OK all, Lets start a thread on our personal experiences with Buck Fever.
I am looking to read about personal experiencences of you or a hunting buddy you witnessed!

Me, On my first Elk hunt I set up overlooking 3 trails under what could be best described as a small mesa(20 feet or so). I setup at the point so I was not skylined and had about 270 degrees of view. The three trails lead to water on my right and to a cut wheat field to the left. What I didn't realize was the most used trail was behind me
Anyway I was sitting there and after about 1 hour heard a crack behind me. I slowly turned my head to look and there stood a 5 x 5 bull Elk at about 10 yards. The Buck Fever set in and I started hyperventilating. Boy was my heart pounding and was I breathing fast. Anyway after about 5 minutes (OK 20 seconds or so) I told myself to relax and BREATHE SLOWLY. I calmed down and after a bit tried to pick up the bow which had an arrow nocked and was lying beside me. I tried this 3 times and each time he snoted and stomped. Not wanting to blow him out(no shot that way) I relaxed and let him settle down. He finely turned around and started browsing back behind me. I slow stood up (crouched over) and got myself together and slowly peeked over the top. I didn;'t see him so I moved up to the edge. Still not seeing him, I stepped up and when I transfered my weight the dirt cracked(It was extremely dry that fall) and he bolted. He was about 30 yards quartering away. The worst was yet to come, as we were hunting eastern Montana the Air Force regularly flew bombers on low level flights over the area and after he bolted I turned around and what did I see flying straight at me but a B1 bomber at about 500-1000 feet doing about 500 knots! If I had seen the plane before I stepped up......
Oh well that's why we call it hunting!

I am looking foward to other stories!
Greg

[corrected spelling in the title, Don]

[ 07-25-2002, 15:22: Message edited by: Don G ]

First time I saw a whitetail on a hunt some 30 years ago. I was placed in a spot my dad used to cover. He hadn't seen a deer there in 25 years of hunting there, so I figured it was the spot for the New guy. WRONG.
About half hour later a 12 pointer steps over the ridge led by a fat doe. I was mesmirized. I was terrified if I moved he'd some how evaporate! He was 20 yards away walking towards me! He stopped behind a bush. Time to get the gun up I thought, my arms wouldn't move, he came out a different way that he went in. Never got the gun up. He walked away.
Came to my senses! Ran like hell down the ridge above him to try for a shot. spotted him and dove on my gut like a football player for a prone shot. Bushes in the way! SHTT! Kneeling then, breathing hard 75 yard shot couldn't get the sights to stay on him. Disapearing over the next hill, desperation shot. MISS!
Shirt tail time for me.

I've been shooting whitetail since I was 10 or 12, so no whitetatil gives me buck fever (yet).

For the first time in 30 years I had buck fever twice while hunting eland in RSA! It must be something about having tracked them intensely for five days, working hard with just occasional glimpses of critters spooked by the swirling wind.

Maybe it was just that my throat was swollen almost shut by abscessed tonsils?

Naaah, it was real buck fever, and it felt great!

I love adrenaline!

Don

[ 07-25-2002, 15:22: Message edited by: Don G ]

I have seen this happen twice with two different hunting partners. Both times they were using Winchester Mod 70's. A huge buck or bear is within 50 yds., standing broadside. They pull the trigger, eject, pull the trigger again, repeat until the rifle is empty. Both times they thought they had fired at the Buck or Bear, when they had actually ejected all their rounds on the ground with their safety in the middle position. The Buck was harvested by me, but the Bear got away.

AG - I don't think you're going to get much comment about this thread. Buck fever is like erectile dysfunction.... - you can't get your gun to shoot so to speak and would probably rather not talk about it.

Long Pig,
I appreciate your statement and yes you are correct that some people think of it as something embarrassing to talk about. I for one am a professional musician and having performed in front of 15,000+ audences can attest to the nervious factor. I ask the question since
A) We have quite a few VERY skilled hunters on this forum
B) This is a topic you see written about in the hunting mags from time to time.
C) I NEVER thought it would have happened to me as I thought I had good control over my nerves based on my background as a musician (I get excited when I take an animal but never even close to Buck Fever)

That was the point, to see what experiences others had or have witnessed.

