Got charged by a buck tonight

[grampy]

Glad you're OK Jerry! A wild animal can be unpredictable.

If that buck lives a couple more years, he'll run off every other buck nearby. Just a real aggressive buck. 

I killed a buck a couple years ago with my bow that we called Big Bully. He was three when I killed him, but only had a decent four point rack. We named him that when he was a yearling spike, because any time he saw another deer, he'd run it off! Even bigger bucks!! At two years old we watched him run off a mature eight point!!! Didn't matter to him! When he stepped out in the open with other deer, he immediately laid his ears back and postured. Does, fawns, bigger bucks, didn't matter. He truly was a big bully! 

The day I shot him, I saw a nice eight going away from me so I grunted. A short time later here comes Big Bully down the run looking for the deer that grunted with his ears laid back. When he stopped ten yards in front of me and looked out to the brush field, I put an arrow through his boiler room.

Could swear we heard the other deer in the area having a party, as we loaded him up!

Pic's of him in the bow harvest thread from 2017.

[Hock3y24]

id have out some bullets in him!

[Cory]

He thinks he’s a bad ass, now does he? Wait about another month and then he will see how bad he is. He will be getting his ass kicked several times a day from the big boys. But in all seriousness glad your ok.

[G-Man]

Had a bear do that a few years ago.. tore my 3d archery targets all up.. it stuffed in my man cave now.

.

[Steuben Jerry]

37 minutes ago, G-Man said:

Had a bear do that a few years ago.. tore my 3d archery targets all up.. it stuffed in my man cave now.

.

The full mount you have, right? I remember the story with him too. Nice bear!

That deer target has a bite out of the neck and ass from a small bear last year. The bear target got bit and clawed up too.

Edited September 14, 2019 by Steuben Jerry

[Steuben Jerry]

9 hours ago, wolc123 said:

I hoped it was unloaded, and that he did not knock it off the cradle, resulting in an "accidental discharge". 

Always a good idea to leave your gun unloaded and action open when you’re downrange..

[NFA-ADK]

Wow crazy.  Glade your OK as this situation could have been much worse.  At minimum I would have an extra foam target to use as protection in case of another charge along with a long stick to beat his ass if he does get close enough.  That testosterone drives them crazy and even a small yearling can cause much damage with those spikes and hooves if they get you on the ground.  Small pellet handgun would work, even if just shot with nothing in it, often that loud sound will scare them off.  

What was the dog doing?  Tell that bitch to get to work!  lol 

I think we need to set that cam on video so we can all watch the festivities!  "And he is the second encounter with the buck that tried to beat me up!"  LOL

Cool story! 

[wolc123]

1 hour ago, Steuben Jerry said:

Always a good idea to leave your gun unloaded and action open when you’re downrange..

I agree, and it was.  It is also good to assume that every gun is loaded.   That was the thought on my mind, when I looked at that little buck messing around with my rifle, as I stood down range.   The gun was pointed in a safe direction (at the target backstop which consists of a huge mound of topsoil).  There was no one else around, but the little buck was the "wildcard".     I had killed lots of deer by the time that incident happened (maybe even that little buck's mother and/or brother) so I do not feel very comfortable downrange while it was standing next to my rifle.    

As far as your little agitator goes, I would shoot it with a paint-ball gun.  Invite some kids over on youth weekend or crossbow season and see if they can take it out for you.  That way, they will know for sure that they got the right one ("look for the big orange mark on the center").   Maybe offer a cash or prize reward if they get the job done.        

Edited September 14, 2019 by wolc123

[Doc]

Is it possible that he is in the early stages of rabies? I have read of cases of rabies in deer.

[Lawdwaz]

1 minute ago, Doc said:

Is it possible that he is in the early stages of rabies? I have read of cases of rabies in deer.

WELCOME BACK!!!!!!!!!!!

[ny hunter]

If he were to that again I would take him out in a heart beat....You might have just caught him in a mood..

[fasteddie]

1 hour ago, Doc said:

Is it possible that he is in the early stages of rabies? I have read of cases of rabies in deer.

