"The Rookie's First" by Stephanie Mallory with Brandy Bunting  
Newcomer to the sport drops the hammer from maybe the highest treestand in the world!
Reprinted with permission from www.realtree.com
April 18, 2005

Author's Note
Brandy Bunting from Lebanon, Indiana, is a nurse by trade and a hunter by newfound passion. Bunting, who's only been hunting for two years, tagged a fine Texas 9-pointer last season, and her proud boyfriend Mark Davis, senior manager of advertising and public relations for Shakespeare Fishing Tackle and friend to Realtree, couldn't wait to show off the pictures of her nice deer to the Realtree team. After seeing the pictures, we decided to share her story with you.

Three years ago, Brandy Bunting of Lebanon, Indiana, would have never pictured herself in a treestand, much less donning camouflage and toting a firearm through the Texas mesquite. But that's just exactly what she did last month while taking part in a management hunt at El Tecolote Ranch in Raymondville, Texas.  "My boyfriend Mark Davis is an avid hunter and introduced me to the deer hunting a couple of years ago," Bunting says. "No one in my family hunted, and I had no hunting experience before meeting Mark. I thought the fact that he hunted was just awesome, and I wanted to give it a try."  Bunting began her hunting experience by joining Davis in the woods as an observer. "Being in the middle of the woods with the wildlife just fascinated me," Bunting says. "The wilderness is so serene and quiet. You can hear everything around you. To be able to sit among the trees and watch the animals go about their routines without any idea that you're there is just awesome."  It wasn't long before Bunting was ready to give deer hunting a try by herself. When she reached the point where she felt comfortable alone in a stand, she and Mark parted ways one evening during South Carolina's late season, and she set up in a box blind on a food plot with the hope of tagging her first deer.  "As the day grew later, a large doe stepped out in the food plot 100 yards from me," Bunting says. "I became so nervous that I began to shake uncontrollably. I finally calmed down and took the shot. The doe went down instantly. She ended up weighing 140 pounds - pretty large for a South Carolina doe. I was so excited, and I became instantly hooked on hunting. I had my cell phone with me and text messaged Mark to let him know of my success."

The Texas Trophy

Bunting continued to enjoy deer hunting with Mark who invited her to accompany him on a management hunt in Texas this past December.  "I was very excited and nervous about this hunt," Bunting says. "I had never hunted anywhere other than South Carolina, and I had never even been to Texas."  El Tecolote Ranch manager Jim Rowland took Bunting under his wing with the mission of finding her a nice management buck.  "We began hunting early on a Friday morning and instantly saw numerous deer," Bunting says. "We saw one good buck, but Jim said he really wanted me to get a better one. That afternoon, we did some scouting from his truck. We spotted a really nice buck through the thicket as it fed at a feeder."  The Tower of Power!  Rowland and Bunting carefully stalked their way to an extremely tall shooting house that he'd built to cover a large section of the ranch. It was so tall that it resembled a fire tower. The duo climbed up three flights of steps, then stopped so Rowland could get a better look at the buck through his binoculars. "He wanted to make sure that the buck met the management criteria," Bunting says.  After glassing the buck, which stood approximately 100 yards away from the tower, Rowland looked at Bunting and said, "Ok, take him!"  "I instantly started shaking," Bunting says. "The wind was gusting strongly, and I was a nervous wreck, not to mention that I was probably 60 feet in the air. I'm not afraid of heights, but I've also never hunted from such a high stand. The stand was so huge that it resembled a little condo. I really got a kick out of it."  Bunting was shooting a 7mm Remington Mountain Gun with a Bushnell 4200 Elite scope but couldn't get a good shot from her location, so she moved up another set of stairs to a platform 70 feet high.  "The buck stood straight in front of me," Bunting says. "He wouldn't quarter away from me. On several occasions the buck went in and out of my sights. I thought to myself, 'I've blown this. I've lost this deer.' I had to really work at calming myself down. I felt as if I had been in that stand forever, when in fact, I had only stood there for about 15 minutes. Finally, the deer walked back into my sights and quartered away from me. I knew it was then or never. I took a breath and exhaled calmly and squeezed the trigger. He took two steps and piled up dropping right there just a few feet from where he had previously stood."  Bunting knew instantly that she had made a good shot. She was so emotional and so excited that she just started bawling. "I was crying so hard that I couldn't breath. When I finally calmed down, we climbed down from the stand and walked over to where the deer lay. He was absolutely beautiful."  Bunting couldn't wait for Davis to see her buck, but he was hunting 45 minutes from her location. When the two finally did meet up, he was ecstatic. "He was more excited about my deer than I was."

With a smile like that, you can tell she's hooked on hunting!

A Shared Passion

The couple's mutual enthusiasm for hunting has helped the two become closer over the years. "It's a really neat thing to be able to share a passion with someone you care so much about," Bunting says. "And I love that I've been taught to hunt by someone who is so serious and so wise about the sport. He knows everything there is to know about deer hunting. Our hunting experiences have definitely brought us closer together."  Bunting says her goal is to continue to expand her hunting experience and to share more time in the woods with Davis. "For Christmas this year, Mark gave me a bow. I've been practicing really hard and can't wait to give it a try this upcoming season."

Support from Friends and Family

The petite blonde's says although her family doesn't hunt, they've shown a lot of support for her newfound love. "My family really thinks it's awesome that I've taken up this sport. But my friends actually laugh at the thought of me hunting. I'm about 5'2," and I weigh about 115 pounds. They think it's hilarious to imagine such a petite woman as myself toting around a big gun through the woods. But in actuality, they support me as well."

Bunting says she encourages her friends and other women to give hunting a try. "Hunting is one of the most serene experiences you can have. Until you actually give it a try, you have no idea how awesome it really is. I definitely encourage any woman who has ever given it a thought to try it out."

Next season, Bunting will try her hand at archery. 
Realtree.com figures that she won't be bowhunting from Rowland's tower stand.

A Word from the Boyfriend

"Brandy is my best friend and hunting buddy besides being my sweetie," Davis says. "She showed an interest in hunting a few years ago and teaching her to hunt has been like learning all over again for me. It's been a blast.

"In addition to her Texas 9-point, Brandy killed a 250-pound brute of an eight-pointer in Missouri and took out two mature does at 100 yards with about three seconds between shots on other hunts in 2004," Davis says. "I nicknamed her 'Annie Oakley' after the season she had. Needless to say she's a quick learner, and I'm her biggest fan."