bonepicker
Very Active Member
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My 12 year old son Luke had an Oregon buck tag this year. He's hunted with me over the years but this was going to be his first tag. He tells people that he had been waiting 8 years for this hunt. 
We were able to get some time off of school and work to devote to this trip. We hunted hard the first few days and Luke passed up a few small bucks, he wanted a 4 point. On the 5th day, we finally found a decent buck with 2 other bucks, we were able to get within 100 yards of them and they had no idea we were there. I got him set up with his shooting stick and he took the shot at the biggest buck. Buck fever got the better of Luke, he had jerked the trigger and overshot, a clean miss. The buck took off and needless to say, Luke was pretty bummed. It cast a shadow on the rest of the day. The next couple days were pretty tough as well as the season was quickly coming to a close and we weren't even seeing any smaller bucks anymore. The last day before breaking camp,we decided to do one last hunt in the area near where Luke had missed a few days before. 500 yards into our hike we spotted the same group of 3 bucks again. The bigger two were sparring which allowed us to get into a great little pocket of buck brush without them seeing us. They moved perfectly toward us (the hand of God I am sure) and Luke was able to take another 100 yard shot. Again he jerked and overshot! But since the bucks didn't know where we were, they trotted even closer to us as they were trying to figure out where to run. Luke took a second shot and made a perfect vitals hit, the buck went down about 5 seconds later. Luke told me that after he missed again he "was so discouraged, I didn't have buck fever anymore, so I was able to just squeeze the trigger without jerking." He was thrilled that his hard work and patience had paid off, as you can see in the picture! Good job Luke!
And this one from another angle.
We were able to get some time off of school and work to devote to this trip. We hunted hard the first few days and Luke passed up a few small bucks, he wanted a 4 point. On the 5th day, we finally found a decent buck with 2 other bucks, we were able to get within 100 yards of them and they had no idea we were there. I got him set up with his shooting stick and he took the shot at the biggest buck. Buck fever got the better of Luke, he had jerked the trigger and overshot, a clean miss. The buck took off and needless to say, Luke was pretty bummed. It cast a shadow on the rest of the day. The next couple days were pretty tough as well as the season was quickly coming to a close and we weren't even seeing any smaller bucks anymore. The last day before breaking camp,we decided to do one last hunt in the area near where Luke had missed a few days before. 500 yards into our hike we spotted the same group of 3 bucks again. The bigger two were sparring which allowed us to get into a great little pocket of buck brush without them seeing us. They moved perfectly toward us (the hand of God I am sure) and Luke was able to take another 100 yard shot. Again he jerked and overshot! But since the bucks didn't know where we were, they trotted even closer to us as they were trying to figure out where to run. Luke took a second shot and made a perfect vitals hit, the buck went down about 5 seconds later. Luke told me that after he missed again he "was so discouraged, I didn't have buck fever anymore, so I was able to just squeeze the trigger without jerking." He was thrilled that his hard work and patience had paid off, as you can see in the picture! Good job Luke!
And this one from another angle.
