Rack Magazine

Some things are just meant to be.

Evan Richardson is not your typical 12-year-old.

While other kids his age might find a thousand things more interesting than twiddling their thumbs in a deer stand, Evan can’t imagine anything more pleasurable. He might be short in the tooth, but this little deer hunter already values the experience more than the killing.

“It’s just good to be out there seeing God’s creation,” the boy says, eliciting smiles from his parents, Chad and Jodi Richardson.

Evan is the second child Chad has introduced to hunting. He first took his daughter, Emily.

“Evan’s older sister killed a nice 8-pointer when she was 9,” he said. “After that, she never did hunt much.”

It was a whole ’nother ballgame with Evan.

Chad began taking his son afield with him when the boy was about 8 years old. Evan showed a keen interest in animal tracks and what made them.

Mirroring his big sister’s accomplishment, he took his first deer – also an 8-pointer – when he was 9.

“After he shot that first buck, I told him he needed to start holding out for something bigger each year,” Chad said. “But that was a hard thing for him to do. When Evan got interested in hunting, I pretty much quit myself because it was more fun just to watch him.

“The 2016 season was just an odd year because we were building a house and didn’t have much time,” he said.

“We’re usually out there early, scouting and making sure our stands are okay. We didn’t do any of that. We just got up and went on opening morning of rifle season.”

“Dad woke me up about 4:30 that day,” Evan said. “He had built a blind close to our house, but he hadn’t been seeing anything there. So we were trying to decide where to hunt when Dad finally said, ‘We better go to your grandmother’s place.’”

He was referring to a Webster County farm Jodi’s family has owned for 50 or 60 years.

En route, father and son stopped at a gas station to grab something to eat.

“The place was busy with other people on their way to hunt, too,” Evan remembered.

Chad had a particular destination in mind, the perfect setup for the two of them.

“We’ve had a two-man ladder stand up at the farm in the same spot for five years,” he said. “It’s been there long enough that the ratchet straps are sinking up into the tree.

“The stand is near the corner of a narrow field that’s about 100 yards wide and 500 yards long,” he continued. “The spot is a natural funnel for deer.

“Crops are rotated in the field, and this past year, it had been in soybeans. There’s timber all around the field,” Chad added. “From up above, it would look like you just cut out a little piece of the woods for the field.”

“We parked the truck and got out,” Evan took over. “We had about a quarter-mile walk to get to the stand. Dad had taught me how to walk quietly.

“It was still dark and a little bit chilly when we got to the stand. After we tied a cord to my gun, I climbed up and Dad followed. I also had a backpack with binoculars, a facemask, grunt call and other stuff.

“The first thing we saw after it got daylight was four or five does feeding about 50 yards away. Then I saw a mom and her fawn off in the distance,” the boy continued. “After a while, a spike came out to our right. It kept looking back, and I wondered what it was looking at.

“Just then, I saw another buck, and thought Oh, my Lord. That’s a BIG DEER!”

“I was sitting on the right,” Chad chimed in. “I could see the biggest side of the rack, which was huge. I had my hand on Evan’s leg and was telling him to wait because I didn’t want him to take a pot shot.

“When the buck came out of the woods, it turned its head and stuck its rack into some branches. The deer was broadside to us, and I told Evan to make a good shot,” he said.

“When I put the scope on it, I was thinking the whole time Please let me hit this deer,” Evan said. “I made sure I squeezed the trigger real easy.

“At the shot, the buck kicked and ran off for about 50 yards before going down like a ton of bricks. I was speechless. Dad said ‘You smoked him!’

“I’ll always remember the feeling after that. We just sat there for 15 minutes before getting down and going over to my deer,” the kid added.

Evan’s big 12-pointer was the third-largest Typical taken in Kentucky that season.

This article was published in the March 2018 edition of Rack Magazine. Subscribe today to have Rack Magazine delivered to your home.

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