Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Triple Trophy, finally!
Writer earns elusive hunting award
I finally earned a Triple Trophy Award.
It happened in the last gasp of daylight Nov. 20, in a snatch of time when my expectations had evaporated.
The Game and Fish Commission established the Triple Trophy Program in 1984 to encourage hunters to kill does. It recognizes hunters who take a deer in a season with archery or crossbow, muzzleloader and modern gun.
In the mid-1980s, the rebuilding phase of deer management in Arkansas had concluded, and the Game and Fish Commission shifted emphasis to maintaining a high-quality deer herd. Hunters may kill two bucks annually in Arkansas. To earn a Triple Trophy Award, you must kill at least one doe.
I’ve fulfilled two-thirds of the requirements many times, usually with muzzleloader and modern gun. Several years ago, I started the season by killing my first deer with a crossbow. I thought I was home free, but I was unable to kill a deer with a muzzleloader. That season ended with me missing a doe with a muzzleloader at pointblank range. It became a question of, “How am I going to blow it this year?”
I got the muzzleloader portion out of the way Oct. 24, when I shot a doe at dusk from my favorite stand at Old Belfast Hunting Club in northern Grant County. On Nov. 2, I took a young doe with a crossbow.
I dared think it. Killing a deer with a modern firearm in Arkansas is automatic. I knew I had jinxed myself by even allowing the thought to enter my mind. For those who do not believe in metaphysics, I can only say that I do. I am the king of “Stuff happens,” and also the king of “Stuff doesn’t happen.” It breaks my heart a lot of times, but it gives me plenty to write about.
With two does on my check sheet, I hoped to complete the Triple Trophy with a buck. For the first time in ages, I have not seen a legal buck anywhere in Arkansas. I hunted a friend’s place who asked me not to shoot a doe. I spent that entire evening covered with does.
I continued to hunt at Old Belfast, but deer had vacated my woods. Several times one or two arrived at dusk when the light was too dim for me to determine their legality. I believed I had overplayed my hand at that stand, but I had no other options.
Conditions had been right for that stand most of modern gun season. It needs a north or northeast wind to keep my scent away from where deer normally approach. I hunted it one evening on a southwest wind, and I heard a big deer break away hurriedly minutes before it would have entered the clearing.
Conditions could not have been worse for my stand Nov. 30. A southwest wind blew my scent directly on the opening. The moon was at waning gibbous phase with 100% illumination, which meant that deer were probably feeding at night.
I had one thing in my favor. On Nov. 30, the solunar tables published Sunday in the Outdoors section of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette showed a minor activity period at 4:30 p.m.
As I understand them, solunar tables extrapolate when high and low tides would occur inland if places like Arkansas had coasts. Anglers know that fish bite on ebb and flood tides. River fishermen know that trout bite on tailwaters during rises resulting from hydropower generation, and also when river levels fall. Neap tides and spring tides figure in the equation, as well.
Theoretically, the push-pull effect of sun/moon interaction also influences feeding activity among terrestrial animals. They feed within an hour each side of a major and minor solunar peak. I have found the tables so reliable over the last 16 years that I plan my hunting trips around them. Bad wind or not, I placed my bet on a late-evening minor activity period.
I arrived at my stand about 3 p.m. and positioned my rifle so I could mount it with minimal motion. My muzzleloader and crossbow deer ran when I shot them, and I found them the next morning. I would take no chances on this play. I brought a Winchester Model 70 Stainless Stalker barrel and action that I fitted to a custom laminated Stocky’s thumbhole stock. Its colors are blue and silver, my Dallas Cowboys Special.
Equipped with a Ballistic Optimizing Shooting System that Winchester and Browning used for several years, the barrel can be tuned to any bullet and load. I tuned it for a 150-grain Sierra soft point boat tail powered by 64.5 grains of RL-22 powder and a Remington Large Magnum Rifle Primer. That is a very hot load that prints a three-shot cloverleaf at 150 yards. It is sighted to hit point of aim at 400 yards. The distance from my stand to the end of the opening is 170 yards, meaning I would have to aim about 3 inches low.
A deer hit with this combination would not run.
The evening was very quiet and the wind swirled. At one point it actually shifted to the northeast for a few minutes. My confidence soared until it shifted back from the south and settled.
At 5 p.m., I saw movement at the edge of the woods. A big doe shuffled nervously at the edge of the clearing. I kept my head low, rested my binoculars on the box stand frame and watched. The doe ducked back into the woods, and I thought the hunt was over.
The doe returned, easing along the wood line adjacent to the clearing. She finally turned, giving me a slight front quartering angle. Two small tree limbs framed the doe’s vital area, creating a fork that accommodated my 3-inch low hold. I squeezed the trigger, and the doe fell where she stood.
Mike Romine, a close friend and fellow member of Old Belfast Hunting Club, texted his congratulations.
“Isn’t it ironic that your worst year at Old Belfast might turn out to be your most memorable?” Romine asked.