The camera issues were solved throughout the morning.
Back at the lodge, we had a bit of down time before heading out again for the afternoon. I was once again on the Fish Snatch stand. Weather was cool and windy but gloriously sunny. The conditions - mostly the wind - did make me glad I was in a box blind even in my heavier clothes.
Almost immediately after getting into the blind, a buck walks out. This had me hopeful that the cool conditions meant animals were moving early and well. The buck stayed for a while and was joined a bit later by a very large group of deer.
Deer milled around and worked their way in and out. In contrast to the first night, I was finding it very easy to stay settled and still. I felt like I was in my happy place.
It never ceases to amaze me that even when the deer don't know I'm there, they have the ability to look through me.
At around 5:00 all the deer bolted away. This had me hopeful that something else was coming in. And it did. A large boar hog lumbered onto the corn. But what to do? He stayed behind the fence that is there for deer season to keep hogs out of bait. I was not comfortable shooting through the fence as any contact would surely push the bullet on an erratic path. I had two pigs in the cooler; I had patience. I watched; adrenaline subsided.
The situation was similar to my 2025 Bear Hunt, where I watched the bear for a very long period of time. Although it was also different since the question now was a good shot opportunity as opposed to the question of if it was the right animal.
After about 20 minutes, deer came out and were hanging out between me and the boar. This was when the boar was nearing the edge of the fencing. The situation was a multi-species Mexican standoff with the boar holding almost all the cards. The deer became an additional barrier for me. Patience Beagle...
The deer moved to the far right of the lane and the boar finally cleared the fence. I still took my time and carefully waited for a clear head shot. At the shot, the pig dropped and rolled - it looked good. As I was chambering another round, he got his feet under him and scooted off to the left. I stared in disbelief and said a few expletives to myself.
I texted Rick; I knew this was not going to make him very happy.
Oddly, the deer were back on the corn within minutes. They seemed to care less about a 30.06 bullet zipping around and were just appreciative that I ran the boar off. It was nearing dark, but it was still a long wait, made even longer by the situation.
Rick texted me to come back to the gate. The unfriendly situation suggests looking in the morning during daylight made more sense. Temperatures were expected to get down into the upper teens, so the hog would be OK (and it was probably a big enough boar that edibility would be a question).
If I was thinking about Aesop the previous morning, I was now back to Pandora and what remained in her jar - hopeful that the deer I saw staring off to the left at dark was looking at something. But hope is just as evil as everything else unleashed by Pandora. Humans just hold on to it...
Bob and Claude had seen only deer; Denis had sat out the night again.
Denis and Claude were once again gracious and shared their wild pig sausage dinner with me. Bob was done hunting and had left, so alone in the lodge I went to sleep - overthinking everything. EVERYTHING!
In the morning, I would either have a hog, or I would get my shirt tail cut.
No comments:
Post a Comment