On a Thursday afternoon in mid November, my dad was able to go hunting for the last hour and a half of shooting time during the Virginia muzzleloader season. He asked my brother, sister and me, “Who wants to go hunting?” Of course I said I wanted to go.
We went to our neighbor’s farm 3 miles down the road. As we walked down the farm road, we saw a young buck run over a hill. We thought it might be chasing a doe, so we found a place and sat down. A few minutes later, we heard a noise and turned our heads, expecting to see a deer. Less than 10 yards away sat a squirrel eating an acorn. We took pictures of it for a minute and even turned on the camera’s flash to see if it would jump, but it didn’t budge an inch.
Soon, Dad and I went to look for more deer. We spotted a doe and her two fawns and tried to stalk them. From 20-30 yards away, Dad stuck up his head to try and see where they were—the trio spotted him and bolted.
Our final stop was the horse pasture. When we got to the top of a hill, a doe popped out of the woods and began running directly at us. Dad and I hit the dirt. Dad put up the shooting sticks, but they collapsed! As Dad was working with the sticks, I saw a 6-point buck strut out of the woods behind the doe. Dad got the shooting sticks back up, and I aimed at the middle of the buck’s chest and pulled the trigger. The buck dropped in his tracks, and my dad congratulated me and shook me!
I couldn’t believe my eyes. I did it. The shot was about 45 yards, and the bullet went through both lungs. We took pictures and loaded everything in the car, and still made it home with 5 minutes to spare before dark!