Just spent the last two hours with my slow rurual internet ... trying to catch up on forum reading ... man the deer reports are piling up now !
Congrat's to all .... hope I didn't miss anybody !
Chris K. sent me these pictures from Oct 28th ... he was out with his 12yr old son Kurtis and a good friend ( Randy ) to one of Randy's deer havens near Plattsville.
Randy closed off the night with a beauty buck !
Blood trail was good , and they ended up finding the buck in a pond !
After the recovery = One happy hunter !
Week of Oct 31st ... I put some time in ... different farms / different set ups .
I was product testing a mechanical that someone gave to me , when I missed an opportunity on a buck similar to this one ... ( sorry , can't tell you where this buck is from > file photo e-mailed to me ) ... he does look like a scrapper though !
It was an exciting hunt at my place , and a close encounter ( 10 yards ) ... took a 15 yard hard quarteing away shot as the buck walked away , but I was perplexed when the buck seemed to shrug off the shot and he eventually , trotted over to the neighbors property ... I tracked minimal blood drops and saw him calmly navigating to the North side bush lot . Wasn't till the next day , when I found my arrow in the bean field that I figured out what went wrong
( Mechanical failed to open ! )
Lesson learned ! ... Stick to my old faithfull fixed blades ~
Only good news was , I saw the buck again a couple days later , crossing back to our side of the road ... didn't seem any worse for the wear ...
I continued to hunt here and there ... Spend some time at one of Sandman's properties ... saw some awsome bucks , but we didn't get any shot opportunities ... ended the night with a set up over a bean field , with another big bodied rack buck coming in to approx 10 yards but wasn't happy with the shooting light , so he got a pass ( legal shooting light , but dark background behind me in the tall grass ) ...
Continued to move around and ended up at a farm that in previous years , has always been good for doe's over clover and apples ... but still NG as any deer that came by me , ended up being too far out or after legal light ... Still fun getting out , and I planned my next trip .
Next memorable set up was at the South West corner of my property ... A new tree stand I put up , over looking a scrape ( 30 yards to the East )
Fenceline between beans and corn ...
You can see my truck approx 200 yards to the north , parked at the ridge point ...
Wouldn't you know it ... later that morning a small rack buck came out chasing a doe about 40 yards behind my truck .
Fun watching him chase the doe for about an hour , before they headed over towards my neighbor to the West .
I felt good about my next set up ... A new farm I got permission on last season ... took a picture of my gear on a deer cart , just before I headed in to another hardwood funnel by a swamp bedding area .
One picture , after I climbed a new maple tree ...
Some contact grunts and fawn bleats > and it wasn't long before I had deer moving my way . Keep in mind , all these pictures are with my small pocket camera , so you might have to squint to see the deer .
I stopped the lead doe at a ranged 22 yards , with a soft bahhhh ... then looked in horror as my arrow sailed about a foot over her back !
... So much for the final field shots to close out that story ... It was back home now to resight my bow .
A few shots at home , confirmed high and left ... I called Excalibur ... talked to Steve ... " he said come on in and we'll sort it out " " we'll have you back in the field in no time "
Now that's customer service ! ... the last smiling face I see is our own famous forum member ( Doemaster ) ... Later , it's back home sighted in ( bang on ! ) , with new confidence , I'm ready for my next archery whitetail encounter ! ( Nov 14th )
Switching over to the blaze orange faze now .... tomorrow is the first week of our 2011 Ontario Controlled Deer Hunt Nov 7th - 13th .
Good luck to all that venture out this week ... have a good / safe hunt ... Looking forward to the pictures ! 
