Rack Magazine

This Hoosier bruiser ties the BTR’s world shotgun record, at least in composite score.

“You shot my deer!” I heard someone exclaim as I sat in my treestand watching the steam rising from the nostrils of my freshly downed buck. I looked to my left and saw a moose of a man in camouflage. He crossed from his cornfield behind me onto mine and was heading toward the magnificent buck I had shot only a few minutes earlier.

I had heard stories of hunters squabbling in the field over disputed kills, though I had never witnessed such. As with all things in life, there is a first time for everything.

For a brief instant, I contemplated the probable outcome of my engaging in a physical altercation with a man half again my size.

Fortunately, my story has a happy ending. And perhaps semi-fortunate for you, gentle reader, is that you get to hear it. So gather ’round, children.

Nov. 17, 2012, was the first day of deer gun season in Indiana. I hunt farmland and small woodlots. Because of this, I consider my spot somewhat inferior since other hunters on adjacent properties theoretically have first crack at deer moving through the area.

From my stand, I can sometimes see two, three or perhaps even up to 12 other hunters at any given time. On this day, I believe there were at least eight of us hunting.

For almost 20 years, my plan of attack has been to take two weeks vacation from work to hunt deer. Indiana deer gun season generally is 16 days in November — two full weeks encompassing three weekends. I try to hunt from morning until dark, maximizing my time in the stand.

There are downsides to my plan, however. It takes incredible mental stamina to look at the same damned soybean stubble or cornstalks for 10 hours a day, 16 days straight, and not go mad from the monotony. Happily, the occasional crow, cardinal, squirrel, barn cat, lost dog, low-flying airplane or whatever shows up to provide welcome diversion and respite.

Hunger must also be considered. Before I began deer hunting, I could take or leave a bologna sandwich — usually leave. Bologna sandwiches are now my staple during deer season. I always have a few in my pack to help ward off hunger on my daylong vigils.

Eight days into the season, however, I am sick and tired of bologna. Consequently, I have found that I can eat no cold cuts at all during the rest of the year. It is a trade-off I have been willing to make.

So on this day, as I had done for years, I arrived at the property early enough to walk to my stand. I left the ATV in my truck bed, where it would remain unless I needed to haul out a buck.

My walk was a little more than half a mile through a picked and re-tilled cornfield. Mercifully, the farmer leaves a truck-width path for me from the road to the woods untilled. It has to be at least a small aggravation for him to leave that strip in the middle of the field, and I have always appreciated it.

There is no way to tell my story without anonymously mentioning the man who owned the land on which I was hunting. His relationship to me can probably best be described as pseudo-stepdad.

He passed away in August 2012. He was a sportsman who took many trophy game animals and fish from all over the world. He and I were able to go fishing several times, once with a charter captain who at the time had a television show.

The 2012 deer season was the first that he was not there to watch me from his window as I sat in my stand. In a season several years earlier, he watched me shoot a nice 12-pointer. From his window seat, he gave play-by-play announcements to my mother over the phone: “The buck is coming. It is coming. It looks like an elk! He is going to shoot. He shot. He shot! The buck is running to the woods!”

The old man eventually drove my truck back and watched me gut the incredibly large-bodied buck.

“His heart looks like a frigging beef heart!” he exclaimed.

I think he was happier than I was.

Over the years, whenever I field-dressed deer, I saved the tongues for him. He considered them delicacies. Sadly, there was no tongue bag in my pack for the 2012 season.

Opening day, I had to watch the dark windows of his empty home for the first time, and a sense of melancholy dampened my usual enthusiasm.

By 9 a.m., I had consumed two sandwiches to quiet my stomach. Seasoned hunters know that a whitetail can hear a rumbling belly from a quarter-mile. When they were gone, I cursed myself for not bringing more. I checked my pockets for granola bars, found one (expiration date 2007), and held it in reserve.

This day I was in a ladder stand with a padded shooting rail surrounded with camouflage material. I had hung a few deer scents in the branches around me, including the fragrant drag I had used en route. My hunting pack (sans sandwiches) was on the floor of the stand behind me.

Around 9:30, I was checking the weather radar on my smartphone. I had placed my gun on the floor in front of me with the barrel resting in the right corner of the shooting rail, pointing upward.

