Stubborn

So, I'll admit it. I'm stubborn. I don't like to change things. I'm also very low tech and old school. I hunt deer using a lever action BLR with iron sights. It's done well for me. I rarely have any shots over 50 yards in the woods where I hunt. I like the quick aim, and I like the look. I also love the .358 Winchester round. But my last three deer seasons have been busts. The first of those years I just never saw any deer close enough to shoot. This past year I had a shot on a pair of does that I decided wasn't safe, and then, on the last day, at last light, I took a downhill shot at a doe and shot right over her back. And yes, iron sights probably did me in that day. But that year in between. That was frustrating.

It was the last day. It was getting near sundown. It was still before legal sundown, but the shadows were getting long. I was sitting on a little hill we like to hunt on. There is a bluff in front of us, woods behind us, little hollows to the right and left. The sun had dipped behind the hill to my left, and the woods were dark. There were five minutes left in the season. And then I saw them. About 60 yards out was a small herd of deer, crossing the hollow, and heading up the bluff. But I couldn't really make them out. There were at least six of them, probably more, and at least one buck. In the dim light of the woods, they were more like ghosts than deer, just grey shadows moving through my line of sight. I strained to see them well enough to draw a bead on one of them, but it was useless. I passed up the shot, and the season was over. Optics would have saved the day. A nice scope, with good LGP, would have made those deer visible and I'd have had venison for the winter. And I probably wouldn't have shot over that deer this past season either.

Now there's a scope on the BLR.  It points nice, is good in dim light, isn't too heavy, and the groupings are very nice at 50 yards.