Black Powder Relief

Flintlock season had begun in Pennsylvania and for the first time ever, both my buck and doe tag remained in my wallet unfilled.

I woke up and got my clothes on and before anything else, I cleaned my flash pan and frizzen in preparation for our afternoon hunt. 

I went to check my fisher traps and as I started out the door I grabbed my gun and loaded it into the truck. When I arrived at the path leading to my traps, I got out and filled the flash pan as the bows of the hemlocks hung low covered in snow. 

I started walking down the snow-covered path as deer tracks also covered it. I figured the chances of seeing a deer were slim as the ground crunched with every step. 

I made my way to the hemlock-covered ridge where my first set was. As I neared it I could tell something was off and fisher tracks covered the snow. The trap was set off and the tracks indicated that he had spent a long time checking everything out which gave me high hopes he would return. 

With nothing to fix my set, I made the way to the second one a couple of hundred yards farther. I just stepped out of the hemlocks and onto the trail again and made it about twenty yards when I saw three does running about a hundred and twenty yards away. 

It was nothing that I didn't already expect since it never seemed that I could walk quietly on the crunchy ground. I made my way out to where I had seen them and was more intently watching all the deer tracks in the snow than looking around.

Something off-color came to the corner of my eye as I neared my next trap and as I turned my head a doe stood under a lone hemlock about forty yards away. She seemed content just watching me so I just kept walking as every opening I came to it seemed a tree was in front of her. 

The hammer was already cocked and I knew once I cleared two big oaks I was going to have my chance. 

I stepped out from behind them and as the gun met my shoulder and the sights met hers the flash went off, as did the barrel. 

Through the smoke, I could see her drop and a bit of relief came over me. As only one tag remained in my wallet now.