over half a mile away and concentrated my glassing efforts around them as there was still a little rutting activity.  About a hundred yards past the does, I found the head and ears of a deer staring back at the does but it was too far to see antlers in my 8x glasses until the buck moved his head.   Finally the deer moved from left to right, revealing a tall, dark horns.  Based on what I had seen, the buck no doubt deserved a better look so I commenced to cut the distance. 

At a distance of approximately 400 yards from the buck, the terrain started to roll off into a small canyon.  If I moved any closer, I would loose elevation which would make it more difficult to see the buck and get a bullet to him.  Though it was a long shot, I began to look for a place to sit my butt without getting on a dog pear or other sticky vegetation. 

The old buck was moving around a little more in his attempt to check all of the does.  Everytime he moved, I had to relocate in order clear my shooting lane.  After three moves, I finally had the buck in a fairly large clearing and I was still undetected.  As I reset my shooting sticks, the buck began walking from right to left.  I could see that he would disappear behind more brush if a shot was not taken in a matter of a couple of seconds. 

I found the shoulder and raised the crosshairs 6-8 inches above his topline and squeezed the trigger.  The recoil caused me to loose target but there was no mistake in the sound of a bullet smacking bone and flesh.  Working the bolt, I looked over the scope for a fleeing buck but the only movement was one of the does trotting to the left.  I looked through the Nikon scope for any sign of life where the buck was and there was none. 

I eased the rifle down and glassed for several minutes.  The does were not spooked and were back to browsing on the brush and weeds.  I found a couple of landmarks, one a cedar with an exposed root and a sotol that was light yellow around the base.  Crossing the small canyon that was choked with catclaw, I found the cedar and proceeded to the sotol.  There was my buck, lying where he was when I took the shot.  There was no sign of a struggle, not even the kick of his legs.

The 150 grain Ballistic Silvertip impacted the buck’s shoulder just under his spine and exited the off shoulder.  Upon field dressing the buck, I found that the bullet had barely cut the underside of the backbone which explained the clean kill.  It was as if lightning had struck him that cool, clear West Texas morning.

See you outdoors!  Gary