Summer Picture of the Dropster
Well one weekend down and one to go! This hunting trip is one I look forward to every year; I get to hunt with some of my best friends. I have been hunting with this group of shotgun hunters for the last eight years. The group has always been a small group by Iowa Shotgun standards, we end up with anywhere from 4 to 8 hunters. Most of us are bow hunters but take the opportunity to hunt the second season of Iowa shotgun season.
I got there the night before to hang out, catch up and share old times, and tell a few funny stories about each other. All of the “remember whens”… and “I can’t believe that happened”. All of the memories that seem to get brought up this time of year, seem like a blooper reel at times. We ended up looking at trail cam pictures by the end of the night seeing what was still around, sure to keep all of us up thinking about some of the monster bucks that roam these parts. Two such bucks we believed to be alive and in the area are two of the hitlist bucks- Dropster and the 9-11 buck. Both are bucks that the landowner had seen while bow hunting earlier in the year.
Summer Picture of the 9-11 Buck
Our hunts start off the same every day we always hunt this same area as the first hunt of the morning. Oddly enough it isn’t in the area we have any trail cams but is known to produce tag filling opportunities. We saw a few deer but most busted out in areas we didn’t have any hunters and we had one small six pointer come by. It was on to the next hunt and so on throughout the day. We had one doe to show for our efforts, but we all agreed we had seen good numbers of deer but we hadn’t got many shot opportunities and when we had as a group we hadn’t capitalized on them. Yep we seemed to be missing, it was a little bit of a shock even our resident dead eye had missed a 60 yard standing broadside shot. I had yet to pull the trigger that day on a deer.
We had weather coming in for the night and we awoke to a fresh inch on the ground and it was still coming down. Again it was back to the same area we hunted first thing the morning before. A few minutes in we had does and fawns running by and just behind them came a great looking buck. He looked to be a 10 point in the 150 class range. He came by at about 40 yards and I was ready, I had an opening I was sure he was heading for. As he passed through the opening I aimed and shot. I had missed he just came going the same as he had. I was bummed but the hunt wasn’t over so I stayed put.
I saw more deer coming through the woods, and then I spotted a buck. He was at about 80 yards and heading my way. When he got to 60 yards he popped his head up and looked right at me. I’m sure he could see me setting at the base of a big oak tree. He milled around at 60 yards and I was taking a closer look at him. I was trying to make up my mind if I wanted to fill a tag on this buck. Was he an 8 or a 10? Just then he ran in to about 40 yards and I could see he was a 10 point 140 B&C buck. He was standing broadside and 40 yards I put but sights on him and dropped him. It is my biggest gun deer to date. I have killed a few bigger with a bow. I was happy when I got to him, he was almost perfect 10. He had one G4 that looked to be smaller than the other but the rest look spot on. I put the tape to him and came up with a green gross score of 140 7/8, with a net of 138 2/8. This year has been a great one for me here in Iowa, I have bested by biggest bow buck scoring on a 160+ 10 point with my bow and now a near perfect 10 with a gun. I’m grateful to the people who I shared this hunt with and the landowners who allow me to hunt their land. I am truly blessed to have great friends.
