YOU ARE TOUGH ONE FOR SURE..

The best hunt I've ever been on in 20 years of Idaho hunting was several years ago. Four of us had muzzleloader tags for a late season cow hunt South of Grangeville, on the South facing slope of Whitebird Canyon. We got up there with 2 ft. of snow on the ground, cleared an area for our sheepherder tent and started hunting. As it turned out at the end of each day one of us had a shot and a story to tell. Phil was so excited when the herd surprised him as they came up the hill he shot into the ground. One of the other guys took a looong shot, and missed. I forget what Brent did wrong but he missed as well. Me, I heard what I thought was another hunter coming up the trail, but a cow elk looked around the tree. I jumped up, cocked the hammer and touched it off, nothing happened of course because I hadn't pulled the set trigger. Re grouped as the elk dodged among the trees and shot one.
At the end of every day we sat around the fire, told our stories and passed the Apricot Brandy around.
At the end of the week we cut some Christmas trees and went home. It was a great hunt.
As close as I've come was poking a hole in a cow's ear when I flinched. I had a hangfire. Pop---------bang.

Awesome story Nobull00! Elk hunting is my favorite. I bet it was exciting getting into camp after everyone had opportunities on punching their tag

I came to Delaware in 1973 from a part of South Carolina where hunting whitetails was only found a hundred miles away. Then I got there, I wanted to get there quickly and since Delaware had a special 2 day muzzleloader season before its shotgun season, I wanted to get there quick - only I was too poor to buy a good black powder gun. I wanted to be creative so I sent to a local sawmill and bought a slab of hard maple. The local gun store sold knockoff Italian black powder parts so I bought a barrel, a flintlock, along with some German silver and brass sheets. Being active duty military, t took me another 3 years before I finished it.

I hand carved the stock using pictures and books I'd found in the library. When I had it done, I shot the gun 3 times insuring it was on with it's buckhorn and blade sights. I embarked on my very first deer hunt all alone with a homemade gun.

There's lots of public land so I found a spot in a small field by the road. There was virtually no pressure back in those days as few people used smokepoles. I didn't have a stand so I crawled up in a pinoak and found a nice limb crotch to sit on. About an hour later, a big doe with a yearling fawn came out about 75 yards away. I'd loaded a 126 grain .44o round ball patched with Vaseline over 60 grains of FFFg powder. I'd primed the pan with hand ground flash powder and when the smoke cleared, the big doe was on the ground. She sprank up and ran about 60 yards before piling up at the edge a multiflora rose thicket. Only 12 deer were taken in the state that year with blackpowder and I had one of them. I took the gun home, cleaned it well, lubed it, and hung it on the wall.

The gun hung on the wall of multiple houses for the next 41 years.

In 2017, I decided to give the old gun to my daughter to hang over her big fireplace. I took it down and ran a few patches down the bore. I blew down the muzzle and found the touchhole was still open. I dry fired it and the old flint sent a shower of sparks off the frizzen into the pan. Then I had a brain fart. How neat would it be to have its first shot and last shot kill a deer. Delaware now had 2 - 2 week seasons and the first was coming up TOMORROW.
I Have a friend who has a serious deer problem and knew that I'd get an opportunity, so I decided I had nothing to lose and nothing to prove - I went.

I loaded the old gun with the same recipe (in fact, I still used a ball from the same packet I'd used 4 decades before). Right about sunset, a button buck came into sight. I'm not that young guy any longer and neither are my eyes. I laid the stock on the stand rail and squinted through my progressive lenses to align those primitive sights. Reminding myself that I'd have to be steady after the pan flashed, I touched the trigger. Fire and smoke bellowed from the old barrel and when it cleared, the deer had fallen where it stood. Not a bad sendoff for the old girl (and the old guy).

George, that is a great story! Thanks for sharing.

I shot several whitetail bucks with a Thompson 50 cal. 180gr round ball Hornady very accurate past 100 yds mid 80s it was opening morning of the shotgun season southwestern MN it was a full moon I was in one of my bow stands it was 20 min before legal shooting I could see a big deer pawing at the scrape then he walked down the trail by my stand it was so dark you couldn't see the sights on the rifle I looked down the side of barrel the flash blinded me for a few seconds and there was no buck laying there got down and looked didn't find any blood after about a 1 1/2 I got out of tree now it was good and bright and found a little blood witch led to a nice non typical about 75 yds down around the bend of the cornfield 180 lbs range

50 caliber Thompson 180 gr round ball I was hunting with a friend mid morning we were making a drive in a small cornfield we were at the end I herd my buddy holler there one coming I had just stepped out of the end and out came a nice buck running broadside 40 yds that was a easy shot pulled the trigger and when I looked at the buck running out came a bone and crocket monster they run together for about 60 yds then the small one tipped over it still was a good day that is hunting quit hunting with a muzzle loader for a few years now I am back at it again

Here's one more, about my brother. This has to be 25 years ago when he and I were messing around with all things guns, bows, fishing, etc... Anyway he had picked up a TC Hawken 50 cal and an uncle helped him work up a load, the right patch thickness, etc and he had it shooting pretty decent. Well it was a new toy he had to use that year deer hunting. We hunted NE WI in the Nicolet NF and it was big woods and at the time pretty good deer numbers.

Anyway, he was still-hunting through the woods and he saw a doe coming through...he happened to have a bonus doe tag that year and when she stopped at about 90 yards he shot. She went maybe 20 yards and dropped. He could see her lying there dead so before walking down to her he reloaded. Just after getting reloaded a very nice 8 pointer that had been trailing the doe finally caught up and was coming into view. My brother also had his standard deer tag, so he got ready, set the trigger, and waited for the buck to give him a shot. The buck moved through the same lane as the doe, but this time the set trigger and gloves on, and I think probably some excitement caused my brother to touch off a bit pre-maturely... The buck was just walking and he wasn't quite lined up, but the ball took the buck right at the base of the head and he dropped in his tracks... I think that year my dad and myself were skunked and my brother shot a double with his muzzleloader. That was an exceptional year for him.