Thanks
Greg

[ 07-25-2002, 21:52: Message edited by: amosgreg ]

I still get a little touch of "buck fever" whenever I see a deer while hunting, it doesn't even need to be a buck. I have though learned to work through it. It took me 20 years of hunting to shoot a male deer, not just a legal buck a male deer, and I've averaged more than one deer a year.

My first 2 misses on bucks were similar... In both instances the buck was close, with other deer and moving fast. In both instances I shot and missed, in retrospect I reviewed my sight picture and realized I was looking at the headgear and not the vitals. I'm glad to say I got over that and have taken a couple of bucks, but being a meat hunter I won't pass on does either.

I once watched my step-brother miss a buck 9 times with 6 arrows in the course of 1/2 hour. You could see his red face through the cammie paint.

Good Luck,
Bob

Second year deer hunting (I was 14), I shot TWELVE (12) times somewhere in the general vicinity of a 5 point buck that was about 50 yards, MAX, away. The deer stood there while I emptied the magazine (30-30 Marlin, held seven rounds), then reloaded my last five rounds and fired them too, then he wandered slowly away. Witnessed by my brother, who, amazingly enough, just can't seem to forget, even 30 some odd years later.

Watched a perfect 8 point buck trot past about 25 yards away, one time when I was 16. It was like my arms wouldn't move or something. Never even raised the gun. Of course, after the earlier incident, I probably just saved a bunch of ammo.

One time as I was sneaking through the woods, I came over the top of a ridge and saw a hunter looking down over the hill through his scope. I went into "all stop, quick quiet" mode, so as not to mess him up. After a few seconds, he lowered the rifle, then raised it again, quickly, then put it down again, and took off down over the hill, where deer were exploding in every direction. I worked my way down to where he was looking around in the deer tracks in the snow. He looked up as I approached, and said "I can't believe I missed twice", and took off following the tracks. When he got back to camp that night, he probably wondered why he still had a magazine full of ammo.

R-WEST

It happened about 30, 35 years ago. We were driving from one hunting area to another when my then hunting buddy saw a weasel running across the cut hay field. He had never seen one although he lived out on the plains all his life. (He was about thirty, I was sixteen.) He decided to get out and take a closer look at the weasel. He walked to a four strand barbed wire fense and took his 303 Brit Enfield with him. That wasn't close enough, so he pushed the rifle under the fense and climbed over. As he was walking closer tp the weasel, the weasel decided to come closer to check out my buddy. That paniced the human, being "charged" by a white ball of fur. He raised his rifle, pointed it, then worked the action. There was some frantic and funny action by my buddy. The weasel kept coming so my buddy beat feet back to the vehicle. He crossed the fense in record time. He was excited as anybody I have ever seen. He told us he was lucky the damed thing didn't bite him. Only firing at the critter prevented that.

Except he didn't fire. And when we said so, he didn't believe us.

We went back and I climbed out and over the fense and recovered the shell he ejected.

Bad news. Somehow, when he ejected the unfired shell, the bullet pulled put and stayed the the barrel. He tried to jamb another shell on top of the stuck bullet. Had he closed the bolt - he was close, there might have been a disaster. As it was, we had to retreat to home to beat the bullet out of the barrel. Only the unfire primer convinced him that he had not fired.

Buck fever is not necessarily confined to bucks.

I have bowhunted for 30 plus years.
A few years ago I was hunting whitetail in Kansas. The first evening I had a group of buck walk slooooowly out of a thicket behind me and keep me in my tree for an hour after dark. I saw a 3 point and a 140 class 8, and heard two or three others.
The next evening, the same thing happened except about 15 minutes earlier. I saw the same two deer but this time I had a monster 10 point walk out behind me. He was 15 yards from me but I had no shot!. He put on a show of a life time! He grunted, scraped, rubbed and something I had never heard of at the time. The "snort wheeze"!! I had heard it the night before, figured it was a deer, but did not know what it was. Every time one of the other deer would start to walk he would grunt and start wacking the brush around him. If they got close, he would jump at them and then snort and weeze, followed by a series of single sylobal grunts. Kind of like a clicking sound.
After the next mornings hunt, I moved my stand back about 40 yards. That evening, things felt right. The sun went down, I heard the turkeys fly to roost....... then it happened!! I started shaking out of control! I could not stop my legs from jumping up and down. I had not even heard, let alone seen a deer.... I finnaly closed my eyes, took several deep breaths..... and calmed down. What an experience!
Just as I calmed down, I heard foot steps. The 3 point walked under me..... followed by you know who! I slide my arrow through both lungs and into the ground and heard him fall at fourty yards. He grossed 176 plus. If he would not have had his G1 brocken off at the beam he would have netted 180 plus.
A true hunt of a life time with a deer of a life time to cap it off. I feel very fortunute to have had the chance.
I remmeber that hunt every day, when I see the mount on my wall.
Got-a-love-it!

