By: Brandon Hirsch

It all started in the summer of 2011, I had my trail cameras out and tree stands hung.   Within a couple weeks of having my cameras out I had received nice pictures of bucks.  I was seeing what I wanted to see to get me excited for the 2011 Bow Season.

 Finally it was here.  My mind and heart was focused on 1 deer, Lawerance Tynes.  At the time of the velvet trail camera footage of him we projected him to be around the 150 inch mark (he actually scored 160”). Opening weekend I filmed Greg in his stand the entire weekend. The next weekend was my turn to hunt, and I was getting really pumped in hoped I’d catch a glimpse of Lawerance Tynes my first time in the woods.  After sitting where I had pictures and videos of him 7 or 8 times and not seeing anything my hopes we’re running pretty dry.  I started to hunt in the bigger part of the woods a mile away from where I had been sitting.  After getting skunked there a hand full of times as well it really started to make me wonder.    It was rare for me to go a day without seeing a deer and somehow I managed to go 0-13 to start the season.  

The rut was about to begin and just thinking about the fact that I had gone out 13 times and not saw a deer made me sick.  I really wanted to hang up my bow and focus on goose and duck hunting.  But if you don’t know me I hate giving up so I head out on November 4th to sit in the bigger woods. My step father was at the creek bottom a half mile away.  My plans we’re to sit till 11 but around 8:45 I felt my phone vibrating. I noticed it was Tim calling.  I picked up and he said “Hey can you help me? “  I was a little confused because I thought he had gone to work that morning.  So I said “yes, where you at? “  His reply was “behind Don’s, I just shot a buck. “  From the tone of his voice I knew it was big so around 9 I climbed down my tree and got to the creek bottom within 10 minutes.  I jumped into his truck and we drove up to it.  My step father had shot Lawerance Tynes, the deer I had my mind and heart focused on since day 1. With the rut activity picking up I decided to start sitting the creek bottom (which is typically a good rut spot). That afternoon I sat there, and finally saw my first deer on our land a handful of does and a nice 9 pointer.

On November 13th, a week and 2 days from when Tim shot Lawerance Tynes, Greg, Mark, and myself found ourselves in the same area with the hopes history would repeat itself; the night before I had seen three shooters so we had a good feeling. Greg was equipped with the camera to film Mark in hopes a shooter would present them with a shot. Filming me would be a challenge since the tree I sit in has very little cover.  We arrived in our stands at 5:15 am. Well before legal shooting time I had 12 deer come within 40 yards of my stand.  I heard a deep grunt in the marsh walking towards me.  I knew it was the 150” 8 I’ve been watching for 2 days.  First light came and there he was standing around a hot doe.  I watched him for an hour before the doe started making her way towards me.  She stopped at 20 yards; he was a little behind her presenting me with a 20 – 25 yard shot.  I drew back as he started to walk towards her, all I could think about was it’s do or die time.  I grunted at him stopping him in his tracks and let the Rage fly.  I watched my arrow hit him in what I thought was the shoulder blade.  He ran off about 150 yards and started to wobble I watched him in my binoculars as he fell over.  I stood there shaking and in shock.  Did I really just shoot my first buck with my bow?  In process of letting Greg and Mark know I just shot the 8, a 130” 9 starts making its way towards me.  I knocked another arrow thinking he could give me a shot too. He didn’t like what he saw in the area so he trotted off.  Greg and Mark made their way to my stand where we began to track my buck.  An hour and a half after I shot we recovered my buck which I ended up making a double lung shot on.  We scored it in the truck finding it to be 152 5/8”.  I set my standards high saying I wasn’t going to shoot anything under 120”s, and mount anything under 150”s.  I’ll give you one guess where this buck is at right now! The buck is believed to be 4.5 years old, and we never had any pictures or videos of him.  Hunting isn’t always easy and doesn’t always go the way you want it to go.  I learned the hard way this year but just kept my head in the game and boy did it sure pay off!   So next time the going is getting tough for you, just keep going!