You wouldn’t expect a serious golfer to hit the links with just any set of clubs. He has to have his clubs — the ones he uses to give him confidence in his drives, chips and putts.
Can you see Tiger Woods out there with a Bear Bryant hound’s tooth hat? No, he has to be wearing a cap with that fancy “TW” inscribed on the front.
It’s the same for deer hunters. We have come to accumulate a bunch of gadgets and gizmos that we assume will not only help us attract big bucks; these special items serve the purpose of giving us confidence.
For example, when I climb into my stand, the first thing I do after getting settled is to reach into a certain pocket in my backpack, pull out the buckeye ball I’ve carried with me for several years and gently rub it before putting it back in its special place. Does rubbing a buckeye ball help me kill a big buck? It hasn’t so far, but since a friend gave it to me, assuring me it would bring good luck in the deer woods, I’m afraid not to try it.
Kenneth Edwards feels the same way about the gadget he always takes along with him. My buckeye ball does nothing auditory nor visual to attract a deer, neither does it carry a smell to appeal to a buck’s olfactory senses. Edwards’ gadget, though, does more than act as a mojo when he has it in his hand. He has come to trust the realistic sounds made by his “Can,” marketed by Primos Calls in Mississippi.
Edwards, GIS manager and wildlife biologist for Timber Star Southwest near Mansfield, has come to rely on the Can whenever he heads out to hunt deer.
“Once I was hunting on some International Paper land in Cherokee County in Texas, an area where I’d found some big scrapes, indicating that a big buck was in the area,” Edwards explained.
“I sat down on the ground, took out my grunt call and my Primos Can, but before I could get all my stuff laid out, I heard something that sounded like a cow lowing. I knew we owned the land for miles around there and there were no cows on the property, and I was puzzled until I heard a buck grunt. I assumed the ‘cow’ sound must have been a doe bleating.
“I pulled out the Can, tipped it over and back to produce the bleating sound, then hit my grunt call. About that time, I saw the outline of a deer on the ridge nearby, but couldn’t tell if it was buck or doe. I hit the Can again, and watched the deer come off the ridge and head my way.
“Just as I identified the deer as a good buck, it jumped the creek and stood 35 yards from me, looking at me. The deer spooked, I hit the call again, he stopped and I shot him.”
Last year, I hunted with Edwards and several other friends on Timber Star land near Mansfield in DeSoto Parish. At the end of the hunt, Edwards told about how the Can worked for him again that day.
“I was sitting on a ladder stand, made a couple of calls on the Can,” he said. “I waited a few minutes, hit the Can again and almost immediately I saw movement to my left. It was a doe, coming up the creek bank, obviously looking for me. While I was watching her, I saw a buck walking away from me. I hit the Can again, and here comes the buck. He spied the doe and started toward her. The buck, an 8 pointer, had a rack only about 15 inches wide and I decided to let him go.
“I waited a few minutes after the buck and doe left, hit the Can again and here comes a 4-point buck. Then here comes another doe across in front of me, and I watch her disappear. I hit the Can again, and here comes the 4-point chasing the doe. He’s grunting with his nose down behind the doe. There is no doubt in my mind that hearing the sounds coming from the Can brought all these deer around me.”
I have talked with other deer hunters who will not go to the woods without certain items they feel are important or at least make their stay in the stand more positive. I regularly visit a website where hunters who have become cyber-friends over the years have their own ideas of what no self-respecting deer hunter would leave at home.
Click here to read the rest of this story, which first appeared in the December 2007 issue of Louisiana Sportsman magazine.
