ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, November 10, 1996 TAG: 9611120025
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C-13 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: OUTDOORS
SOURCE: BILL COCHRAN
At 100 yards, it was a long shot for a traditional, open-sighted muzzleloading rifle, but Glenn Gardner figured it was a now or never situation.
The buck he watched was a huge one, its antlers thick and tall, its body beefy, the kind every hunter hopes to see at least once in a lifetime.
Gardner, 26, had gotten into his stand on a Giles County mountainside before daylight. He had used some blowdowns for a blind where mature white oaks and red oaks on a flat half way up a ridge were casting their fruit to the ground.
He and his dad, Lew, both from Narrows, had scouted the area a few weeks earlier and determined it was an ideal spot for turkeys and deer. On opening day of the turkey season, Gardner killed a turkey. He also spotted a half-dozen trees that had been horned and several buck scrapes in the leaves along the imprint of an old logging road leading to the flat. He figured it was the place to be Monday, when the muzzleloading deer season opened.
``I heard a gang of turkeys come off the roost that morning,'' he said. ``I almost got up to start toward them with the muzzleloader. I love to turkey hunt.''
The swoosh of wings and the chatter of turkeys 150 yards away were like a magnet pulling on Gardner, but he didn't move.
``I told myself, `I've already killed a turkey, so I am going to sit here and see what I can do with the deer.'''
About 9 a.m. a doe approached, moving fast, pausing occasionally to look back over her shoulder. She came through the mature woods, penetrated a little thicket and passed within 35 yards of Gardner's stand. At that distance, Gardner could see she was breathing so hard that her tongue was hanging out.
``She didn't appear to be spoked by another hunter,'' he said. ``She was just moving pretty good.''
A couple hundred yards behind her, Gardner spotted a second deer. There was no question that it was much bigger than the first, and it was following the same trail, with its head down, like a tracking dog.
``When I finally saw its rack, I knew it was really big,'' said Gardner. ``He was in some brush and when he came through the brush he was almost pushing brush down with his rack, like it was a snowplow.''
The buck appeared to be in full rut and the doe obviously wanted nothing to do with him.
``He came up within about 100 yards of me and he stopped and started the other way,'' Gardner said. ``I could see the rack and I got nervous. This was the biggest deer I'd ever seen in the woods, and I have hunted all my life. When he took about three steps in the other direction, I said, `Well, I'm going to try this deer. He is a long way away, but I am going to try him.'''
Gardner's shot missed. When the smoke cleared, he expected to see the buck's white tail bounding through the oaks, but the deer just stood there.
``He acted like I hadn't pulled the trigger,'' said Gardner.
The buck continued to sniff the ground and started making a circle, the ardor of the rut apparently making him oblivious to Gardner and the boom of his gun.
``I guess what he had done was lose the scent of the doe for a second. When he made about half of a circle he picked up that scent and started coming straight for me, where the doe had been.''
Gardner frantically began reloading his rifle.
``I didn't measure powder or anything. I poured enough powder in my barrel to probably kill something. I didn't get the chance to seat the bullet. I pushed it down as far as I could and let it go. Everything happened so fast. By the time I got a cap on the gun he walked up within 35 yards of me. He never looked up.''
The second shot dropped the buck, which had 8 points and a 21-inch outside spread, making it one of the best of the black-powder season to show up in the busy Blacksburg taxidermist shop of Dewayne Linkous.
LENGTH: Medium: 73 linesby CNB