The photo above is me with the second whitetail doe my hunting companion, Kirk Musgrove, and I harvested between 3:00 and 5:00 pm on January 15, 2024 during an extended doe hunting season in Kerr County, Texas. The Winchester XPR 300 Win Mag purchased from Helotes Tactical and the Accufire Noctis V1 sight are included in the picture. For ammo, we shot Remington Core-Lokt 300 Winchester Magnum 150 Grain Centerfire Rifle Ammo purchased from Cabela’s.

No Lies

For those of you shaking your head in disbelief thinking Mike must be stretching the truth making up an unbelievable hunting story about a blind man bagging two deer in two hours, the picture at the end of this post shows me standing between my first and second deer harvested, so far, in my life. 

Not Just Beginner’s Luck

Before you contributed our success solely to beginner luck, this hunt was the third time Kirk and I hunted together in the YO Ranch Land on the 88 acres Kirk along with his dad and brother own. In fact, before our success, Kirk and I spent the last four hours on Sunday evening of legal hunting time sitting in a nylon tent-style ground blind while actual temperatures dropped from low teens to single digits. Since the wind chill was forecasted to be below zero the next morning, we decided to work on ranch chores, allowing us to frequently get in-and-out of the truck to warm up, and post pone hunting until the temperature was forecasted to warm up to the low-20s in the afternoon. We also decided hunting a permanent elevated wood blind, so a portable propane heater could be used was the wise choice for Monday’s hunt.

It has been over 40 years, but I also did have some early childhood experience hunting on the family farm in Nebraska. You can read the hunting page for my early childhood hunting experience. In addition, there are posts about Kirk and my first two hunts that took place in November and December 2023. As a tease, I will tell you in November I was using my finger as a gun and in December only took pictures.

Monday Afternoon Hunt

About 2:35 Kirk and I climbed into the deer stand. I turned on the Noctis V1 after I securely mounted my rifle to a BOG Death Grip tripod. Kirk launched the Accufire app on my iPhone and established a wi-fi remote connection to my sight.

Doe One

Shortly before 3:00, Kirk started whispering, “We have a whitetail doe coming towards us. Be patient, I will tell you when to shoulder up.”

A few minutes later, Kirk says “Shoulder up and move towards the right. More right, a bit more right, on target.”

Kirk reminds me to make small adjustments now, whispering something like “down, left, up, right, down, left, hold, hold, and finally fire.”

While we exchange a high five, Kirk is no longer whispering, “great shot, we did it.”

Doe Two

We were back in the stand around 4:30, after we had picked up and hung the first deer back at the campsite.

Around 5:00 pm, Kirk starts whispering, “we have two whitetail doe heading towards us. This is incredible, if there is an opportunity I will try to get you on the bigger one. They will be extra cautious, so move slow and be very patient.”

It took over five minutes between the shoulder and the fire command This time in addition to left, right, up, down, and hold there were moving again, be patient, hold, take a breath, off target, might be a clear shot soon, back in the trees, right, hold.” To me, this dance seemed to take much longer than the five minutes, but finally I hear “fire” followed by kirk exclaiming, “we did it again, another great shot.”

The weather might have been cold, but the hunting was so hot, Kirk and I never had to light the forementioned portable heater.

Thank You

There will be others I will thank in additional postings. For now, I want to posthumously Thank my Dad and Grandpa Tackett for taking me hunting in early childhood. I know, both men would have enjoyed these pictures and this story. Incidentally, the Winchester XPR bolt-action is similar to the Winchester 25-06 Model 70 I carried as a teenager, but never shot during Nebraska deer season. No matter how many directional commands Dad gave I never could locate a deer in the scope. I would have loved to use the Accufire technology with my Dad and Grandpa.

Most importantly, thank you Kirk for sharing the Musgrove Family ranch and for your invaluable contributions to make this a successful hunt.