I had the pleasure of filming my long-time huntin' buddy, Terry Rice, take the biggest free-range deer I have ever seen! He is not a TBH'er so I asked him if it was cool with him if I told the story..... He said "go for it"
This deer had only been spotted once. One the other side of the ranch, in the evening. On our drive up it was decided that we wouldn't risk spooking this deer in the morning, we would hunt him in evening and in order to make sure we didn't spook him, we would hunt on the other side of the ranch. The stand where we decided to hunt the first morning has been very productive over the years and Terry had sent me pictures of several great bucks, so it didn't upset me at all that I would be the "shooter" the first morn and Terry would man the camera and we would go after his monster buck that evening.
The weather was PERFECT. We were in the stand 45 min before sun-up. Trying to snooze without snoring, when deer started to show up in the area we have named "the honey hole". There were 4 or 5 and as the sun finally started to give us some light you could tell one of them was a hoss of a deer.. a brute and he was inside of 20 yards. We are both expecting it to be Big 10 that we had seen pics of. I was ready. Terry was ready. All we need is enough light. Then the buck raised his head and against the sunrise all I saw was a bunch of horn with a big ol' kicker off the right side. We are both thinking "wow... didn't know he had a kicker"... then he raised his head again and we both see this beautiful drop-tine off his left.I looked at Terry and told him what he already knew...."that's your deer" his response was something like "what the #$*% is he doing over here?" Now we have a decision to make. Do we let him walk and risk never seeing him again or do we try to get swapped around were Terry can make the shot and I can hopefully get it on film. Even though he didn't tell me that I couldn't, there was no way I was going to shoot this deer. He had worked his tail off out here for 9 years for a deer like this. We were in a pop up blind, 17yds from a monster buck. No one would try to swap bows for camera and swap spots... LET'S TRY IT!!! After about 20 minutes we managed to get things re-situated. At one point he had wandered off a little ways but never out of view. Terry was now in position and I was trying to ease behind him to get the shot when 2 doe came out and put us back into statue mode. Big Boy sees the ladies and comes over to show off. He is now standing broadside in front of Terry at 19 yds. Terry and I made a pact a long time ago that "if the camera ain't running you don't shoot". I couldn't get the camera on the buck, and it was running so I zoomed in on Terry's face as he was staring at the buck of a lifetime. Then his eyes cut straight to the camera. They say you can tell a lot by looking into someone's eyes, and these were telling me that "YOU HAD BETTER GET YOUR BUTT IN POSITION BECAUSE I AM ABOUT TO LAY THE SMACKDOWN ON THIS FREAKNASTY WHETHER THE CAMERA IS ON OR NOT.... AND BY THE WAY, IF YOU SPOOK THIS DEER I WILL SHOOT YOU!" I eased the camera into the window beside Terry as he started to draw, found him in the viewfinder, made sure his string and arrow were going to clear the camera and whispered "got him" just before Terry squeezed off a perfect shot. He sent the 2 Blade Rage straight through this bad-boy's heart. He bolted and went down within 50 yards of being hit. PERFECT!!! And I thank God that I was there to witness it!
We scored him at 188 3/8 gross.... It was an awesome experience.
This deer had only been spotted once. One the other side of the ranch, in the evening. On our drive up it was decided that we wouldn't risk spooking this deer in the morning, we would hunt him in evening and in order to make sure we didn't spook him, we would hunt on the other side of the ranch. The stand where we decided to hunt the first morning has been very productive over the years and Terry had sent me pictures of several great bucks, so it didn't upset me at all that I would be the "shooter" the first morn and Terry would man the camera and we would go after his monster buck that evening.
The weather was PERFECT. We were in the stand 45 min before sun-up. Trying to snooze without snoring, when deer started to show up in the area we have named "the honey hole". There were 4 or 5 and as the sun finally started to give us some light you could tell one of them was a hoss of a deer.. a brute and he was inside of 20 yards. We are both expecting it to be Big 10 that we had seen pics of. I was ready. Terry was ready. All we need is enough light. Then the buck raised his head and against the sunrise all I saw was a bunch of horn with a big ol' kicker off the right side. We are both thinking "wow... didn't know he had a kicker"... then he raised his head again and we both see this beautiful drop-tine off his left.I looked at Terry and told him what he already knew...."that's your deer" his response was something like "what the #$*% is he doing over here?" Now we have a decision to make. Do we let him walk and risk never seeing him again or do we try to get swapped around were Terry can make the shot and I can hopefully get it on film. Even though he didn't tell me that I couldn't, there was no way I was going to shoot this deer. He had worked his tail off out here for 9 years for a deer like this. We were in a pop up blind, 17yds from a monster buck. No one would try to swap bows for camera and swap spots... LET'S TRY IT!!! After about 20 minutes we managed to get things re-situated. At one point he had wandered off a little ways but never out of view. Terry was now in position and I was trying to ease behind him to get the shot when 2 doe came out and put us back into statue mode. Big Boy sees the ladies and comes over to show off. He is now standing broadside in front of Terry at 19 yds. Terry and I made a pact a long time ago that "if the camera ain't running you don't shoot". I couldn't get the camera on the buck, and it was running so I zoomed in on Terry's face as he was staring at the buck of a lifetime. Then his eyes cut straight to the camera. They say you can tell a lot by looking into someone's eyes, and these were telling me that "YOU HAD BETTER GET YOUR BUTT IN POSITION BECAUSE I AM ABOUT TO LAY THE SMACKDOWN ON THIS FREAKNASTY WHETHER THE CAMERA IS ON OR NOT.... AND BY THE WAY, IF YOU SPOOK THIS DEER I WILL SHOOT YOU!" I eased the camera into the window beside Terry as he started to draw, found him in the viewfinder, made sure his string and arrow were going to clear the camera and whispered "got him" just before Terry squeezed off a perfect shot. He sent the 2 Blade Rage straight through this bad-boy's heart. He bolted and went down within 50 yards of being hit. PERFECT!!! And I thank God that I was there to witness it!
We scored him at 188 3/8 gross.... It was an awesome experience.
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