[zachaliles]

taken on opening day in upstate new york. from stand to buck was 150M(paced) using a rem 700 .223 with federal premium vital shock 55Gr barnes TSX. dropped on the spot. my father in law is doing up a euro mount for me. i couldnt justify spending $400 on a shoulder mount for him, but he was just nice enough i couldnt just get rid of the rack. and by the way, this is my first "nice" buck. very symmetrical 8 pointer. hanging weight was 110.

as a side note, my brother in law took a buck the same morning from the same stand at about the same spot with a muzzle loader. my father in law aged him and said hes a 2.5 year old buck. now that i got him out of the way, i can start looking for a bigger trophy. even though this guy isnt huge, hes still a trophy to me, and will always be my first good buck.

 

[kdub]

Congrats on the nice buck.

Sounds like you've found the super highway of deer trails!

 

[broom_jm]

Great work on tagging your first quality buck!

Next time, consider taking a few extra minutes to stage your photos with a natural backdrop and the buck in a less awkward position. It has become important to me, as the years pass, to get my pictures done before the messy work begins. Those photos will bring back memories for decades to come, so the more you do to make the pictures represent the hunt, instead of the gutting process, the more you will enjoy viewing and sharing them.

Again, congratulations on your first big buck!

 

[zachaliles]

it was kind of a warm day, about 50 degrees by the time i shot him, so i wanted to get it gutted as quickly as possible so as not to ruin any meat. and where you see him on the ground is where he was shot. he didnt go anywhere. the only other scenery are the trees another 50M off on the edge of the feild. we were hunting over a cut bean feild. the stand i was in is about 50M off the feild in the wood line, the tree line on the other side is about 200M from my stand. but i get what youre saying. i was just glad to take a nice buck, and wasnt really thinking about the picture. i still get a good feeling looking at the picture. ill keep it in mind for next year. one thing i regret is not having my rifle in the picture. would have been nice to have it in there. oh well, hindsights 20/20 right?

and yes, that stand is where you sit if you want to fill your tags. im not super familiar with that feild, and i was wondering why everyone was fighting over that stand the night before. we do what we refer to as the "war council" or the "war tribunal" the night prior to opening day and go over where everyone will be, where we meet, what time and hand out the radios. we use private channel radios to stay in contact all day. makes life so easy. anyway, the stand is located at the end of the feild and to the left is a little gully where deer like to come through. a doe came running fast up through that gully, i wanted to stop her to get meat in the freezer. as soon as i got my grunt tube up, out comes this guy, so i grunted and he stopped. big mistake. about the same thing happened to my brother in law, except there was no doe in his story. mine was shot with a .223, his was shot with a muzzle loader. the one i gave him for a wedding gift.

 

[mattsbox99]

I won't rag on you about the photo, you did good work. Your first priority is making sure the animal is taken care of, not what somebody else thinks on the internet about your photography. You have all the time in the world to handle the photography after the animal is taken care of. Besides, you didn't work that hard to take a pretty picture, you did it to harvest a great whitetail and enjoy the prosperity of the land.

 

[BarkBuster20]

I won't rag on you about the photo, you did good work. Your first priority is making sure the animal is taken care of, not what somebody else thinks on the internet about your photography. You have all the time in the world to handle the photography after the animal is taken care of. Besides, you didn't work that hard to take a pretty picture, you did it to harvest a great whitetail and enjoy the prosperity of the land.

couldnt agree more.


Zachaliles, where was your bullet placement, and what type of bullet performance did you get? Congrats on a nice buck.

 

[broom_jm]

If it sounded like I was ragging on him, I apologize. From my perspective, there is no need to rush the job of field dressing the deer. It's worth the extra time involved to drag the deer to a nice backdrop, position it in a natural position and take 15 or 20 minutes to get a bunch of quality photographs. You only get a nice deer once in a while, so why not go the extra mile and get your pictures before there is a gut pile and a bunch of blood all over the place? Heck, I take pictures throughout the process, but the ones I really treasure are the ones where the deer looks just as it did when I pulled the trigger.

Zach, that's a nice 8-pointer and if it seemed like I was trying to rain on your parade, I sincerely apologize. You have every right to be proud of that deer...I know I would be!

 

[41 Mag]

Congrats on a nice buck.

 

[Shawn Crea]

Nice buck zach, and congrats. Bet it eats well!

 

[BarkBuster20]

If it sounded like I was ragging on him, I apologize. From my perspective, there is no need to rush the job of field dressing the deer. It's worth the extra time involved to drag the deer to a nice backdrop, position it in a natural position and take 15 or 20 minutes to get a bunch of quality photographs. You only get a nice deer once in a while, so why not go the extra mile and get your pictures before there is a gut pile and a bunch of blood all over the place? Heck, I take pictures throughout the process, but the ones I really treasure are the ones where the deer looks just as it did when I pulled the trigger.

Zach, that's a nice 8-pointer and if it seemed like I was trying to rain on your parade, I sincerely apologize. You have every right to be proud of that deer...I know I would be!

Its just a matter of preference, if its under 30 degrees i might prolong the gutting till i got a few good pics on a nice buck, but depending on the circumstances 90% of the time i just gut it, and am happy if i get a half decent pic later. I dont have a tripod and timer on my camera either, and usually hunt alone, but i do usually try getting a pic of my elk with my rifle with my phone before any cutting has been done.

I know one thing for sure, id be more upset if i let the meat taint than if i missed out on some clean photos, sometimes better to be safe then sorry. Understand where your coming from too, though. IMO the rack alone is a good memory of the hunt.

 

[mattsbox99]

My last one slid right into a nice photo!

Around here, passing around hunting pictures is akin to passing around pictures of the kids, although I can assure you that I've seen way more pictures of deer than kids on my coworkers phones and on their desks.

---

My priority is the animal, I don't want to feel like I am glorifying anything other than the hunt. The hunt involves gutting, blood, and sometimes a poor shot. I hate that last part more than anything, but its happened and I think about it before I pull the trigger.

Cleaning the animal has never bothered me, I get right on it and get the job done quickly. My brother and one friend take their sweet time, and usually I have to finish for them. One year I went to get the truck, a mile away, and I came back on my friend hadn't even gotten started yet. I took charge of that siuation.

 

[zachaliles]

well, to say the least a decent picture was the last thing on my mind. i was actually in the process of getting ready to drag it to the truck when my father in law stopped me to take the picture. next year ill think about it more. but like i said, i wanted to get it gutted quick because it had warmed up pretty quickly. but, next years buck will hopefully be taken with a bow. i need to take the bow hunters safety course before that though. ill still post picture here even though it wont be a rifle that takes it... thanks for all the replies guys.

 

[Jakeway]

You done good! Nice looking buck.

 

[zachaliles]

oh and broom, i dont look at it as raggin, just constructive criticism. and you did bring up a good point.