AG - Sorry if I offended you, I was trying to put a bit of humor in the thread . I have not had any buck fever, but I do get pretty wound up before I shoot at something - I get something like tunnel vision and this "zen" focus, most of the time I do not hear the gun go off but do feel the recoil. I guess some combat experience took the "nerves" out of me.

No offense taken and you had a good point as I know several people who wouldn't even think of admitting to it occuring to them.

Greg

All Right!!!! My name is Alan and I still get a touch of buck fever every time I get one in the sights or within bow range! I'll gladly admit it. After hunting 20+ years, the day I don't get that excitement and rush, the day I just coldly touch the trigger on some magnificent creature is the day you A.R. fellas get to buy a ton of nice rifles and equipment at bargain basement prices. That "fever" is part of what make it all so grand and exciting.

This really isn't a buck fever story,but it is pretty funny.A few years back my dad,myself and a friend were Elk hunting in Montana.We all got unpacked and setup in our tent the first night and went to sleep.A few hours later all cozy in our sleeping bags my dad suddenly erupts up out of his sleeping bag,Desert Eagle 44 Mag.drawn ,flipping out What happened we asked.Something licked my hand he replied.We looked around,saw nothing and told him he was crazy and to go back to sleep.About a half hour later same thing,but this time his hand was wet with saliva.We never did see what licked his hand that night,but to make a long story short we found out the next morning that we were sleeping in the tent that the guides usually slept in.One of the guides took his dog along and it seems the dog would sleep under the cot that my dad was using.The dog would enter and exit the tent through the side wall.Needless to say it was a great first night in Montana and a great trip!!

When I was in high school I got buck fever bad. I was then and still am a good shot but then I was impatient. I got excited and hurried my shots and missed alot. Now when I see a deer I sit for a moment and enjoy the rush of adreniline before setting up for the shot. Once the deer is in my sights I am a rock, no nerves, just all killing machine. Then once the kill is made I enjoy the rush all over again.

I had icewater coursing through my veins when I was in my teens and twenties.

In my early thirties I had alot of job stress. This was combined with a belief that I just had to kill - this was related to peer pressure. For about two seasons I was nothing short of awful. The exclamation point was a total of 7 shots directed at a hapless doe that kept walking in towards me. First shot was at about 300 yards, but I finally flinched one into the boiler room at about 200 yds. This was from a pretty solid rest, BTW, lest it seem unsporting. I felt pretty humiliated and almost dreaded each shot opportunity.

Getting past the situation required practice (something I had previously thought was for other people), a change in mindset (it's OK not to shoot if I don't feel right about it), and of course, a change in equipment........sometimes you have to blame the gun ;-).

So I did away with the Ruger 300 and went on to one-shot kill every deer I've since attempted with an incredibly accurate 300 WBY Rem 700 Arylon. Confidence helps.

But all BS aside, the key was learning to control the emotions "don't touch the trigger unless I'm able to keep crosshairs on the kill-zone", etc. I let a few go by just to prove to myself that I had the necessary discipline. Now at 47 I don't really care if I shoot or not. I'm looking ahead to the day my children are old enough to join me - and to give their Dad a chance to witness the magic again through their eyes.

Sam

I'm going to give you the long version. It happened on my first deer hunt forty years ago.

I had gone with my dad three years in a row mule deer hunting, but wasn't allowed to have a license or carry a gun.

The fourth year he said he thought I was ready. My buck fever started from the moment he told me I would get to hunt.

We borrowed a gun from a friend, a retired Major in the air force. His den had three walls of solid gun racks, double layered. He let me have my pick (then led me to a .270 with open sights).

We shot it a few different times at targets, I flinched mostly, then the big day came.

We got up about 2:00am on opening day, picked up my dad's two friends, and drove in to the mountains of south central New Mexico.

Shortly after daybreak, we were driving along a ridge when a fawn jumped up. We stopped and watched it, then drove on. Within minutes we met a pickup with about five teenagers in the back, all with rifles. After they disappeared behind us, we heard shots.

