Bowhunting the late season

I was determined to get out on the last afternoon of deer season, despite a vicious winter storm that had been howling since the previous evening. High winds had done away with any thought I had of sitting in a tree stand, so I was trudging through a foot of fresh snow in search of a buck that was hunkered down and sheltering from the weather. It was nearing sunset, and after several hours of wandering the property, I’d seen only a doe and fawn bedded at the base of a small bluff. They hadn’t a clue that they were in my sights, even though I’d been within 20 metres. I already had meat in the freezer, and I was looking for a buck. The King I turned to start heading back toward the truck, which was now well over a mile away. The straightest path had me walking along a fencerow between two wide-open cut corn­fields, directly into the clawing, tearing wind and snow. I shuffled along with my head down until I reached an intersecting fence that ran off to my left. As I looked up, I caught movement 180 metres away on the far side of the field, where a small wooded valley met the field edge. Deer were streaming out of the valley and breaking into a run diagonally across the cut field in front of me. There were 23 deer in all, but once I raised my binoculars, the tenth one in line had all my attention — it was The King. That wasn’t my name for him; my hunting partner had coined it when he saw him for the first time. Four seasons earlier, I’d passed The King up as a three-and-a-half-year-old eight-pointer with antler measurements grossing about 125. At the time, he was wide open and under 20 metres away and I was at full draw, but I decided to let him grow another season. I’d hunted him every year since and taken photos and videos, but never again had he been close enough for a shot. Big buck pursuit All the deer headed to my side of the field, to a spot where the combine had spilled a bunch of corn during harvesting, at the end of the intersecting fenceline I’d just reached. Here was my chance. Staying low, I moved along the fencerow on the opposite side of the deer. The