This was my fourth season trying to connect with a CT Whitetail and yesterday at 8:45 the Gods finally smiled. Buck was out at around 160 yards in a 15 knot cross wind. Flipped up the Express sight, dampened the front blade with my saliva -soaked thumb, a la Sgt. York and let the hammer drop. Ok, ok... in my freakin' dreams!! Actually the buck came right up my backside to around 15 yds, winded me, or perhaps heard my knees knocking like two claves!! He did the ol' 180 spin-around, scampered back and gave me an angling-in quartering shot at around 25-30 yds. Saw the slice of that front blade on his front shoulder, and like the shot gunner I am, slapped that trigger like a baby's bottom. He tore off, tail down, and then I heard a CRASH and the woods fell silent. Waited a good five minutes for my heart to settle back in my chest and started after him.
No blood....no hair.....SQUAT, for a good 50-60 yards. Elation, turned quickly to the depths of depression. So I pressed onward. Then out of the corner of my eye I saw the glint of something that turned out to be a blotch of fresh blood about 3 feet up on a sapling....then another patch on the tree next to it. I looked 5 yards ahead and there he was, piled-up about 10 feet off the trail.
Fairly respectable 8-PT, tipping the scale at 161 lbs., dressed.
I sat there for a good 10 minutes in awe, thinking that after 133 years, the gun was back home in the Nutmeg State AND could still bring home the bacon. They say the cowboys would spend 3 months wages to own a Winchester. It's easy to see why!
