I knew my time was getting short.  The wind had changed direction right after my son William had managed to take a nice 10 point on the second morning of our hunt, during an all too-brief cold snap.  That afternoon we had seen a mature freak horn chasing does but didn't get him.  On the way out we had stopped at the entrance gate to phone home (the only place where there's cell coverage) and managed to barely see him again in fading light, chasing does in anothe pasture.  We figured we'd help the landowner get this deer off his place and hunt there the next morning - with the weather the way it was activity was going to be way down and we didn't want this thing breeding anymore.  Besides, our freezer was empty and even with William's buck, venison seems to disappear rather quickly around our place.

Next morning had us facing into a 20-30 mile per hour wind.  It wasn't that cold but with that much wind and increasing humidity it wasn't a day at the beach either, even with insulated camo.  We'd managed to find a reasonable place to sit, and after the seemingly endless fine tuning of our location due to the ever-present cacti and a bad case of 'I think we can see a little better over there' waffling, we finally settled-in.  Well, all we saw what looked like a flash of horn and hide real early but sunrise showed us nothing - no doe, no freak horn, nada.

With all our good intentions and thoughts of an easy hunt deflated we finally packed it up and started a slow half mile walk back to camp.  We had made it out to the main road when something caught my eye up ahead.  Out of nowhere three doe skittered off the little hill off to the left of us about 125 yards ahead.  We froze, but they had already seen us.  We felt pretty certain they had just seen motion so William and I sat down slowly on the road (didn't have to worry about sitting on cactus at least), hoping our camo and time would allow them to calm down.  If they had been closer no way would this have worked.  After about 5 minutes though they had had enough and bounced away.  Interestingly they didn't blow and one of them looked over her shoulder.  So, we stayed still. 

Sure enough, there was another group.  I had my binoculars up by then but really didn't need them to see a big-bodied buck with the does.  And, while they were still a little cautious from the others running away they were still moving in to feed and I was able to get my gun up.  Shooting lanes were sparse where they were feeding but over the next 30 seconds or so I was able to get enough of a look to see that the buck was a pretty heavy 8 pointer.  What's more, he stood broadside and gave me a perfect shot.

Now, I'd like to tell you that it was over in a few seconds - one big 'bang', a little smoke, and a short stroll over to a very dead buck.  But, for some reason yours truly got a case of the 'second guesses'.   When I first saw him he looked good, not great...but the more I tried to look at him the more questions I had.  If any of you have experienced this before a flood of 'what ifs' go through your mind.  Its only the second day of a 5 day hunt...its the rut and there might be something better out there...but the weather isn't going to be any good and activity could drop even further...did I REALLY get a good enough look at him?  Weren't his horns more over the ears than that?  Etc, etc. Finally (this entire episode took about 1-2 minutes max) the buck ended all doubt and disappeared into the brush. 

We never saw him again.  In fact, I didn't see another shootable buck the rest of the trip because sure enough the weather turned lousy and stayed that way.  To make things worse the landowner called me after I got back to ask me if I'd seen the 20" 8 point (with a drop tine no less) his friend saw out on the same ranch in a different part of the same pasture.  Ouch!  Since it was seen almost a mile from where I saw this one I don't think it was the deer I saw...surely I could have differentiated an 17-18" buck from a 20" buck right?  In heavy cover...at 125 yards...only a brief look...yeah...sure.  

They say if a buck's not big enough at the first good look he's probably not going to grow much more while you look at him.  It was a hard choice but (I think) it was the right one.  Such as it is with hunting I guess.  But, if either one of those two get anywhere close to my crosshairs next year.......