Holy crap Doc . You're alive and well , I hope . Glad to see you aboard again ! 

[Core]

13 hours ago, Steuben Jerry said:

I need to plan for a next encounter and come out looking a bit more in charge.

00 buck

[Core]

12 hours ago, Lawdwaz said:

A friend was kept in a stand 30 years ago in Painted Post by a buck. He had used some Tink’s 69 in a scrape below his stand.   I was getting worried about an hour after sunset when he finally came out of the woods, scared. This was (deceased now) who had hunted all over the west for a kinda of game and NEVER had anything like this happen prior. 

Was he out of arrows or ammo? Tags are irrelevant when being threatened by a wild animal.

[Steuben Jerry]

29 minutes ago, Core said:

00 buck

Ha, I don’t want to hurt him, just get him to change his opinion of me..

[Steuben Jerry]

49 minutes ago, ny hunter said:

If he were to that again I would take him out in a heart beat....You might have just caught him in a mood..

Yeah, I just interrupted his sparring match and I think he thought I was another 3-D target. He was thrashing that bear so hard, I was able to walk up to within 20 yards of him and was oblivious.

 We see him near the yard or in it all the time this summer and he’s tolerant of us or used to us. He always bolts if I’m in the yard or when he sees me in the woods. 

I walked out on the deck a while ago to where I can see the deer target, and I see no target, so he finished it off after I put it back together.

[Steuben Jerry]

2 hours ago, Doc said:

Is it possible that he is in the early stages of rabies? I have read of cases of rabies in deer.

Good to see you back!

[Steuben Jerry]

2 hours ago, NFA-ADK said:

What was the dog doing?  Tell that bitch to get to work!  lol 

He left his fightin’ antlers in the house. 

[Robhuntandfish]

3 minutes ago, Steuben Jerry said:

He left his fightin’ antlers in the house. 

Release the dog!  He looks tough 

[crappyice]

Two words...CWD confirmed!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Steuben Jerry]

Did a little brush hogging yesterday afternoon and when I came back to the house, he was standing just off the trail nearby the targets. I drove within 15 feet of him. He was acting a bit skittish at least and trotted off just as I passed by him.

He’s a cute little buck, can’t be more than 80-90 lbs. seems bold as a 3 year old ten point though.

[UpStateRedNeck]

You might want to consider throwing an M80 or something in his direction.  More for his safety than yours.  If he stats this unafraid of people he's going to wind up in somebody's freezer before too long.

[grampy]

On 9/14/2019 at 8:11 AM, Doc said:

Is it possible that he is in the early stages of rabies? I have read of cases of rabies in deer.

Welcome back Doc! Missed you around here!

[Buckstopshere]

A few years back on a property I hunt was a bully of a spike buck I called Napoleon Bonaparte. The rascal would run decent bucks out of the area. I have trail cam photos of him, and saw/heard him from a stand a few times. He would snort, grunt and chase the other bucks...and some of them were wide racked older deer. At first I thought he was rutting behind does. Nope. He was just a bully.  Here's 

Shooting Napoleon and other junkyard bucks

          Some of us have a tendency to anthropomorphize when it comes to deer hunting as we try to make sense of the behavioral rhythms of the mysterious whitetail. 

         Anthropomorphize is a long word for those moments when we define our experiences by placing human feelings and emotions on animal actions.

         These days it's fashionable to believe that animals have thoughts and feelings as we humans do. The Disney/Pixar universe of cartoons has helped turn fantasy into reality for the multitudes. 

         Let me elaborate.

         In order to attract deer, specifically bucks to a couple of small hunting properties, I came up with a new idea. Well, kind of new, but only in the application. 

         By studying and musing about other ungulates and their breeding patterns, all with an eye on understanding whitetails, the concept of the lek kept surfacing. 

         A lek is a very short word for a complex set of male pre-mating behaviors at a special or particular place or locus. What does a lek have to do with whitetail scrape making? 

         After having experimented with whitetail scrapes and mobile licking branches for many years (since 2007) and mock scrapes for many years before that, I attempted to create a "whitetail lek.' By physically moving overhanging branches from scrapes outside the specific area and zip-tying them to a number of trees and branches on a small hunting property this season.

