Monday morning my youngest sealed the deal on his first real buck other than spikes and does. This animal has a huge significance for our family and means a ton us. Over 2.5 years ago we had worked out a trade with a guide for filling feeders,building fence,etc in exchange for the opportunity to hunt on some ranches in far West Texas. I had always dreamed of giving my two boys a more rural life. Hunting for years has not been very accessible for us. We did what we could because ranching and the outdoors have always been close to my heart. So I thought trading our time with good hard work in the outdoors was a win win situation. However we were never able to collect on the deal we had made.
http://www.texashuntingforum.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/3257957/1
We were involved in a horrific rolloever accident. We were fortunate to make it out of it alive. My oldest broke his femur in two. His upper arm had a compound open fracture that punctured through his flesh. He also broke his orbit and has tremendous scaring. Titanium rod in his leg and screws in both the leg and arm. He also lost his miniscus in his knee. After 7 surgeries he is doing better for a young man of 20 but lives with chronic pain. My youngest broke his arm went through two surgeries but had the least of all our our injuries besides scaring and PTSD. I broke my back in 3 places and can still pull my own but also live with pretty much constant pain. Well enough of the bad stuff. Spring forward to Monday of this last week. My boys/young men never wanting to be unfair decided we'd draw straws to see who hunted blinds/feeders we had setup up back in Sept. Sunday I hunted the only bow blind and my oldest hunted a tank blind with my youngest hunting a tripod setup up on a feeder on the edge of a pasture bordered by thick post oaks. None of us saw a thing all day. It had just rained a ton the day before and we had tons of sign. Cameras showed at least 8-10 bucks and only a handful of does. Sunday night the boys insisted we again draw straws(use a random number generator app my son has) to determine what blinds we hunt. I won the right to choose and the obvious choice was our best blind/feeder at the tank. I had a feeling Monday something just might show up so I made my youngest hunt it since my oldest had already done so. Sitting in the bow blind in the still somewhat dark morning I was startled by the crack of a rifle at 8:00 a.m. Being only a quarter of a mile away or so I knew it came from our property. I texted him and he said he had a nice buck down. Excited and wanting to share with him the whole experience I left off hunting and went to help my son out with his deer. I was thrilled and humbled by his harvest. The icing on the cake........he signed the tag under landowner with his own name! Hunted all the rest of the week until Saturday and never saw anything other than a small 4pt that my oldest son rightfully let walk. Now to get his older brother one as well.

Congrats.

Great buck and great write up!!! Sure glad you all have had an oppurtunity to heal and what better way than hunting your own land and celebrating. Prayers for continued healing for you and your family

Great buck and story

Well it sounds as if you all are blessed to still be with us. Great job and story. It certainly lends perspective to all of us. Keep up the good work and take care amigo!! Happy holidays and a great buck.

Really nice write up

Great story great buck! Congrats to all.

Congrats!

Congrats!

Well done!

Nicely done.

Awesome! Thanks for sharing!

Great!

Nice buck

Great buck and story!

Nice story and good deer.

Very cool

Congrats!

Great buck.

Thats awesome man! Congrats!!!!