My cell phone vibrated in my pocket, so I took it out and whispered softly "What's up, Honey!" An equally soft whispered reply came. "There are some deer in the weed patch. One of them is an old, mature doe. Want me to shoot her?" Wanda asked.
"Three deer crossed below the North Star stand and if they come out I am going to look them over. If one of them is a mature doe, I am going to take her. Shoot the old girl if she gets in the right place," I replied.
Within seconds, the three deer started across the power line below my stand. One of them was chunky with a square looking chest, had a very long neck and a long face, all the traits of an older age class doe. Almost relunctantly, I found the doe in the scope, held the crosshairs tight against her shoulder and squeezed the trigger. The doe crumpled at the roar of the Encore, but I reloaded just to make sure.
Wanda calls again to ask if the deer is down. I reassure her that it is down and out. She said "The deer in the weed patch just raised their heads when you shot. I am going to take this one, too." True to her word, Wanda's little .243 barked and as the shot echoed down the river basin, she called again. "Big doe down!" she says.
Wanda and I have worked on building our deer herd for years. We do not kill button bucks for any reason, we let the young bucks pass, we only kill does when we discuss it and agree that we need to remove a few, we shoot only mature does and we are very selective about the bucks that we shoot. As a result, we have a good resident doe population, quite a few bucks along with a couple of thumpers in the older age class.
The reason that we decided to harvest the does on this particular hunt was the fact that we had not gone South where we normally reap a bountiful harvest of does to feed the family during the year. Also, we felt that we had sheltered the does long enough that we could selectively remove a couple without hurting our resident population. When aged, the doe I killed was 3 1/2 years old and Wanda's was aged at 5 1/2 years. They made a wonderful addition to our family meals for the future.
Wanda and I are as passionate about our hunting as anyone I know and we love every aspect of the hunt, but there is another reason that we hunt...we absolute love the wild game that hunting brings to our table. We always have a house full of kids and they all would rather have a plate full of back strap or deer steak as they would to have the best cut of beef or pork that you can buy. We have had kids living with us that would tell us that they did not like deer meat. I just prepare a skillet full of meat, they eat some of it and want more, then ask what it is. When I tell them it is deer meat, they always say "Wow! That's good. I didn't think I would like it but I like it the way you cook it!"
Every year we plan on taking as many deer as legally possible, but we have to leave home to do that because we don't want to take that many deer off our property. That also gives us the opportunity to hunt some new country. During the 2007 season, I was invited to hunt the Two Rivers Hunting Club property inside the levee of the Mississippi River where David Jordening killed the biggest buck killed in the state of Arkansas the year before. I killed an old warhorse of a buck and a wild boar. Mr. Jordening shot an impressive heavy racked buck while I was there. When I left, I had three bucks and the wild hog in the back of the truck. All of the bucks and the hog weighed considerably over 200 pounds each. They did not go to waste.
One of the benefits of eating wild game is the fact deer for instance have no unnatural additives like growth hormones that are commonly given to commercial cattle, the meat is higher in protein and lower in cholesterol than the commercial beef. Very good to eat and good for you. So, the other side of hunting is being able to reap a wild harvest that is very beneficial to your family. I know it works well for our family and I am sure it will work for yours.
