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I should start by saying he has been hard after a deer for 3 years now. He's hunted with me for more than a few years now, but only been old enough to have his own tag for 3 years now. The last two years he has he has hunted both Bow and Firearms season, and here in Kansas that covers September through January, but to no avail. He's gotten a few bow shots off in the last couple of years but hasn't been able to make it all come together. But this afternoon he made it all work, he walked down to the north end of our property with his .270 Winchester Model 70(pre-64) it's a hand me down it was my fathers, then mine and I have passed it on to him. All of us have taken our first deer with this rifle and someday I expect he will pass it on to his own kid. Firearms season opened a couple days ago and we have been out morning and evening pretty much everyday, he's gotten pretty familiar with the deers patterns since he's been down there 4-6 days a week for most of bow season. So tonight he went down and sat at the end of the hedge row in an opening were the trees open up in the fence line. The spot looks out on both the pasture to the east and the field to the west as well as being able to see into the trees on the north end of our property. It a good location and give a good field of view and clean shooting area for at least 100 yards in 3 directions. We had seen the deer coming out of the field to the southwest and heading either straight north or heading northeast into the trees the last couple of days. So he sat down on a little portable 3 leg stool facing the field expecting them to come across as they had the last few evenings. This evening though this buck decided to come out of the trees and across the pasture behind him.

He caught the movement out of the corner of his eye, and thankfully all the practice and years of sitting with Dad watching deer, he didn't get over excited. He waited till the deer looked away and then turned slightly in his stool, he had to perform this wait and turn move a couple times, when the deer would look away. But his patience paid off, he got turned enough without spooking him to get his rifle up and clear of the grass and tree he was sitting in. He waited a little bit hoping the deer would turn and present a better shot, but it was pretty well locked onto him, eye's intent ears up. So he decided it was now or never. The shot was beautiful it went in right were the esophagus enter the ribcage and exited just to the side of the spine 5 ribs back. The deer dropped right in it's tracks. He did all the gutting and the skinning himself with only a very slight assistance from me. The shot was about 55 paces, I have almost a 36" step so probably about 53-54 yards. He was using hand loads 150gr Nosler Partitions, they aren't hot but are very accurate in this rifle. The only oddity was it wasn't a through and through, this is the first time I have recovered a partition on a deer, the bullet was right beneath the skin resting just off to the side of the spine. Near as I can tell after we got it skinned, the bullet didn't hit any bone, just went through soft tissue, the base is intact, the upper portion of lead is missing, and the mushroom is folded almost completely around the base. I'm so very proud of him tonight, my son the great hunter, he did everything right today, he reacted in a cool calm manner and didn't spook his game.

In the second picture you can see the far tree line that is the west edge of our property, he was sitting on the close fence line off to the south(Left) in the picture, there are a couple place in the fence that are dense brush, and he was sitting at the end of one of the brush areas were the fence separates the pasture from the field.

I'm so proud of him.

Colin

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