Deer season is just two months away in parts of the US and it’s not to soon to begin planning on bagging that special deer this year. If you have depleted your venison supply, you may want to set your sights on a fat doe, ideally last year’s fawn that’s fully grown, yet not begun the reproductive cycle. For a number of reasons, taking that first deer tests your practice regimen and gear set-up. Plus, making a one-shot kill will boost your motivation and confidence.
The Confidence Factor
I grew up in a small town well before the internet was invented. In those days, the best way for a hunting story to go viral was to tell it at the local barber shop. Barber Carl Banzhoff was an instinctive archer, one of the reasons that I relished each trip to the clippers just to hear his stories. One morning, as he was sitting in his tree stand, a groundhog came walking by. Banzhoff drew his recurve and shot instinctively, pinning the woodchuck to the ground. “Man that was a real boost to my confidence,” he said. “I couldn’t wait for a deer to walk by.”
12 Do’s and Don’ts
Josh Honeycutt lays out his 12-point plan of pitfalls to avoid in this post from the Realtree website:
I’m going to start this off by saying that I’m not a great deer hunter. In reality, I’m probably an average one. But I am confident in my abilities to find, target and kill mature deer because I pay heed to all the little things. The details. All of the minute factors that lead up to a successful hunt. Because of that, I’ve connected on quite a few mature bucks throughout the years. Not because I’m a great deer hunter — I’m not. But I’m constantly learning something new, studying my mistakes, and learning from them. And at some point or another in my hunting career, I’ve made every mistake on this list. But I made it a priority not to make them again.
https://www.realtree.com/deer-hunting/galleries/12-reasons-you-ll-suck-at-deer-hunting-this-season
