Hunter’s Journal – July 2016

By Adam Woods

Unlike most hunting stories that begin in the woods, mine started the summer of 2015 in my basement with a few pieces of cedar and a wood burner.

One of my to-dos before the season started was to create a sign for our club that our members could place out front, like the signs you see on hunting TV shows and at famous outfitters around the country. I connected several cedar boards, carefully traced and filled the outline of the Slippery Hill Hunting Club logo, torched the wood for a rustic look and added an outdoor varnish for protection. With the sign completed, I anxiously awaited my opportunity to pose next to it with a buck. Now, let’s fast forward a few months to opening weekend of rifle season in Talbot County.

The morning of Oct. 18, the second day of the rifle season, was unseasonably cool. It was fairly windy, but there were no mosquitoes, which was great. I settled into my stand before daylight, thinking about the previous day’s trail-cam check. On opening morning, just after daybreak, a huge buck cruised through where I was currently sitting. It was too bad I had chosen a different stand that day.  

I felt like I was in the perfect spot as I faced north and about 25 feet up in my Summit Viper. I overlooked a narrow creek bottom surrounded by thick cutover. 

As the darkness became daylight, the action began. To my right, I heard the leaves crunch and sticks break—the sound every hunter yearns to hear. Five does came right down the creek bottom at a brisk pace, directly in front of my stand. I thought to myself, the rut is still a few weeks out, but maybe this cold snap had the bucks fired up early. My excitement soon diminished as nothing followed. Still, seeing five does at daybreak was a great start to the morning and would have made for a fine hunt if that were the end.

Hours passed, nothing moved, and I heard very few shots off in the distance. Around 9 a.m., I thought I heard a faint grunt in the distance. I sat in silence, listening for another sound. 

A few minutes passed, and I heard what I knew for sure was buck grunt, and it was closer. The grunts gave way to fierce snorts. I still couldn’t see anything, but whatever was going on in the woods was headed in my direction. 

A flash of brown and a glimmer of antler in the morning sunlight was the first visual indication of a buck. At that point the action was about a 100 yards away but still in the thick stuff. Then I heard it, that sound that we Southern hunters rarely ever hear in the wild—antlers crashing. I thought to myself, “Oh my gosh! There are multiple bucks, and they are fighting.” 

At that point my adrenaline was pumping wildly. For a brief moment, I thought I was on a TV show, hunting the rut in southern Illinois or western Kentucky. No way does this happen to regular guys hunting in central Georgia.

“There he is!” I silently shouted. About 75 yards from my tree stand, I saw one of my trail-camera bucks standing in the creek bottom. He was a main-frame 8-pointer with two abnormal points, and he was looking back toward the cutover. 

I readied my bolt-action Remington 78 Sportsman .30-06, topped with a Redfield Revenge scope. I took a breath and squeezed the trigger. 

Boom! 

The deer just stood there for a second or two and then proceeded to trot down the creek bottom toward my stand. Not knowing if I made a good shot or missed completely, I racked another round and made a grunt sound to stop him. 

Boom! 

This time he was DRT—Dead Right There.

Adam Woods, of Acworth, with his double harvest in Talbot County on Oct. 18, 2015.

Before I could even react to what had just happened, I saw the other buck—which had a much bigger rack— running down the creek bottom toward the downed buck. The buck had his head lowered, neck swollen and hair standing up, as if he was still looking for a fight. Unfortunately for the buck, he lost the fight with my .30-06 as he stopped right in front of my stand. 

Boom! 

He fell into the creek and 10 yards from the first buck. 

I hadn’t even processed what had taken place, when I saw something else coming down the creek. I looked back to my right and a small 8 and a decent 6 were headed my way. The smarter of the two, the 6-pointer, took off running at first sight of the downed buck, but the 8 just stood there. 

At that point I was shaking uncontrollably and was in no condition to try climbing down. I had just killed my biggest buck to date, beat that record 10 seconds later with what turned out to be a symmetrical, main-frame 10-pointer with a base kicker, while witnessing what few ever get to see or hear in the wild—an all-out buck brawl! 

After the dust, and my nerves, settled and I realized that both of my buck tags were punched on opening weekend, and it would be a month before duck season, I climbed down to take a closer look at my bucks. I just stood there in awe looking down at the two biggest bucks I had ever taken and looked up at the sky to thank God for an amazing hunt.

These thoughts were abruptly interrupted by my cell phone ringing. It was my hunting buddies calling to see what in the world was going on in my section of the woods. I confidently said, “I am going to need some help, got two nice ones on the ground.”

Rewinding back to my first shot, it was a little low. When in doubt, keep shootin’!