Joe Rotert

USA – Omaha, NE

Elkhorn River Magic

“Bill, Bill, Bill – oh my gosh, big buck – big buck” I was doing a little early season scouting while talking on the cell phone with my brother. I guessed that I had alerted this big boy from his bed about 70 yards away and all I could see was a glimpse of his rack bouncing through the trees as he headed up river. Even at a quick glimpse I knew this was a quality deer and was hoping that he wasn’t just passing through. I didn’t know at the time this was going to be my only sighting of him until many days into the season.
This was my second year hunting this piece of property and I was still getting to know the habits of the local deer heard as well as the wanderers. We strategically placed two stands in this small section of river bottom; one right in the dense of the willow and cottonwood trees within reach of the adjoining corn field, and the second on the edge of the trees overlooking a food plot and en-route to a small pond. The property owner had installed the pond a few years earlier and has done just an incredible job at promoting an environment for wildlife to thrive here. I knew on day one in the stand what a special place this truly was when I had eleven different bucks walk past! Not a single doe to be found, just the male population on that particular night and I was perfectly fine with that. I remember thinking at the time that this is just crazy, I’m literally a few hundred yards from one of the busiest roads outside of the Omaha metro and I am in wildlife heaven!
The night was late October and as I’m sure you have heard many times before, I wasn’t going to go hunting that night but I remembered a Sunday obligation so if I wanted to spend time in the stand that weekend I’d better get going. I pulled in the driveway and noticed the landowner had planted some viburnum for a snow block on the north side of the drive. He’s always busy cleaning the pond, installing food plots, and working the land. I got out of the truck and put on my lightweight Scentlock gear and walked through the field of winter wheat. The wind was light and out of the southwest, typical for this time of year in Nebraska. I was contemplating which stand to sit in and, lucky for me, chose to overlook the food plot that night. It was around 5:30 and I was only in the stand for ten minutes before the first doe arrived. Before long I had eleven deer wandering around below me all within 40 yards. A little one by nothing, a two by two, another little forkie, and does – most of which I had seen before. The little 2 x 2 was busy chasing does foreshadowing that magical event called the “rut” that every bow hunter dreams about this time of year. I was 14 feet up the tree and was happy to see that not a single deer had winded me in any direction. A possible tribute to the Scentlock clothing or just the height of the stand I didn’t know but I was happy with the set – up. I watched the group below me for at least 45 minutes, took a few pictures, and shot some video. All of this while a friend was texting me updates on the final big 12 Nebraska – Oklahoma game. Technology sure has changed the times spent in the stand. As daylight was fading, I was tempted to harvest one of the larger does but figured I would have more opportunities for that toward the end of the season. All of the deer were out of sight and I had about 10 – 12 minutes of shooting light left. That’s when the thought came to me of another empty but active night. I took another look over my left shoulder and what do you know – a little Elkhorn river magic produced a set of “horns” that had snuck up behind me! He was smack dab in the middle of the milo food plot and headed broadside in my direction. My arrow was knocked, holding steady in my whisker biscuit and I was clipping my release to the string. The big guy was slowly and cautiously working his way north. He would stop, bite a few tops off of the milo, survey his surroundings, and then repeat this scenario every 5 to 6 yards. There’s a reason why these guys get as big as they are and you could tell this buck was no exception. He was super cautious even as he was eating. He had waited until every one of the other deer had left the food plot before he stepped in. I didn’t think he was ever going to come into range and I couldn’t take the chance of turning toward him at this point. I waited until I was partially concealed behind the one and only overhanging branch that was between him and I. Here we go – I brought my bow to full draw and waited for just a few more teeny, tiny little steps! Of course, where does he go, dead straight away from me behind the only branch that could screw this up. For a brief moment you think it’s not going to happen again and you start to second guess yourself. Maybe I should have drawn sooner? Maybe I should have turned toward him? Wait, here comes… what is that, a raccoon and now they’ve both stopped at a stand-off and I’m still at full draw with my Diamond Marquis. Fortunately, I have an 80%let off and this all just lasted seconds and now he’s turning back on the path that will place him broadside directly in front of me. I had already ranged all of the distances to the front and back of the milo so I knew he was just over the 25 yard mark. It was getting very close to running out of shooting light so it was now or never. I placed the pin just behind the shoulder and moved up ever so slightly just as he stopped for another mouthful of milo. I pulled the trigger and “Thwap” you could hear that all too familiar sound of the arrow hit. The bruiser dropped immediately and I knew what had happened. It was a bittersweet moment knowing that I had just spine shot this beautiful buck and he was down but not finished. I knocked another Cabelas Stalker Extreme tipped with a 3 blade Muzzy and sent it through the boiler room along with a third just to expedite the ending. I climbed out of my stand and found the bruiser had expired by the time I walked the short distance to him. This is normally the time when every hunter realizes that he or she had just harvested a good animal but there is rack shrinkage. This was not to be as I knew this was by far the largest whitetail that I ever had the privilege of taking.
I texted my friend Mark who was bow hunting a few miles away and asked for his assistance in loading the beast. The property owner came down to take a few pictures and I spent the rest of the evening with a huge smile on my face. I had no idea at the time that this deer was going to score almost 165 inches and win the Nebraska Big Buck Contest archery division for 2010!