We turned back and within a matter of minutes we found the fawn, gut shot, still on its feet. One of the saddest sights I'd seen. It hobbled off into the trees, I wondered whether I wanted to be a hunter afterall.

By about 9:30am we hadn't seen anything and moved to another area. We stopped the jeep on a ridge and all spread out to take a leak. About the time I started spelling my name in the dirt, my dad started whispering frantically for me to get over where he was. What he forgot to say was, bring the gun.

I ran over there and a big mule deer buck was standing broadside to us about fifty yards down the hillside. He told me to race back to the jeep and bring the rifle, but by the time I got back, the buck was bouncing across the bottom of the draw into the trees. My dad didn't say much, but I felt like I failed.

By lunch, we hadn't seen anything else, and stopped to eat sandwiches on a rock outcrop. They were talking, and I was bored. I finished my sandwich, picked up a rock, and threw it down the canyon. Two doe and a buck bailed out of the brush, and ran off before we could react. I had the feeling I shouldn't have been throwing rocks like a stupid kid.

We packed up and drove off and began a climb up the side of the mountain. Suddenly someone yelled, "DEER!" and we jerked to a stop. I was sitting on the passenger side, front. They told me to not step out, that the deer were about fifty yards up the hill. I saw nothing.

One man then said, "there's the buck!" I strained but couldn't see anything. All three men were trying to help me see the deer, but starting to get frantic. Finally I saw legs, but not a clear body, not a rack, nothing to shoot at. The men were telling at me to shoot. The pressure was intense. I had the gun out the window. I sighted at the bush where the deer's legs showed, and tried to pull the trigger. The safety was on.

Some of the deer began to move and the men were about to go ballistic. "SHOOT! SHOOT!"

I took the safety off, aimed in the general direction, and pulled the trigger. No shell in the chamber.

The deer were gone. I felt like shit, and probably would have burst into tears if it were just me and my dad, but we drove on, without anyone saying much.

We saw no more deer that day, and I'd messed up every opportunity I had. I wanted to go home as much as anything else.

We were driving a faint jeep trail and crested a hill about 4:30pm. The sun was getting low and the men were saying that we should stay on our toes.

Suddenly the man sitting behind the driver yelled, "STOP!" I couldn't see anything but the driver said, "Nice Buck!" My dad was sitting behind me. He leaned forward and told me that if his friend shot, for me to bail out, run around the front of the jeep and see if I could get a shot.

Seconds later his gun went off. I bailed out, ran around the front of the jeep searching in the trees for anything that moved. Suddenly there he was. I saw his head and rack racing through the pines.

I pulled the .270 up, aimed at his head as it went through an opening and fired, all in the same motion.

I lost sight of him, and started running the direction he was running hoping to get another chance.

The man that had shot from the jeep was screaming at me to, "stop shooting, you dumb little X#$@&%#, he's dead".

I kept running and he kept yelling, that he'd killed him already. I heard him screaming at my dad that I shouldn't have been allowed to come with them.

I finally stopped running, completely winded, still hearing the man berating me to my dad. I felt like I was going to throw up. The gun weighed about 100 pounds and I had no choice but to go back and face the music.

I turned around and thirty yards in front of me lay a ten point mule deer buck, dead as a door. I was in shock. He was beautiful. I eased up from behind. Not a wound on him. Then I saw a trickle of blood coming from his ear. I was speechless.

I walked the fifty yards through the trees back towards my dad and saw the other man rolling over another buck about to start field dressing him.

My dad looked beaten. He asked me what I had shot at. I told him it was a buck, but the other shooter jumped in the conversation and said he'd already shot it and it was laying on the ground when I fired. He was as mad as anyone I'd ever seen.

I told him I didn't shoot at his buck, I shot at my buck, and it was laying over there. All three of them stood there with their mouths hanging open; didn't know what to think I guess.

We hurried over to my buck, and I guarantee you, my dad was more thrilled then I; and I was higher than a kite.

The other shooter started stammering around, my dad and the other man pounced on him. My buck was bigger than his, my shot was more difficult than his, and I was just a kid. They ate him alive.

I've never had buck fever since that hunt. I've never felt pressure like that day. Had I not killed that buck, I don't know if I ever would have had the nerve to go deer hunting again. That one shot was "make or break" for me.