I saw a doe cross into the field to my left. An antlered buck was walking right behind her with love on his mind. They had been traveling from behind me. The doe walked out in front of me, turned, and angled back toward my stand with the buck bringing up the rear. I waited until the doe turned her head to look back at the buck, and then picked up my gun.

I put the gun on the shooting rail and shouldered it. The buck seemed oblivious to anything except the doe and continued to follow her toward me with its head down, its wide rack obscuring much of its body as I viewed it through my scope.

The doe stopped and appeared nervous. I think she spotted me. The buck continued to her, quartering toward me.

About 50 yards from me, the buck stopped and lifted its head. Time to shoot, I decided.

I put the crosshairs just right of the brisket and fired. The buck stomped around, but did not run. Neither did the doe.

The buck stood still for a few seconds, and then began walking to my right, giving me a broadside target.

After I fired a second time, it pivoted and fell. The doe travelled away to my right, exiting my field, and I heard a boom soon afterward. I learned later that a hunter on the neighboring property shot her.
The words came while my eyes were on the dead buck.

“You shot my deer!” the moose-man yelled. He was following the same path the buck had taken.

Moose-man crossed into my field and turned to speak with me. For a split second, I did not recognize him. But then I realized he was a fellow hunter who hunted the adjacent land.

I had met him a few times over the years during deer season, and we had exchanged information such as “Which way did they go?” (West) “Did you see anyone messing with my deer stands?” (I had.) “Do you have any extra bologna sandwiches?” (He did not.)

The moose-man asked for permission to go look at my buck, which I granted. He marched to the deer while I descended my stand. Ay Chihuahua! I thought when I saw the antlers up close.

As it turned out, the buck and doe had passed right in front of my acquaintance on their way toward me. Indiana has a one-buck rule. He had already taken a buck during bow season and did not try for the doe because he wanted to watch the giant-racked deer.

He had witnessed my harvest and congratulated me on a clean, quick kill. We ogled the antlers and chatted a bit. He took some photos, and then returned to his property to resume hunting.

My usual practice upon getting a deer is to send a text message with photo to my good friend Bubba Joe. He usually responds with a “Good job” or whatever.

So I dutifully selected a photo and sent a message about a 30-something-point buck to him. Almost immediately, my phone rang.

“I am coming to see!” Bubba Joe informed me.

I explained where I was and asked him to unload my ATV and drive it to me to save a walk. Meanwhile, I gathered my gear and field-dressed the buck.

I tagged it with my homemade deer tag. I bought an Indiana Lifetime Comprehensive Hunting and Fishing License (no longer offered) in 1996. It covers all possible Indiana hunting and fishing licenses.

From a cost standpoint, I broke even long ago. A minor inconvenience is that I have no official temporary tags and have to craft my own. Over the years, I have used scraps of paper, wrappers, keychain tags (work great) and notecards, to name a few items.

Lately, the Indiana DNR website has been offering a temporary tag that can be printed. I now use that and handwrite “Lifetime” for license type.

When Bubba Joe eventually arrived on my ATV, I rigged the buck for transport. I had failed to ask him to also bring my deer cart, so we initially employed a plastic deer drag sled already at my stand. The thing is akin to, but much more expensive than, a child’s snow sled.

Unfortunately, the buck’s rack proved too cumbersome for the narrow sled. So we unloaded the buck and tied it to the ATV with a rope.

Bubba Joe pointed to my truck in the distance and noted the crowd gathering. Sure enough, word had already spread. I marveled at modern communication technology. I noticed other trucks with hunters milling about, waiting for my buck and me to make an appearance.

I climbed aboard the ATV and started again. I had to drag the buck slowly and arrived at my truck with no further issues.

I enjoyed talking with several of the hunters who had gathered to see the buck and offer me congratulations.

After about an hour, I decided to call an end to my one-man deer show. I thanked everyone for coming and asked them to please drive safely going home.

Bubba Joe took charge of loading the buck onto my hitch rack, which he’d fabricated and recently given to me. He was as proud of the hitch rack as I was of the buck’s rack. Perhaps even more so.

As I drove away, I glanced in my rearview mirror at the house and the dark windows. I think the old man would have been proud.

Hunter: Tim Beck
BTR Score: 315 2/8"
View BTR Scoresheet

This article was published in the February 2016 edition of Rack Magazine. Subscribe today to have Rack Magazine delivered to your home.

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