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Greener Pastures
By Dale Weddle
Ohio deer hunter crosses river to collect a little venison AND the buck of his dreams. Keith Miller is the kind of friend every hunter should have. “He’s serious about his hunting,” says Erik Heller. “Still, he was willing to share his spot with me.” That spot is a 200-acre farm in Kentucky, just across the Ohio River ... READ MORE
The Way to a Man’s Wallet
By Ed Waite
Double drops are a powerful incentive. It took seeing a buck with matching drop tines for Sam Tolbert to spring for a couple of trail cameras. It’s also why he bought his first crossbow. Sam was making a mid-morning, pre-party dumpster run on July 9, his son’s birthday, when he spotted three racked whitetails emerging from the trees and... READ MORE
Change of Plan
By Ed Waite
A funny thing happened on the way to a noontime rendezvous. The Indiana whitetail Zack Bowling tagged in 2016 got 15 free passes two years earlier, when it was a 4 1/2-year-old with an attitude. The bowhunter from Indianapolis would’ve shot it in 2015, but opportunity never knocked. He wound up spending more time in a hospital bed than in a d... READ MORE
Truth in Advertising
By Mike Handley
Oklahoman’s 2017 brute wears twice as many inches as the man’s previous best whitetail. When Steven Everett purchased 130 acres in Logan County, Oklahoma, in 2015, the previous landowner told him the property held some big bucks. Deer season had already started, so Steven didn’t have a lot of time to scout or erect stands. But he ... READ MORE
Georgia Buck Gets Its Due
By Lisa Price
The hypothetical becomes a reality, thanks to a deer hunter’s last will and testament. Cooper’s Creek Wildlife Management Area is one of Georgia’s largest, spanning about 30,000 acres. Nestled in the northeast, it’s part of the Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest. One of the local towns is Dahlonega, where many scenes from ... READ MORE
Lesser Stand
By Mike Handley
A low-percentage stand in a wobbly tree puts bowhunter in the right place at the right time. When Jeremy Way found both sheds off the buck he’d been hunting for two years, he was thrilled to learn it had survived the 2014 season. But when the 32-year-old hunter didn’t see the whitetail during the fall and winter of 2015, he was sure som... READ MORE
And the Winner Is...
By Mike Handley
Counting points is a lot more fun than tallying votes. Although voting in Kansas and much of the country was four hours from closing on Tuesday, Nov. 8, Dustin Norris was dying to know what exit polls were predicting. He wanted to see the map. The redder the better, to his way of thinking. The 35-year-old, laid-off welder was eager to see who was g... READ MORE
Pennsylvania Crossbow Record
By Eric Carns
One hunter’s loss leads to another’s gain. One gets the photos; the other gets the buck. My story begins weeks before Pennsylvania’s 2016 archery season even started, when my brother-in-law sent me pictures of a massive buck in velvet. One of my parents’ neighbors, a kid, was sharing trail camera photographs with him. Little... READ MORE
Piano Man
By Mike Handley
This Richland Parish bruiser, or at least its buddy, couldn’t resist the tickling of ivories. The rattling bag Geoffrey Henry bought just prior to the Oct. 1, 2017, bow opener was worth every penny. The deer hunter from Start, Louisiana, picked it up at Simmons’ Sporting Goods in Bastrop, after a couple of buddies in the store’s a... READ MORE
No Joke
By Mike Handley
Arkansas naysayer has a little crow to go along with his venison. When Chris Cypert saw the 2016 trail camera photograph of a buck with an extra beam, reportedly within 30 miles of his home in Searcy, Arkansas, he refused to take it seriously. He’d seen plenty of big buck photographs passed around from phone to phone, shared on Facebook, and ... READ MORE
WMA Monster
By Mike Handley
Breaking a sweat to escape well beaten paths puts this Oklahoman in the record books. Grunting at noises helped. One of the finest whitetails to fall in Oklahoma in 2016 came off land open to all. Ross Fenley, a 26-year-old mechanical engineer for International Paper Co., shot it while hunting with friends at the Three Rivers Wildlife Management Ar... READ MORE
Dos Desparos
By Mike Handley
State-record buck offers plenty of incentive to aim high, the second time. David Lecuyer doesn’t always take 280-yard shots at deer. But when he does, he shoots twice. The first two bullets – David’s and his buddy Bobby’s – probably whizzed underneath the lovestruck buck at the opposite end of the Kansas cornfield. The... READ MORE
Rifle Season Without Bullets
By Dale Weddle
Kentucky college student learns the worth of a climber, not to mention public land. One of the finest whitetails checked in during Kentucky’s 2014 rifle season came off a wildlife management area, but a bullet wasn’t responsible for the hole in its side. Cody Likins, a student at Eastern Kentucky University, shot the animal with his bow... READ MORE
A Deer with Two Names
By Ed Waite
Eighty yards from his ride home, this Indiana hunter stumbles into the ring of a whitetail circus. After tagging a 10-pointer in 2014, Jeff Berkemeier’s priority shifted from shooting a buck to collecting freezer meat. About 5:00 one cold and misty evening during Indiana’s blackpowder season, Jeff spotted a doe — venison — a... READ MORE
Daniel Gets His Groove Back
By Dale Weddle
This Kentucky hunter recombobulates in time to make his last bullet count. Most people who miss a buck four times would either keep their mouths shut or sing the blues. Daniel Lay is not most people. If he’d had the presence of mind to stand up and leave after firing all but one of his bullets in 2016, the hunter from Williamsburg, Kentucky,... READ MORE
The 10th Camera
By John E. Phillips
You’ll always find what you’re seeking in the last place you look. The day after the 2015 deer season ended, one of Jamie Barnette’s trail cameras photographed the biggest – if not, certainly the most unique – whitetail he’d seen in eight years of hunting Kansas. He and his buddies pegged it as a 3-year-old weari... READ MORE
A Series of Fortunate Events
By Mike Handley
Any number of factors could’ve altered this tale of whoa to one of woe. If Darren Ambrose had been hunting with a compound instead of a longbow in 2009, chances are he wouldn’t have had an opportunity for a do-over. He was so bedazzled by the whitetail sporting a drop tine and 21 other points that he shot over its back from a mere 10 ya... READ MORE
Nearly Point-Blank
By John E. Phillips
Ohio man learns not to dismiss his wife’s intuition. Although Charles Gerken was sitting beside his wife, Fabiola, on Oct. 9, 2016, he didn’t see the buck she shot at nearly point-blank range until afterward “I tried to wake my husband, but he was so sound asleep he wouldn’t wake up,” Fabiola said. “The buck was ... READ MORE
We Three Kings
By Richard P. Smith
Three of four Michigan crossbow records are toppled during the 2016 season. Editor’s Note: Wondering how Michigan could gain three new state records in one season without one cancelling out another? Under Buckmasters’ system, every weapon category has No. 1 spots for the four types of racks we recognize: typical, perfect, semi-irregular... READ MORE
CCTV
By Mike Handley
This Kansas bowhunter is a believer in trail cameras. He also knows a year can turn a good buck into a great one. Ethan Lorance knows the value of eyes in the sky, or at least on the ground. The 25-year-old pipefitter from Bonner Springs, Kansas, employed several trail cameras to learn as much as he could about the buck that made him a social media... READ MORE