Tell me about your first trad kill

[rhendrix]

I’m dyiiiiiing to go hunting this year, it’s been two years since I’ve pulled a string back on a live animal and I’m finally getting settled enough to POSSIBLY go hunting this year (thanks divorce and moving to a state with some of the worst public land hunting I’ve ever experienced). So....to aid in my very obvious withdraws, I wanna hear about your first trad kill. I don’t care if it’s a squirrel, turkey, whitetail, elk...whatever. Let’s hear the story in every little intimate detail so I can keep this fire stoked until I get out and make it happen. Hopefully this year is THE year.

Ron

 

[sneaky]

I'm more curious about where you live with the crappy public land hunting!

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[rhendrix]

I'm more curious about where you live with the crappy public land hunting!

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North Carolina. The game lands are terrible and poorly managed. I spent all last year scouting for deer and barely turned any up. It is what it is. I have a chance to take vacation and go to Ohio if my work schedule allows but October-December is our crunch time. Disadvantage to working commercial construction I suppose.

 

[marktole]

My first trad kill was bowfishing! Got a gar. Planning to hunt my home state for mule deer this fall with the same recurve.

 

[jspradley]

My first trad kill was a porcupine. I shot 3 arrows with BHs through it and off into who knows where before I realized what I was doing and how much those lost arrows cost....

Was delicious though!

 

[sneaky]

North Carolina. The game lands are terrible and poorly managed. I spent all last year scouting for deer and barely turned any up. It is what it is. I have a chance to take vacation and go to Ohio if my work schedule allows but October-December is our crunch time. Disadvantage to working commercial construction I suppose.

I've got a friend who is a state biologist over there in NC. Ohio is open til Feb, you got time!

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[Billy Goat]

Pigeon when I was around 7 years old I think. I had been hunting them for probably 2 years around the farm before I got one.

 

[MadDawg]

I can't remember the first kill, but when I was about 5 or 6 I snuck up on a rabbit and bounced a wooden arrow off his side! Man I was as pumped as could be!

 

[ScottinPA]

As a kid there were numerous critters killed. When I went back to trad in 2001 I screwed up on a few deer, including a good 10pt. Finally came together on a mature doe at 17 yds. Perfect double lung, she only flinched and kept feeding then coughed, laid down and died. The compound went down the road soon thereafter.

 

[Btaylor]

Bullfrogs were first kills with a recurve. Chest wader spot and stalks in a bar pit south of town. more freakin snakes than any place I have ever seen but lots of frogs too. High school friday nights...bows, beers and bullfrogs.

 

[ledflight]

Small buck last October. Nothing felt likely - got to the stand late.
But in the quiet aftermath of the sunrise, the morning turned around. It was my 3rd hunt ever but my first time being out in the rut. In the distance I hear the crack of antlers clashing - another first. Then, does run by, chased by bucks, all a blur past me.
A little after all that activity this little buck wanders into view. I am ready (unlike my very first hunt where a doe walked right under my stand before I could get bow into position and I had to watch her walk away!)
I watch him come closer and closer in that wandering way, he's taking his time. Once he makes a sneak turn behind a tree almost fooling me into getting busted.
Then he starts making his way towards prime open area. He feeds a little with his head down behind a tree as I wait for him to continue to that shooting lane I had visualized when I suddenly I realize - "I can shoot him right now!"
So I slowly draw my recurve and let it fly!
Thwack and he is off. I can see arrow sticking out. Shot was high and back. But it is in him.
After about 30min got down from the tree and back to the house. 90min or so later we start a track - find the arrow in parts, blood on feathers. It must have worked its way through? Not foamy blood, not dark... good blood but it fades and after a couple hours we head back for lunch and to rest up for another session. Obvious now that we rookies pushed him.
Head back out to track around 3 maybe? Not sure anymore but after some low moments of despair, around 5pm we find him near a bedding zone. Quite relief. Luckily my "gut" shot missed the yucky guts - no intestines were burst. Did get two holes.
Pulled out the phone to review a gutting video as we went to work, keeping the heart (shoulda kept that liver!), then dragged out.
I owe a lot to my buddy for tracking assistance.
Ate the heart the next night with my 6yr old son. Later the backstraps would be the first meat my then 6month old daughter ever tasted.
Southwest Spyder recurve - 50lbs, Easton 2219s with 225grain Van Diemans on the business end.

 

[Where's Bruce?]

Hope to post mine next month.

 

[Beendare]

I shot a few small critters before I shot any deer or hogs.....but what hooked me was a trip to Australia.

My buddy brought his Black Widow 63# as I recall. He happens to be a lefty like me.....up to that point I really hadn't shot a stick bow. So we took it out and I shot a few arrows with it- struggling of course to hold at full draw.

You guys that shoot stick bows know that learning curve....I'm a pretty big guy, shooting an 80# compound at the time and can hold my own in a weight room. Pretty strong right? Ugh no........ I struggled big time to hold form with that bow........ but I got off enough practice shots to develop a gap.

So a couple days later we are driving out to a water buff spot out in the middle of nowhere....and we spot a couple scrub bulls that nobody wanted to shoot so my buddy says, "Take my recurve with a blunt" I snuck in and drilled the one small bull at 30-ish yards dead center.....the guys back in the Highlux watching through binos roared their approval.

I was hooked from that point on.....the magic flight of the arrow and all that. /Grin

I bought a stick bow when we got home.

...

 

[FLS]

Sept 1997. Whitetail in velvet here in SC. 45# Bear grizzly, Easton xx75 2016 and a bear razor head. About a 20 yard shot and 50 yard recovery.