I remember a "Gunsmoke" episode many, MANY years ago... something about a gunfighter, as I recall. He didn't see "people" he had to shoot, he saw "things." (I sure wish I could remember which episode it was, because I'd sure like to buy it.) Anyway... even for "primitive times" such as when "Gunsmoke" was on the air, they did some kind of "special effect" to show, once, what it was the guy saw before he drew his gun -- it was a vision of kind of a cloudy, "blobby" sort of thing. That's how he was able to kill; he didn't see his adversaries as "people," he saw them as things.

This has pretty much been the case with me. When the quarry is finally "at hand," I don't see it as "a caribou" or "a bear" or "a deer" or whatever. It's more of "a thing" to be shot -- and that's what I do. I have all kinds of thoughts, feelings, and moments of reverence after the kill... but, at the time of the shot, it's just "a thing." Maybe it's a Zen thing, I don't know.

Russ

How about the after effects?
When we came out to a freind of mine, who had just shot his first buck, he was standing there, with a stupid grin on his face, knife drawn, and shaking like a leaf. The old man simply said " give me that damn thing before ya cut yer self" He apparently was lost in a day dream about the kill, and had been since the shots some fifteen minutes before.(five from a 300Sav just about cut the deer in half at 20 yards)

Kensco: Great story. I've seen people put so much pressure on kids to perform that they can't do it. Hell, the kids put enough pressure on themselves. When I take a kid hunting, I always try to make it a pressure free experience.

It was my little brother Joe's first deer hunt. He was 15 and had saved for a Ruger M77 in 270. I had put him on a stand and gave him explicit instructions not to shoot a doe. The landowner had crop damage permits but wanted to save them untill Thanksgiving weekend when he had family coming.

About 9am I heard shots coming from Joes stand. Then more shots & more shots. I thought he must be in a gunfight or something. I didn't see any deer fleeing my way and after a few minuets I went to check on him.

When I got to him he was white as a sheet. I asked "what happened"? I got a deer was the exicted reply. I asked why so many shots as there were at least 7 maybe more. He stated the deer just stood there so he kept shooting. He couldn't tell me if it was a buck or doe. I asked where he was aiming and he replyed at the deer. Feeling a tracking job coming on I asked which direction the deer headed. Joe replyed that the deer was down a short distance away.

I walked up on a big doe shot squarely in the ass right at the base of the tail. Remarkedly the inside damage wasn't to bad. I dressed the deer and went to the landowner who was very understanding to a young boy and his first deer.

The next year I put him on stand and shortly after daybreak I heard one shot. He came across the field and had a buck down. It was a 7pt one shot through the lungs. I guess he cured his buck fever.

That was Joe's last deer hunt as he left us the following August. I have those horns mounted on a plaque.

My nephew who had never shot anything in his life had decided in his very late teens to take up deer hunting. I let him borrow my late father's M700 ADL .243 and he got good at punchung paper at the range. There were few deer on our property at that time so he wasn't having any luck seeing a buck. He went hunting on his cousin's property were there were lots of deer(Texas hill country). One morning he was in the stand and here came a forkhorn yearling. The cousins heard him shoot three times in an orderly succession. They walked the few hundred yards to the near stand where he was and there he sat in the stand. That little buck had walked across his view at just 30 yards and had never broke stride as he fired at it. No sign of any hit. He's never hunted since and when I last asked him if he wanted to go hunting with me he said an adamant, NO! I guess he thinks it's just not for him.

Thank You Russ for your kind comments. I think I'll take his 270 this year to deer camp.

Rich,
And whether you get something or not He will be with you again.

Good Luck and Thanks!
Greg

The first and best time I went bowhunting for elk was in the Bridger Wilderness in WY. I looked at over 20 elk in two days when I called the first in. I was on a steep timbered slope and the elk was about 100 yards below me. At the first scream I produced I heard crashing behind me so I turned around layed down prone in a small clearing since I had no time to take cover. Immediately a large 7x7 came out of the trees 20 yards above me and started bugling to the bull below me. After a few minutes I heard the bull below me tearing up brush well within bow range but I couldn't turn to look at it. After the two bulls screamed at each other over my prone figure for a few minutes the wind changed and the 7x7 got excited. I rose and drew my stick bow well past my ear and fired the wood arrow about 10 feet over his back at an estimated 400 f.p.s.. Needless to say they both left and nobody was around to witness my story. Never did get anything.

Elk will do that to you!!!!!