         This experiment would endeavor to create a huge vortex of buck and doe breeding pheromones on the licking branches, and all natural. Theoretically, bucks and does from all over the area would be drawn in like honey bees to a full bloom clover plot.

         I tried my best to overwhelm the specific bucks and does on my two small properties with scent from a multitude of scrapes and licking branches from surrounding towns all over the southern part of my county. 

         This attempt at creating an artificial whitetail lek worked surprisingly well to say the least, as far as attracting bucks and does during the daytime and of course, mostly at night to this hotspot.          Truly, the scrape cluster received an amazing amount of attention, all duly recorded on a series of trail cameras. And it was the gift that kept giving. As more and more bucks and does came in, leaving their scent, it exponentially increased the whitetail traffic. 

         That is, it seemed to work well until a behavioral glitch or trait manifested itself. 

         And this is where the anthropomorphizing comes in. 

         The whitetail lek, that inordinately held so much attraction for both bucks and does, and if I may say so, unnaturally and unforeseen, tended to concentrate wild whitetails into these two hunting properties... into small areas. And as with human beings, the most aggressive, pugnacious, and confrontational tended to take over. 

         In both cases the culprits, the perps that disrupted the plan were 2.5 year-old, (or possibly older) spike and fork-horn bucks. 

         It may seem counterintuitive in the whitetail world, but sometimes the smaller package wins.

         Two spike bucks, and one four-pointer, were meaner than junkyard dogs. 

         As soon as another buck came into the scrape cluster or lek, no matter the size, the spikes would attack and drive the newcomer away. 

         And those driven away were sometimes dandy six and eight pointers!

         These larger racked bucks were evidently lovers not fighters.

         How can this be? We have always been led to believe the buck with the larger rack is always the superior animal. But like they say, "it ain't the size of the dog in the fight, but the size of the fight in the dog."

         Whitetail researchers continually note that smaller and younger, more bold and feisty bucks drive older, larger racked animals away when the rut is on. The smaller buck actually dominates the larger bucks at times. And new DNA studies confirm that spike bucks are fathering as many as 25% of the fawns!

         So what do we do about these "junkyard bucks?" Well, I came to the conclusion to shoot them and allow the six- and eight-pointers to live another day. 

         Studies have born out the fact that spikes and forks as 2.5 year olds will grow decent racks in time. 

         But, it is hard to argue that a 2.5 year-old eight point may be a finer animal to let live to go on and create a much better specimen the following year. Since one of them is going in the freezer, and I already have a garage wall full of small eight pointers, the big mean spike I called Napoleon, took the permanent dirt nap.

         Of course the reason he was called Napoleon was because of his willingness to fight despite his stature. Most of us probably have known people who enjoy fighting. I remember an old friend of mine back in the day who couldn't wait to pick a barroom fight with bigger guys, no matter how large or tough. A little liquid fuel only fired him up more. We define these spike's behavioral syndrome as "the Napoleon Complex."

         But in reality, the bottom line to all this is, if you want to keep good bucks around your hunting property, make sure that you do not implement the simplistic notion that all spike and fork horns should be passed up because in fact some, may be "Napoleons" and are driving your shyer, bigger racked bucks away.

         And in conclusion, passing on feisty sub-par racked bucks may be one more reason why we are not seeing the bucks we expect and one more reason to save the little eight-pointer for another day next season by putting a tag on your Napoleon. 

 

Oak Duke/Wellsville, NY

 

         

         

           

[NFA-ADK]

These are what I like to call real dominant bucks, does not matter the size.  Simply put when two of them meet which is usually rare this is when you get those knock down tooth and claw fights where one of them usually dies if not both of them when evenly matched. 

That would be a type of dominant buck that would actually respond to snorts and threats like a roar when calling.  Deer and Deer Hunting had a video about a spike buck like this that would challenge the larger bucks on the properly, cool stuff.  See if I can find it online.  

This only shows a preview, one of the twin fawn bucks was very aggressive even challenging adult bucks to the point where Charlie was afraid he might get killed. 

Cool episode!