Mergrath picked up a gun and shot a public land D16 deer!
Well here we go:
Most of you know that I spend pretty much all of time archery hunting. I haven't hunted more than 5 times with a rifle in my four years of hunting thus far. Personally, it's just a greater satisfaction due to the challenge for me. So, as gaytorfan stated "I ventured to the dark side".
I archery hunted Thursday evening and was about 15 minutes shy of having a very big 3x3 within 20 yards. It didn't happen and my plans were to possibly hit the same area the next morning. However, srfnkill had taken Friday off of work due to the illness of his father and called saying his morning was open and wanted to hunt with me (he filled both of his tags early in the season...and it's killing the poor guy.) Obviously archery hunting with one person is hard enough alone and I don't share a treestand unlike some of you.
So we hit the hill Friday morning and are greeted with 39 degrees, a heavy wind, fog and light rain. We hiked the high desert and stopped and glassed for hours. We finnaly @ 10:00 am start glassing an east facing hillside and I immediately pick-up deer. This is the third time in my last four hunts that I've been able to glass up deer which is something that has me excited. There is deffinately two bucks @ 260 yards mixed in with a couple does. One is a spike and the other well...with the fog and wind it was almost impossible to determine if it was legal or not. We seriously glassed these bucks for over an hour! It was really hard to pass but we couldn't be sure so we did the appropriate thing.
I gave serious thought to returning to the same spot the next morning. Again, it's a tough decision for me but when srfnkill called and wanted to do another hunt, I couldn't resist. So, we head out and park in a much closer spot to hillside from the day before. As I'm putting my gloves on (26 degrees) my phone goes off...it's my wife texting me that her grandmother had just passed away @ 5:00 am.
I reply back if she wanted me to come home and he she said no, just don't stay out all day.
So, we head out and find a nice spot on the hillside adjacent from the hillside with the deer from the day before. As soon as there is a sliver of light I start glassin the ridgeline...deer...deer...deer...legal buck! So, I start getting my rifle all set-up on the sticks and get my crosshairs on him. I take a shot at 300 yards and I miss clean. The deer didn't even move! He just kept eating so I load another round and bam, he starts heading down the hill and zig-zagging a bit and goes down. We start high-fiving thinking this deal is done...not!
We head up to recover the deer and can't find him anywhere...WTF? We start circling the spot and srfnkill picks up some blood as do I. We start tracking the deer heading south around the slope. Along the way I find a 1-1/2" piece of bone! All of the sudden I look up toward the ridge and see this little midget deer. (I kid you not...this deer is a midget!) I knew this midget deer was sticking close to the wounded buck so I head up. I get to about 10 yards and the buck jumps up and heads over the ridge torward the camping area.
I'm not sure how the laws apply here but I went after him. I get to the top and he's about half way down the other side. I put the rifle to my shoulder and bam, down he goes. We drag him to the bottom tag, drag, truck, freezer! Now, back to my archery hunting!
. Just thought that i'd keep you in the loop for us successfull hunters is all! 
you guys are out of your minds...although I almost took a 560 yard shot a few weeks ago! 
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