Most of you may have heard that I harvested, what I consider a local Pacific Hybrid monster. It was a Thursday afternoon, after work. I walked and glassed for about an hour. I set up in couple of places to grunt call the pre rut. I found a perfect setup. It was an open meadow area surrounded by real heavy brush. I just bumped a small forked horn and it looked promising. I grunt called for about five minutes. I was kneeling in a small alcove in a sumac bush. It was on!!!! I heard two approaching deer from two directions. If I sat there long enough, it would have started a brawl. The noise coming through the brush from both sides of me sounded like the TE-REX feeding scene from Jurassic Park. I was waiting for the one directly in front of me to show itself, at the same time the noise to my right continued but did not get closer. I dropped off my backpack and leaned forward. I peered around the brush only to see the buck at 35 yards, raking the bush up and down. I stood up and moved slowly into a shooting position. With his head in the bush, I glassed him quickly. I could see he was a shooter, thick and points galore. I drew back, held and released a well placed shot right in the boiler pocket. He then bolted directly towards me, running past at 10 yards. He ran by and I said to my self, "YES", oh my gosh, he is huge! I quickly moved to the edge where he went over to see if I could see him. I saw him moving down t he hill at about 40 yards, and down he went. I glassed him as I saw him get back up and go slowly around a large bush. I patiently watched, as I thought I saw him drop his head. I went back to my back pack and called home. I then called a hunting partner Rob Ramos and left a voice mail. I tried to call others, but my phone was low on power and my signal was weak. I waited about a half an hour before going down to where I last saw him. As I approached, "He was gone". Oh no! I glassed around and noticed my arrow about 10 yards away. I picked it up and it was covered with blood and bubbles. I did not want to push fast and push him if I only got one lung. I slowly zig zagged down the hill as I caught sign of his rump and there he was piled up. In total he only went less than 70 yards downhill from where I shot him. The shot was good indeed. I put my hands on his antlers and expressed a sigh of relief. I was so pumped and excited. I called home one last time before my phone quit, to let Debbie know it would be a late night. I took a few photographs of the deer and wished the camera I had, had a timer. My phone would not take any pictures as the charge was to far gone and it was getting dark. Anyway I was pretty far from the vehicle and mostly uphill and over a few ridges. I decided to cut him in half to make it out before morning. It was still a toat to handle on my portapack frame. After packing him the best I could I started to the car. My mag light was going dim and no phone. Hardly any trail to speak of, I made my way through the dark to half way. I decided to take my backpack and bow to the car, charge my phone and get another light out of the Jeep. I called home and they said, Rob and Debbie were on their way. So I waited a bit to rest. The got there and it was about 11:00 pm. After they got here we hiked down and started halling him up. We stopped but only a few times to rest. I told Rob and Debbie. If you are going to pinch me and wake me up, just do it before I carry him all the way out. They laughed. We got to the vehicle at 12:30 am. I decided to come back in the morning for the other half. We woke the fire department staff and chief at Las Virgenes fire dept. To validate the tag. He was not upset in the least and said thanks for showing him. We got home and took some other photos of me and the deer. In the morning I retrieved the second half without any animal feasting upon my harvest. He is now at the butcher and caped to be my best California buck to date. WOW. I green scored him 128 5/8s. That places him in the top ten for the California Pacific hybrid. Bear season opened today. Hmmmmmmmm? Thanks for sharing the moment. Bob Bombardier