And from Public Land, No Less
By Mike Handley
Less than an hour after settling into his stand on Dec. 13, 2016, Josh Clark changed his mind.
The clock was ticking on the last day of the Canemount Wildlife Management Area’s primitive weapons hunt, and he wanted to look at something else, preferably a deer.
The hunter from Iuka, Mississippi, had already devoted a day and a half to the place he went Wednesday morning. He’d chosen it after stumbling across an impressive rub line while scouting the first day.
He thought he’d found the perfect pinch point for deer traveling the steeply corrugated hills above the river, rough country if you want to walk a straight line. Some of the gullies are 60 feet deep.
Josh had driven the six hours to hunt the WMA the previous year, but he’d been drawn for Zone 1 (of six). His 2016 permit was good for Zone 3, which was foreign to him.
Following the advice of the owner of the cabin where he was staying, he began scouting land near an oxbow. The suggestion was right on the money.
“It was crazy. The rubs I found were on trees the size of power poles. They were 3 and 4 feet off the ground, too, so I knew there had to be a big deer there,” he said.
The first evening, he saw a couple of does and a spike. He saw nothing on Tuesday.
He offered the stand to his buddy, Dee Vaughn, the last morning, explaining the funnel and rubs, but Dee declined. Josh’s main reason for going back was to collect his climber, though he wound up sitting in it for about 45 minutes.
“When I got off the four-wheeler, I started spraying buck bombs,” he said. “I ran out of one can and got another to spray all the way to the stand.”
He also went for broke, rattling and grunting with abandon.
When nothing responded, he became desperate to make the most of the few remaining hours. After lowering his .35 Whelen rifle 20 feet to the ground, he stood. But before he could grip his treestand, he caught a glimpse of antler.
A buck was approaching. A good one.
Josh frantically hoisted the rope tied to his rifle.
“I knew I didn’t have long,” he said. “I just dialed my scope about halfway up and found an opening.”
The shot’s recoil knocked his cap down over Josh’s eyes, so he didn’t see if the buck reacted. He lifted his brim just in time to see the deer rocketing out of sight. He thought – or maybe hoped – its gait was less than steady.
“I’m always second-guessing myself,” he said. “I really thought I’d missed, at first.”
When he couldn’t reach Dee, Josh called another friend, Brian Moore, after finding blood. Judging by the amount described, Brian told him the deer was dead or dying. Rather than wait for help, Josh began following the trail.
As soon as he topped a hill, he saw the dead buck and called Brian to say he’d shot a 150-incher. He knew he’d guessed low when he reached it.
“I was freaking out. When I called Brian back to tell him it was every bit a 170, he said ‘No way!’” Josh exclaimed. “I probably tried calling Dee 14 or 15 times, but he had no service.”
The friends were hunting only three-quarters of a mile apart, but Dee was in bottomland, and Josh was in the hills. Dee didn’t even hear the shot.
“It took me two or three days to understand what I’d shot, a 200-plus-inch deer on public land,” Josh said. “Not many people can say that.”
The grand whitetail is a poster buck for the BTR.
When the news spread soon after Josh shot it, newspaper and tabloid writers claimed the whitetail could shatter Mississippi’s Typical record. What they didn’t realize is that more than 17 inches of the estimated score came from non-typical points.
Non-typical growth and unmatched typical points are not included in a B&C gross score. In addition, side-to-side differences are subtracted to arrive at a net score.
Every scorable inch is included in the BTR score, however. The 9.4 percent of irregularity – all the stickers and kickers – merely puts the deer in Buckmasters’ semi-irregular category.