Wisconsin Firearm Season Nears

By Brandon Wikman

Mobs of blaze orange junkies will be decorating the woods of Wisconsin in mere days. The 2011 Wisconsin firearm season will be well underway and I’m more stoked to have a rifle in my hands this year than ever before… for many reasons!

To me, firearm season is an archery hunter’s biggest revenge. As diehard bow hunters have come to realize, it takes several floating variables to come together, lineup, and cluster to successfully put a killing arrow into a deer. The deer must be in your comfortable shooting range, their body position must be ever so perfect to slip an arrow into and so much more. Now that firearm season is tossed into November’s mix, we are lucky enough to get a way with a whole lot more movement, increase our killing range, and ultimately jack the odds of putting a buck on a tailgate. It’s a great thing!

This fall has provided me enlightenment. I realized after hunting 30 days in Wisconsin that there are times, moments and experiences that deter your ability to kill, period. No matter what you do as a hunter, when you’re out of luck, you are seriously out of luck. I’ve been blessed to have several bittersweet moments throughout the past 3 months.
I can count on one hand and remember five different big buck encounters this fall just like it was yesterday. Out of five giant whitetail encounters, I was unable to pull a shot off with my bow! Below are the five instances this fall that I’ve experienced.

Maybe you may have also had this happen to you:

1. 9-point buck scraping directly behind me. No shot.

2. 11-point buck spotting me in a tree at thirty yards. No shot.

3. 10-point buck walks into twenty yards face-to-face. No shot.

4. 10-point buck stands quartering to me at forty-five yards. No shot.

5. 8-point buck stands broadside at eighty yards for ten minutes. No shot.

As you can see, my luck this fall just hasn’t quite bridged success. Each encounter only adds more fuel to my drive for putting a buck on the ground. I will continue to run rapid with the bow in my hands until this weekend. This is the only time when the bow is put back in the case for a few days and the rifle is broken out. Good luck to all as season continues!