Every year
giant whitetails are taken in our area that would rival some of the best in
North America. However, Northwestern Ontario can be one of the most challenging
places to hunt big game. The weather is usually consistently cold which makes
sitting in a stand all day a bit of a chore. Walking ridges, logging cuts, and
still hunting can be very effective if you find the right area but the density
of the woods and underbrush can limit your visibility to virtually nothing (it’s
no wonder the gun of choice for all the old-timers was an open sight 30-30). Most
of what I hunt is public land so pressure from other hunters can be a little
disheartening from time to time but I strongly believe that if you have a
little bit of ambition you can get into some prime areas with little to no pressure.
For me the
biggest challenge I have faced this year is the excessive population of timber
wolves. Prior to three years ago I could probably count on one hand the number
of wolves I had seen in the wild. In the past three years I have seen well over
ten times that. Two weeks ago I picked up one of my trail cams from one of my
better deer areas. It hadn’t checked it for a couple of weeks so I was pretty anxious
to get it home and see what was on it. Within the first few pictures I had a
great buck stroll by but shortly after that my camera picked up nothing but
wolves. The wolves moved in and there was literally no deer moving through my
area. Personally I think wolves are truly amazing animals but, when you’re a deer
hunter, it’s really disheartening to see them move into your prime hunting
ground.
Yesterday morning I worked my way back to that
same stand just as the sun was coming up. The whole way I tried to remain
optimistic about seeing the buck that crossed my trail cam over 4 weeks ago but
my optimism was shattered on the walk into my stand when I heard a pack of
wolves howling. They sounded close so I slowed down hoping to get into my stand
without spooking them and hoping that one wold cross my sights but none of them
did. For a minute I thought about getting out of my stand and going home, thinking
that the wolves had spooked off any chance I had a seeing the buck, but my stubbornness
prevailed. I picked up my rattle bag and went to work smashing the antlers
together as hard as I could. I repeated my rattle about every 45 minutes.
Around 9am I had just set down the rattle bag when I caught my first glimpse of
movement along the tree line about 120 yards in front of me. For a minute I couldn’t
make out whether it was that buck I was looking for or not, but as soon as it
picked up its head there was no doubt. He cut across in front of me never
getting any closer than 120 yards. My heart was racing and I was finding a hard
time finding a good shot as he moved just along the edge of the tree line. I
was running out of real estate when I finally found my shot. I squeezed the
trigger and tried to watch the deer as my recoil bucked by eyesight. I waited a
long ten minutes, got down from my perch, and walked over to where the deer was
when I shot. I tracked him for 50 yards before I found him. It was a clean shot
and easy part was over. Getting him out was a chore to say the least but it all
was worth it. Even with a low deer population there are still lots of big ones
out there. They just might take a little hard work to get at.
