By Jackie Otto

Twas’ the night before opening day at deer camp, all through the camp were thoughts; “which stand should I hunt, the one with the big eight pointer pictures, the one with the tall and wide frame nine pointer or the one deep in the swamp where you can be surprised at what shows up.” Dancing dreams of that perfect broadside shot at a trophy deer would start my sleep each night months before opening day of archery season. The house was strewn with camo clothing, bows, arrows and I was doing endless sharpening of broad heads. I was making list after list of things to take to camp, food, equipment, camera gear, scent control sprays and the telltale odor of deer pee scents. (Spray Lysol will not get rid of that smell once it has been spilled, trust me.)

To some, this story can be humorous, yet to me it is why they call fishing, fishing and hunting, hunting rather than catching fish and or harvesting game. Being in the right place at the right time is a big part of a successful hunting trip, if success means bagging your game in the way you dreamed of for the last six months. I am still a firm believer that anytime is a good time to go fishing or hunting, even if your arrow doesn’t meat, oh I meant “meet” its target. Knowing I have done everything to prepare mentally and physically for the challenge, the right time and right place I was not.

Preparations were made long before the season of archery arrived at our house, practicing every day shooting targets at 10, 20, 30 yards and making sure our sights were on and our muscles were in shape to make a clean and ethical shot. Buying new gear and setting up new strings for the bows are a must each season to make us certain that we have done our best. I am fortunate to have a very large back yard partially fenced with a cement wall, so we can safely have target practice at home. We recently found out that Arrowhead Archery in Tampa has an excellent indoor range. There isn’t much that Arrowhead can’t provide for your archery enjoyment, including sales of everything needed to equip yourself properly.

Back to…Twas the night before opening morning, and all through my house was odor of animal urine, combined with vanilla and pine cover scents, plastic bags of camo clothing and hopes of bagging that big buck. The only creatures that were stirring was the hubby stirring a drink and the crinkling of a bag of chips being opened. Restless was the night’s sleep, 5 am comes awfully early when you’ve accustomed to waking at 7 am every morning. Exercising and walking on the treadmill helped get us to our stands on opening morning, but not without a gallon of sweat from the sweltering heat. By 8 am it was close to 80 degrees and by noon it hit 97 degrees and washing with scent-free soaps no longer cut the mustard. I don’t think it was our scent that kept the deer from appearing for their broadside shots, they were just smart enough to feed at night during the almost full moon, (right time – right place).

After three days of enduring the heat, I finally found a dumb one (a small doe), success with a bow and a clean, fast ethical harvest was made. Smiles were all around and another stirring of drinks the evening after the hunt. Weather and moon phases have more control of animals than you can imagine, I should have been more aware of the weather and the moon phase, again right time – right place.

All in all I’d do it all over again; there just isn’t anything like sitting in a tree stand watching the wild world wake up in the morning. Squirrels, rabbits and every imaginable bird keep you busy watching their antics and each time I do this I learn something from these animals…Right time-right place. I would love to show you pictures of the trophies from my dreams each night before I fall into deep sleep but instead I’ll show you real pictures from game cameras that keep me going back to the woods in hopes of getting that one, that special one. I’ll get him…muzzle loading season is right around the corner and I’ll be able to reach out and touch one.

Please always be safe, (especially while hunting) be courteous and know your regulations.