Thomas Mlsna

Harvest Story: After filling an antelope and mule deer tag in WY, both spot and stalk, public land DIY hunts, I returned home and shifted gears to whitetails on our family farm, a near-1,000 cow dairy farm. While top-dressing the Fall Feast brassica food plots with cereal rye, I pulled cards on the cameras monitoring those food sources and one travel corridor that intersected with the road to those plots. The intel told me my target buck was in the area and my gut told me he was hitting the food plots more than the cameras revealed. Planning for the cold front to promote early movement, and the wind direction to dictate a bedding location, I knew I had to hunt a plot that didn’t have a stand or blind due to poor accessibility; deer bed all around it. I decided I would have to slip into a position and set up in the adjacent corn field, and never leave cover, and that I did. My first sit yielded many deer, and I was able to watch my target buck feed for nearly an hour, while never offering me a high percentage shot. At dusk, I was able to slip out the way I came, through the corn field, without alerting the deer to my presence. I waited 2 days for the same wind direction and the buck showed up again, feeding on apples and nutrient rich food plot. I waited in the shadows of the corn, as still as possible to not break the silence of the setting. Deer were so close that wind carried the scent of their salad to me, along with the sound of them tearing off the leaves and chewing them up. When the buck finally stepped into my window carved within the row of corn, and no does were paying attention to my location, I decided it was time. I grabbed a range measurement on the buck as he turned broadside, adjusted my single pin sight , stood up, drew back, settled in and addressed my trigger. With my pin floating about 1/3 of the way up his armpit, my back tensed up and the trigger broke the silence in the valley. The buck went down immediately, never leaving the plot.