(The following is an e-mail I received from one of my customers and friend, Bill Baker. I'd like to share his 1997 hunting season success story by printing the original letter. Congratulations Bill!!!)

Darryl,

I got one!!!!! Do you believe it? Sorry I haven't written lately but I lost my hard drive. It's been a month without a computer and I lost a lot of files. Back to the deer. I've been practicing as much as possible and even passed up a few does. At any rate I was in my stand, a large oak tree in an apple orchard behind my house. I saw a few does in the morning and heard some turkeys in the pines. I hit my grunt call a few times and watched a school bus in the distance. Suddenly from behind I heard the tell tale sound of a deer approaching. I looked back and saw a lone deer coming right at me. I realized the deer would pass directly under my stand. I hugged the tree and closed my eyes. The deer stopped right under me. Finally I heard it begin to move on and I open my eyes and readied the Journey. I did not see any horns but elected to shoot since I had not filled my doe tag. However a large bush blocked my shot and I waited until the deer cleared the bush. I drew on the deer as it quartered away and at 15 yards, I aimed and tried to make a smooth release. As I released the Eskimo tipped shaft, to my surprise my tab and glove went with the arrow! My heart jumped into my throat as I realized that my string was behind my tab. The deer jumped off with its tail down and with my red and white feathered shaft. I waited thirty minutes before I moved to the ground.

I returned home and luckily my boys had not yet gone to school. I told them to prepare for a long tracking job and explained my misfortune with the glove and tab. We collected our tracking materials and headed to the woods. We entered the woods and I climbed up my tree to retrace the shot and angle of my arrow. My boys found my tab and glove near some upturned leaves. I got down out of my stand and joined the boys. The trail was easy to follow and after about 15 yards of travel we found my arrow. The arrow was like new, unbroken and broadhead still sharp. We continued on the trail. Suddenly my son said, "look there it is". Lying to the left and behind us was my deer. A closer examination revealed that it was indeed a buck. Although a fair sized deer for these parts its body weight was around 130lb. However its antlers were only about three inches in length. Billy noted that it was good we culled this guy before he passed on his bad antler genetics. I agreed. As luck would have it, the deer only went 30 yards at best from the orchard. I was really happy. We had a round of high fives and discussed how lucky I was. We cleaned the deer and started the drag back to my house.

Well I did it! Not a pretty shot and not a wall hanger, but that piece of wood you made in Canada took its first deer. Thanks. I still have a tag left but I'm kinda fussy now that there is meat in the freezer. Going after the turkeys in the morning. Lots of snow here.

Later,

Bill