First Hunt, First Day, First Buck
Greg Byers of Waukesha sends us a photo of his first Wisconsin buck taken at Wyslusing State Park in Prairie Du Chien at about 7:00 am opening morning. Byers is the INET account representative for “On Wisconsin Outdoors” and was instrumental along with INET Graphic Design expert Sam Matter in building our website. Both deer hunter s sighted in their rifles at OWO advertising client Wern Valley Sportsmen Club the week before the gun deer season, Byers with an Interarms Mark X bolt action .308 and Matter with a Steyr .30-06 bolt action. Both were dead-nuts on with their shooting when the session concluded, with Sam also sighting in his .17 HMR rifle used when squirrel hunting.
Matter said that of eight hunters in his group deer hunting in the Crivitz area in Marinette County, four were successful. Sam said he was not one of the successful hunters, but enjoyed the field experience and time on the range. The .30-06 was perfectly sighted in after four rounds and the newly purchased .17 HMR was also sighted in to perfection after the shooting session.
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| Greg Byers of Waukesha sights in his Interarms Mark X .308 bolt action rifle on the Wern Valley Sportsmen’s Club shooting range before deer season. | Sam Matter of Mukwonago sights-in his newly purchased .17 HMR on the Wern Valley Sportsmen’s Club shooting range. Matter will use the rifle while squirrel hunting. |
Byers was successful in the west central region of Wisconsin and sent us the story. The day prior to opening day, Eric Clark, Mike Kulas, and Byers scouted the land at Wyalusing State Park “looking for good spots to sit with the most activity and biggest field of view”.
“My spot was halfway up a ridge looking down the valley with a stream running through the middle,” Byers said. “The next morning started at 4 am with Eric, Mike and I gathering all of our gear for the day. I remember Mike and Eric springing out of bed all ramped up talking about getting a ‘teeerrdy point buck’ and I all could think about is putting in a chew without my wife there to shake her head in disappointment.”
After driving to Wyalusing state park, said that he “could not wait to get to my spot so I could take a nap”. It’s probably safe to say that Byers, a sergeant in the Marines who served a combat tour in Iraq as a rifleman/machine gunner, did not take many such naps while serving his country against a different target.
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| With his Steyr .30-06 bolt action deer rifle sighted in ,Sam Matter, foreground, shoots his newly purchased .17 HMR squirrel gun on the Wern Valley Sportsmen’s Club shooting range while Greg Byers sights his Interarms Mark X .308 bolt action rifle in the background prior to deer season. | Greg Byers, Marine sergeant veteran who served a combat tour in Iraq as a rifleman/machine gunner, finds his final group with the Interarms Mark X .308 bolt action rifle on the Wern Valley Sportsmen’s Club shooting range satisfactory prior to the Wisconsin deer hunt. Byers scored on opening day with a 7-point buck at Wyalusing State Park near Prairie du Chien. |
“Once we got to the park we got all our gear on and started to trek through the woods at about 5:30,” he said. “As I was walking I was thinking to myself ‘why in the world would anyone want to willingly wake up at 4 am to sit in the woods and wait for a deer to come?’ It wasn’t until I sat down in my spot and the sun started to rise before I realized what the hype was all about.”
“I remember sitting there with a big dip in listening to the wind blowing and watching a pair of squirrels chasing each other around. My mind was at peace. It was really nice to get away from my very fast- paced life and just enjoy the moment and not think about work or any stress in general. Time seemed to slow down and I was totally relaxed and loving life.”
After about two hours Byers heard two consecutive gun shots from the direction of Eric’s stand followed closely by a verifying call that his friend’s buck was down and tagged.
“I was pretty excited for him,” Byers said. “But I was thinking that there was no chance for me to get a deer in the spot I was in after talking on the phone. I decided to move down the stream to a little water fall and check the field of vision there. It was not a better stand so I decided to head back to the original stand and when I re-entered the valley I could not believe my eyes; a huge buck was several hundred yards ahead.”
“I tried to sneak up the valley to the top of the ridge so that I could get a good shot without the buck seeing me. By the time I got to the top of the ridge the buck was gone. I decided to take a seat and after a few minutes I could see another buck going down the hill at roughly 80 yards. I took a knee and made sure I had a perfect site picture before taking the shot. I slowly inhaled and exhaled. On the pause I took the shot.”
Byers said he was startled when the buck started to sprint towards him. He re-chambered another round and took one final finishing shot on the struggling buck as it turned.
On day one of his first deer hunt ever, Greg Byers takes his first buck.
“I could not believe it,” Byers said. I tagged a buck on the first day ever of Wisconsin deer hunting. My buddies had to help me with the next steps of gutting the deer and dragging him out of the woods. It was an amazing time in the field. I’ll be going next year. I can’t wait for the venison!”