First Shot at a Deer

One early morning, I woke with fresh excitement at 5:45. I ran upstairs and found dad in the kitchen, frying eggs. We ate quickly, then went into the porch. I pulled on my layers

and made sure I had my gear: a permanent marker wrapped in green masking tape to label shells, a little camo pack filled with ammo for my gun – a 6.5 Creedmoor I was borrowing, a keychain with a compass and whistle, and earplugs. My coat pockets were filled. I hoisted the rifle over my shoulder and checked that the safety was on, fit my orange headband over my ears, and went out into the frosty November air. I set my gun beside the passenger seat in Dad’s old 1998 GMC Sierra. I was anxious to get going, but the windshield was so frosted that we couldn’t see a thing. Soon dad came in with a big thermos filled with hot water. (for hand cleaning), his backpack, and his .30-06 rifle.

“Do you have the tags?” I asked.

“Yup.”

“Ammo?”

“Yup. You ready?” Dad grinned.

“Yeah. I can’t wait!” I grinned back.

Dad had defrost on full blast, but it was taking too long for me. After all, we should have left earlier anyways.

“What if we use the washer fluid?” I asked.

Dad ran the wipers along with fluid, and the windshield cleared up. Then we were off to scout for deer. As we crawled along the gravel roads looking out over the snowy Alberta prairie, I grabbed my binoculars from my coveralls pocket and rolled down the window. Dad drove slowly, and I watched the fields for signs of game. As we drove past my neighbors place I scanned the group of trees in the middle of the field. Last year Dad had shot a good-sized buck there, before I had gotten my hunting license. Me and my younger brother had stayed behind a pivot wheel out of the wind while dad crept toward the trees and stalked the deer. When Dad called us over after about 30 minutes, we were disappointed because we hadn’t heard a shot, only to see a whitetail buck lying at his feet. We were surprised, because the wind had prevented us from hearing the shot, and we hadn’t expected success. But that was last year. I didn’t see anything there now.

Suddenly I saw a whitetail buck and doe running across the field, away from us. We circled around to the driveway and got out. I shoved in my earplugs and stretched my headband over them. I loaded my gun, but kept the safety on. Dad cut the engine and sent an excited grin my way. I smiled and quietly closed the passenger door. Ahead of us was a hill near a canal, to my left. We planned to climb the hill and shoot from the top: where a barbed wire fence hid us from the deer’s sight. My heart raced excitedly. When we reach the hill, I stayed low, lay down by the fence, and rested my gun on our backpack. The two whitetails were about 300-400 yards away, one up and one bedded down, though neither noticed us yet. Dad lay down a few feet away, beside me. I glanced his way and he gave me an encouraging smile. I flicked off the safety and put my eye to the scope. I had tags for a whitetail buck and a whitetail doe, so I could shoot either. During target practice back home, I could hit near bullseye from 100 yards. This was much farther than that. My heart was beating hard. I lined up the standing deer in my scope and aimed carefully. I slowly pulled the trigger. As soon as the shot went off, I looked up in excitement. Both deer were up and staring. I had missed. Dad shot once,

and I reloaded my gun and tried to find the deer in my scope, but they were now running with their tails up. When they stopped to look back I tried to shoot, but the snow and grass prevented me from getting a clear view. Dad shot once more, and missed. I watched the deer run into the trees before looking up from my scope. I was disappointed, and realized I had forgotten to aim higher than the target. When you shoot from that far away, you need to shoot higher because the bullet will go down a bit. Dad grinned. “Good try.” He said. I smiled. Oh well.  I guess there’s always next time. I searched for my shell in the snow and finally found it. Dad shouldered the backpack and his rifle, and we started walking back to the truck. Once inside the truck again with the guns unloaded, I took the marker from my pocket and unwrapped a length of tape. I wrapped that around my shell, and labeled it first shot at a deer, 3-400 yds, 6.5 Creedmoor, in very messy handwriting, since dad had started driving. When hunting season ended we still hadn’t gotten anything. We’ll have to retry next year, which is only in about a month!