My Father in Laws Buck

[Woodsman416]

My F-I-L has been a hunter and fisherman his entire life. He was born on Christmas day in 1922 in Newark so he's spent a lot of time in and on New Jerseys woods and waters

 

He enlisted in the army and spent a good portion of WWII touring all the best European destinations. Places like Anzio and Dachau. The war ended while he was still in Germany and he went on walk-about for a while, hunting roe deer and belgian hares and learning how to "finger" trout. After the war he came back to NJ and worked as a mason and hunted and fished. He is such a dedicated outdoorsman that he may not remember my wife's birthday but he remembers it was opening day of trout season. He loved bird hunting above all else and especially liked grouse hunting. He even developed his own line of German shorthairs that were well known among bird hunters at the time.

 

In the 1980s he built a house on the shore of Lake Murray in South Carolina, moved there and spent his retirement hunting and fishing.

 

About 10 years ago time started taking it's toll on him and it was decided that it would be best if he came back to NJ and lived with us. Since he moved back, he still did some fishing but problems with his knees made it hard to get out in the woods. Two years ago some friends and I decided to get him back out deer hunting again. You can read about that hunt here: http://www.nj.com/hunterdon-county-democrat/index.ssf/2015/04/92-year-old_kingwood_township_hunter_surprises_you.html

 

Last year things didn't work out. The only time I have during the shotgun seasons are Friday afternoons. With rain, cold weather, covering people on vacation or meetings it didn't come together. This year was different. On Friday, January 13th it all came together. A mild afternoon with a good wind and Rich was ready to go. 

 

We arrived at my friends property at about 2:30 PM. Rich got out of my truck and into the passenger seat of a Polaris Ranger for the ride to the blind. At the blind he gets out of the ATV and right into the blind chair. Not much walking at all! I gave him a forked stick to rest the front of my Browning Gold 10 ga on and I went back to my truck, grabbed my bow and headed to a treestand about 150 yards from the blind. I could keep an eye on the field and his blind with my binos.

 

It wasn't until about 4:00 PM when deer started coming into the field. Eight does came out of one corner and started walking the edge of the field towards his blind. They were going to pass him at about 30 yards. When the line of does were in front of his stand they all stopped and looked across the field. I swung my binos over to the far corner and watched as a buck stepped out into the field. It headed right for the does. I wasn't sure at the time if Rich could see the buck or not. The buck was still to the right of his blind when a shot rang out. The does ran for the far edge of the field. The buck back tracked about 10 yards and froze. When the does got most of the way across the field they stopped too. I started counting. 1..2..3..4..5..6..7..8. All the does were standing. None of them looked injured. I scanned them again. Counted 8 again. Clean miss. Rich later told me that the stick I gave him fell over as he was pulling the trigger. 

 

All the deer were now on edge but they didn't seem to realize where the shot came from.  The does headed back towards the middle of the field and the buck turned again and headed right back towards the blind. SHOOT! SHOOT THE BUCK! SHOOT THE BUCK! I was screaming in my head. Can't he see it? SHOOT!!! SHOOT!!!......BOOM! The bucks front legs collapse! He pushes himself across the field for about 30 yards, tries to get up once and expires. I got down immediately, headed up to get the Ranger and down to the blind to congratulate Rich on a successful hunt. His buck is a nice 7 point with a little sticker off the right side burr.

 

94 years old and he got his buck!

[mattg1500]

Nice! Congrats!

[Howell boy]

[BowhunterNJ]

Awesome! :up:

[Nomad]

That's terrific!  Great job giving him a hand!

[3Blade]

Very Cool! Congrats to him!!

[Tarhunt]

That's fantastic! Congrats!

[Zipper]

Great job! Congratulations to you and a member of the Greatest Generation!

[MGHunter66]

A moment etched in time.

[Devil Horns]

That's awesome. Congrats to him!! Great job getting him setup. That is a memory to last a lifetime.

 

 

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[Live to Hunt]

Wow awesome story

[Rusty]

That's so great, congratulations to him.   

[Jghunter75]

Wow can't beat that!!!!

[TDietz]

NICE!! How cool is that? Thanks for taking time, both to take the old guy out, and to write up a more than twitter sized story. Old boy was handling a 10 bore!!!!!!! that is great

[hammer4reel]

awesome story, CONGRATS .

hope im able to have that kind of luck at that age