Plenty of magazines, blogs, and writers can tell you the best way to hunt deer under any condition imaginable, including while suspended upside down from a tethered hot air balloon using a longbow and rivercane arrows while blindfolded. However, none of these so-called “experts” ever talk about how real hunters hunt real deer in the real deer woods. Until now…
A Deer Hunters Daily Timeline
4 a.m. – Alarm clock goes off. Leap from bed ready, and trip over hunting gear conveniently piled up next to the bed.
4:10 a.m. – Limp and hop into the bathroom to survey damage.
4:15 a.m. – Wonder briefly how long it will take to get Tinks #69 out of the bedroom carpet.
4:20 a.m. – Hunting buddy pulls up. Leap in truck and speed off to deer camp.
4:45 a.m. – Go back home to get deer rifle. Eventually find it under the bed because it was kicked there at 4 a.m.
4:50 a.m. – Set new land speed record getting to the deer camp.
5 a.m. – Explain to highway patrol that this is, literally, a case of life or death. Do not explain the “death” is that big buck on the trail cameras.
5:45 a.m. – Never mind unloading the truck. Leave everything in it and drive to the woods. Mentally mark the places where stuff bounces out of truck bed. Pick it up on the way back to camp.
6 a.m. – Turn on flashlight to find the glow-in-the-dark tacks in trees leading to the deer stand.
6:01 a.m. – Drop dead flashlight and start feeling trees for the first invisible tack.
6:10 a.m. – No idea where stand is, but close enough for government work. Sit on the ground in the middle of a deadfall.
6:30 a.m. – Sunrise. See stand 20 yards away. Glow-in-the-dark tacks now visible.
6:31 a.m. – Get in stand. Halfway up, the trail cam monster buck walks by, stares up, continues to stroll away.
6:32 a.m. – Evict squirrel from stand.
6:35 a.m. – Monster buck refuses to come back.
6:40 a.m. – Squirrel returns with squirrel lawyer. They threaten to sue everyone and everything, including the monster buck they saw on the other side of the bushes that were left intact specifically to provide some cover.
7 a.m. – Take out smartphone. Start playing video game “Deer Hunter: Now It’s Personal.”
7:30 a.m. – Level up. Phone makes a celebratory racket. Loud snort from below. Monster buck is not amused by the mad gamer skills and relocates to the next county without providing a forwarding address.
7:31 a.m. – Consider shooting phone. Instead, put it in a pocket.
7:45 a.m. – Squirrels return. Throw phone at squirrels. They pick it up and run off with it. Realize tree rats are stealing a $600 smartphone.
7:45:20 a.m. – Unload rifle at fleeing squirrels. Shoot phone instead.
8 a.m. – Get out of stand. Get very dead smartphone.
8:01 a.m. – Watch another buck turn into a brown blur leaving the area.
8:30 a.m. – Realize glow-in-the-dark tacks are visible during the day, but the tacks were stuck to the trees on the going-in side of the tree. No markers for how to get out. Lost.
8:31 a.m. – Reach for the smartphone to load GPS to get map. The smartphone has a .270 hole in it.
8:33 a.m. – Heavy rain.
9:45 a.m. – Find road. Stand is 50 yards off the road. Glowing tacks still visible through the downpour.
10:30 a.m. – Hunting buddy pulls up with the monster buck in the back of the truck.
10:31 a.m. – Threaten to wrap gun barrel around hunting buddy’s throat if he even thinks about saying something.
11 a.m. – Think about taking up less stressful hobby like milking cobras.
12 p.m. – Lunch
12:15 p.m. – Nap
2:00 p.m. – Repeat
