I headed out into the woods for the last day of late muzzleloader season. I was invited to hunt with my dad on private land in Harford County, MD. It was an afternoon hunt which started out slow.... In fact like paint drying slow. I didn't even see a squirrel, bird, nothing, let alone a deer. Sunset came and went and it was quickly getting dark. I was about to call it a night with just about 10 minutes of legal shooting light left when i heard a snap of a stick. I quickly looked in that direction and here comes deer around the hillside walking pretty steady. I quickly threw my muzzleloader up and got the deer in my site. Being that it was getting dark I couldn't even tell what the deer was until I had it in my scope. I quickly realized it was a decent size buck and I lined my shot up and waited on him to stop in a clearing. As soon as he stopped with just 8 legal minutes of shooting light left, I touched off and down he went.....
He however, didn't stay down long. I had taken a slightly quartering to me shot and he had fallen over where I shot him, then he got up and took off up the hill. He quickly got up close to my dad and turned to head back down the hill in an all out run, he took a shot at him while running but as it turned out missed. The deer ran back down the hill and away from both of us and then crashed down.
After about 20 minutes we got down and headed towards the last place we saw the deer. There was a decent blood trail from where I hit him and he fell over on, so finding him wasn't going to be too challenging. He only ran about 80 yards before he pilled up in some brush. However, it was 80 more yards away from the truck and up a very step hill. Man I had my work cut out for me. About 3 hours later I got him out of the woods, a great 8 point that had a big body, guessing he was around 160lbs dressed.
Here are some pictures!