 

[coyotecreek]

My first trad kill was a small forky whitetail buck here in Kansas. I was hunting with my son who was only 7 or 8 years old at the time. The buck came under our stand and he wanted me to shoot him. I told him that the buck needed to grow a little. Well a week later that little buck came by again and I figured that he had grown enough! I shot him at 6 yards. My son wasn't with me this time, but it was "his deer".

My favorite trad kill though was my first buck with equipment that I had built. I got into building bows several years ago and when I shot my first deer with a bow, arrows, string, silencers, and quiver that I had all built myself, that was an accomplishment.

 

[juanblanco1981]

My first Trad Kill was almost 4 years ago. I had dabbled on and off with traditional for a few years, but finally had the confidence that I could make an ethical shot inside of 20 yards. It was the 3rd week of november and I had already killed a buck so I figured, what better time to take the recurve out and see if I could kill a doe before church. I had hung a stand on the point of a little clump of timber in an overgrown cattle pasture about 9 feet off of the ground. ( I was afraid, after practicing some from a tree, that a higher angle on a close shot would throw me off.) In front of me was about an acre of scrubby cedars that had become a bedding area over the last couple years and it touched the point of timber I was stationed in. My hope was that it would funnel a deer down to 10 yards or less as they passed between the two terrain features. Overnight a cold front came in and the temps were in the high 20's, as the sun came up everything was covered in a layer of frost. Like normal, as it got light I started to question my stand placement and whether I was wasting my time in this spot or not. Fortunately I had pretty good back cover and the deer in my area don't seem to look up to much, because immediately I had a doe at 5 yards and being 9 feet up it didn't seem high enough all of a sudden! As she passed in front of me and my adrenaline spiked, I kind of went brain dead and just shot without thinking. Before I knew it, I had shot just over her back and she ran off into the cedars. As I stood in my stand evaluating what went wrong (and sulking) I watched a couple small bucks walk through the same path, (which were off limits since we only get one antlered tag) I realized my stand was keeping me pretty well hidden and didn't need to rush the shot. WIthin half an hour I had a nice doe come through the same path and I simply focused on executing the shot I had practiced so many times. She came to a stop about 12 yards out quartering away from me with her head down. I picked a spot behind her shoulder and let the arrow fly. It did not pass through as it had clearly hit the offside shoulder and she ran away through the cedars and out of site. It took a minute for me to think clearly because the close encounter had rattled me more then anything I had experienced before. I waited a while and got down to track, but it was not difficult as the blood had sprayed over the frost covered vegetation. I quickly found her about 60 yards away and called my wife to bring out the kids to help with the recovery. They were almost in disbelief as they saw the deer and the bow in my hand. I think they were skeptical that a simple stick and string could bring home a deer.

 

[jog]

Elk hunting, a grouse stuck its head out from behind a rock. I went to full draw, settled in and shot its head off. I was so surprised I blurted loudly: NO WAY!!! I was psyched to say the least.

 

[Gerard Marcaurele]

So there I was.... it was dark and dreary with so much humidity you could wear the air around you. As I walked down a narrow little path something drew the attention of my faithful little pup. From around a small corner I caught a glimpse of movement as my little dog went bounding towards this unknown sound/creature. Fearful for both of our lives, I summoned all my courage and ran and grabbed my recurve hanging on the wall. As soon as I regained composure, I saw the hideous beast my four legged friend was after and swiftly called her off the chase. She had done her job in cornering it, and done her job well. I drew back, settled my anchor, and pulled through my shot only to miss wide by about a foot. The beast began to move closer and my heart began to pound faster... I nocked my second and final existing arrow and executed another perfect miss... I had no choice but to risk life and limb to recover one of my errant arrows to make another shot.

I successfully retrieved this arrow after putting on what I would describe as the most successful sneak of all time. I then backed away sufficiently far enough to draw back yet again as the beast began again to charge. This time my arrow found it’s mark, and the monster was no more. Crisis averted and no lives were lost. I was elated, and such a feat makes me swell with pride to this day.



Actually, my dog spooked up an armadillo rutting up around the garage and my recurve was the closest thing I could grab. If you’re gonna tell a story, might as well tell a good one.

 

[Bvas]

My first trad kill took place on a late January deer hunt ten years ago. I had filled my buck tag with the compound earlier in the season. I decided to hang up the compound and try to fill my remaining antlerless tag with an old York recurve I had been playing with.

There was about four inches of fresh snow. So a spot and stalk hunt was in order. It was a straight uphill climb from the truck to the area I intended to hunt. I got to staring at the ground as I was climbing to try and make it go quicker. When I got to the top of the 150yd climb, I stopped for a breather and look around. As I looked to my right, there laid a deer bedded with its back to me not ten yds from the path. Completely oblivious to my presence.
Somehow I managed to get an arrow out and take a shot undetected. The arrow struck just above the spine and the deer jumped from its bed and nearly ran me over trying to escape.
Penetration was not good, and I feared a pure shoulder hit. I called a bud and about an hour later we took up the trail. We had all day and decent blood, so the chase was on. We pushed the deer nearly a mile with it allowing us to get close several times. At the mile mark the deer finally turned and headed back towards where I had shot it. I told my bud I was going to pick up the pace because it looked like the deer was tiring. After about 200yds of fast walk/jogging I came around some brush and there laid the deer stone dead. Ended up being a one lung shot with most of the blood in the chest cavity.
Technically it was my first buck with a trad bow, as it ended up being 1-1/2 old buck that had shed out.

 

[rhendrix]

I've got a friend who is a state biologist over there in NC. Ohio is open til Feb, you got time!

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Think you could give me their contact info in a PM. Tried all year and saw nothing but sign and other hunters. No deer.