Shotgun Season 05

I don't exactly remember what it was that went wrong with the 2005 deer hunt in NJ. All that i do remember is that I don't have many pictures of deer with that year on them.

It might have had something to do with shooting 4 good sized deer out of our primary hunting grounds the year earlier.

I did get my deer that year. I had to go to Missouri to get it, and it wasn't much to write home about.





Missouri hunting season is for 10 days in November. It is a rifle season, allowing only shotguns with the use of slugs.

That is what i shot this deer with....20 gauge slugs. I shot him on the last day of trip, after not seeing any deer the whole week.

I shot him from this bluff.




The details of the rest of the 05 season are fuzzy.

One deer was killed in our piece. A five pointer was Shot by my dads buddy Elmer.





My buddy Bobby Atkinson did end up killing a nice 9 pointer in his peice that year.




This was the biggest deer we got that year. We found it freshly killed on buck Rd.






That pretty much wrapped up the 05 season. Deer were killed, just not by us.

Shotgun & Muzzle Loader 2004

The 2004 gun season was one of the best years of hunting for us behind my Dads house.

Early Muzzle loader, usually the last Monday and Tuesday of November, was particularly golden for my brother Andrew and my Dad.




Andrew made the first kill of the season, a seven pointer, on the first morning.





Then, my dad shot this eight pointer, the next evening(Tuesday).




My brother and I had actually seen this deer chasing a doe earlier that afternoon while heading out to our stands.






Monday morning, first day of shotgun, i had two does travel by me fast around 7:00 AM . Behind them, moving at a steady pace, was this six pointer.





He came in at about 40 yards and i dropped him in his tracks.





From this tree stand.





The rest of the week it rained and was warm. As far as the deer drives go, we didn't produce anything. It was a general wash out.

After shotgun concluded, Muzzle loader resumed. Hunting from my dads stand, from which he had shot the eight pointer, i had two bucks come into my range. The fist was a small Y buck that i had seen Tuesday of early muzzle loader. The second was a buck i hadn't seen before, and that i considered big enough to shoot.





That concluded the 2007 gun season.

Shotgun Season 2003

I am Starting this blog out at the 2003 hunting season for shotgun in New Jersey. The primary reason being that this is the first season i had a digital camera (sony mavica cd 500).

It wasn't a trophy year, but we did have some quantity. All together our group, consisting of mostly family, managed to shoot five deer, all bucks, over the course of shotgun week.


The Kill in my garage.

Uncle Steve started off the week with a quick kill on Tuesday, the second day, with a scrubby one horned three pointer. A buck none the less.

That same day, after the momentum of the first success, we did another drive in a small piece and Andy killed this buck.

This Deer is not hanging in the group picture due to complications at the checking station.

The next one, was the deer that i shot walking in to my stand in the evening on Thursday. I jump shot this deer, killing it with a 20 gauge slug at 83 yards. It looked a lot bigger from that distance. I thought it was at least a six pointer, but ended up only being a three.

No dice on Friday, but at least we had some dead deer to keep us company while drinking beer in the garage.

Saturday morning we resumed the killing when Uncle Steve filled his second buck tag with another four pointer. Very similar to the deer that Andy shot on Tuesday.

Our final kill was taken on state game land by Bill Patton. This deer got in between our standers twice before he shot it. This deer was a five pointer dressing 135 pounds. It was the biggest deer that we had gotten that year, and was blind in one eye. Luckily it had three points on one side, considering in that wildlife management zone it needed to have three points or better to be taken.

Right before the season, Me and my cousin (Mark a.k.a. Pepe), found this deer after it was hit by a car in a residential area. The force of the impact actually knocked its antlers right off of its skull.




This deer was a nine pointer with a 21 inch inside spread.

Shotgun Season 02

This is an ammendment to my original blog post. I started the blog with the season of 03 because that is when I had aquired my first digital camera. Recently, however, I stumbled across these pictures taken with a digital Nikon by my father and just had to post them up.

Here is a picture of me and my cousin Pete with our deer that we killed during the six day firearm season December 2002.

I shot this deer on a three man soft push in a small private piece Thursday of Shotgun week 2002. I spotted him about 50 yds out and decided to wait to take the shot. He was with five does, that, earlier in the week I had let run past me on the same drive. Sure enough, the does, sensing it was safe proceeded to trot right past me within 15 yds. He followed them in and i hit him with a 20 gauge slug in the neck dropping him in his tracks.