Spent Saturday and part of Sunday in Young and Archer counties helping out with a couple of Youth hunts.

Ended up by the time I left, with one young man killing a 9 point southwest of Olney, on Saturday morning.

I am waiting to hear back from the outfitter as to the age of the deer.

He thinks it is only 2.5, and I believe it is an older animal 3.5 to 4.5, maybe older.

I am hoping in a way, that the outfitter is right, because if I am right, it just gives me a little more ammunition as to why I don't feel that the AR's are going to improve things in the long run.

This animal, while having 9 points, only had an 11 inch if that much inside spread.

If it was a younger animal, then some good genetics were lost.

If it was an older animal, then that means the assumption some folks have, including myself, that such animals would be left to breed and pass along those inferior genetics, and legally could not be culled out of the herd.

On Saturday afternoon, the other young man on this hunt shoot a large older doe in Archer county.

I came home Sunday after the morning hunt, neither of the hunters got anything.

The one I had with me had a chance at a management buck, but just could not get set up with a shot he felt comfotable taking.

I had him on a small, probably 2.5 six pointer, that the left antler was only about 1/2, maybe 2/3's the size of the right antler, it was a readily apparent size difference between the two and I felt that it will probably never develope properly and the animal will always have an imbalanced rack.

Whetehr the difference is due to genetics or not I don't know, I do know that the animals on that property have access to protein year round.

The one we were looking at was in a group of six bucks, all appeared to bne 1.5 to 2.5 years old, 3 branch antlered bucks, 3 spikes.

Have not heard how things went Sunday afternoon, but this was the first deer for these two young men and they both did a good job and them and their Dad's had a great time.

It's unfortunate the youth weekend comes at a time when the deer have been hunted for months and are prone to move more nocturnally but fortunately for my son some deer were still out before sundown. Saturday evening he spooked the first three deer that came in, 2 does and a button buck. Just as the sunset though a group of three bucks came in including a 2.5 year old with no brow tines and he was able to make a nice 75 yard double lung shot with my Knight muzzle loader. He was able to follow the ample blood trail the 50 yards or so to find the buck. While no monster it was IMO a nice deer to take from the herd and at the same time a real nice deer for a 13 year old youth. It was the 10th deer he has taken since he was 8 and he was pretty happy. I was proud of his ability to pick up the blood trail, find the blood even with the failing light and the red dirt with out the help of his old dad. I'll post a pick later.

Congratulations to you and your son, sounds like he did a great job and you all made some life long memories.