A friend invited me up to Iowa for the first shotgun/mzl season, 5 day season.
Started out with warm weather, highs in 60s lows in upper 30s, not much deer movement.
Cold front came in Sunday night temps dropped to highs in low 30s, lows in the teens. 20-35mph wind everyday, it was about as cold as I could stand. We were stand/blind hunting, no fancy deer house LOL!
Deer were strictly on a feeding pattern, no rut activity at all.
We were walking 1/2 mile thru a huge cornfield, surrounded by thick timber, brushy fields, and CRP to a very secluded back section.
Really didn't see that many deer, and only a few bucks. Didn't see any bucks on Tuesday.
Last day, Wednesday, about 4.30 deer started piling out of the CRP into the farthest part of the field that we could see, probably 800yards away. We saw close to 60 deer, several small bucks and 2 decent ones. In a last ditch effort we decided to make a move to close the distance as they were not heading our way. We had some terrain features to use to our advantage plus a favorable wind. We were able to cut the distance to 400yds before we ran out of terrain. As luck would have it the bucks were feeding our way. At the very last minute one of the bigger bucks was roughly 200yds and turned broadside, with my SML rested on my knee I took the shot. I heard the bullet impact but lost him in the scope. I told my buddy I hit him, heard the bullet impact. He's watching thru binos and says, "he's still walking". I get back on my scope in time to see the buck rare up and fall over backwards. Didn't go 20 as the saying goes!!! LOL
Had a great time on my first Iowa deer hunt, met a lot of very nice people, and saw what is probably the finest deer hunting habitat I've ever seen.
Sorry for the long post but I hope y'all enjoy the story.
Started out with warm weather, highs in 60s lows in upper 30s, not much deer movement.
Cold front came in Sunday night temps dropped to highs in low 30s, lows in the teens. 20-35mph wind everyday, it was about as cold as I could stand. We were stand/blind hunting, no fancy deer house LOL!
Deer were strictly on a feeding pattern, no rut activity at all.
We were walking 1/2 mile thru a huge cornfield, surrounded by thick timber, brushy fields, and CRP to a very secluded back section.
Really didn't see that many deer, and only a few bucks. Didn't see any bucks on Tuesday.
Last day, Wednesday, about 4.30 deer started piling out of the CRP into the farthest part of the field that we could see, probably 800yards away. We saw close to 60 deer, several small bucks and 2 decent ones. In a last ditch effort we decided to make a move to close the distance as they were not heading our way. We had some terrain features to use to our advantage plus a favorable wind. We were able to cut the distance to 400yds before we ran out of terrain. As luck would have it the bucks were feeding our way. At the very last minute one of the bigger bucks was roughly 200yds and turned broadside, with my SML rested on my knee I took the shot. I heard the bullet impact but lost him in the scope. I told my buddy I hit him, heard the bullet impact. He's watching thru binos and says, "he's still walking". I get back on my scope in time to see the buck rare up and fall over backwards. Didn't go 20 as the saying goes!!! LOL
Had a great time on my first Iowa deer hunt, met a lot of very nice people, and saw what is probably the finest deer hunting habitat I've ever seen.
Sorry for the long post but I hope y'all enjoy the story.
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