Big Buck Down in Missouri

[Old school]

Took a preacher friend hunting this past Saturday and he put down a big one. Opening day at 2:00 in the afternoon cruising the ridges.

--Mitch

[WapitiTalk1]

Dandy buck, man is he wide! Would love to see more photos of the head gear on that bruiser when you get a chance.

[Old school]

Here are a couple more pics. Palmated matching split brow tines.

--Mitch

[Fridaythe13th]

very nice buck. love the spread and the split brow tines.

[ElkNut1]

Boy howdy, what a toad sir! A huge congrats!!!

ElkNut1

[Indian Summer]

Dang. That's a beauty.

[Lost Dog]

Nice buck! Any more details to the story?

[Old school]

I'll post the details tomorrow.

--Mitch

[Old school]

We started the morning by leaving the house at 3:45AM - 2 hour drive to our hunting farm in central MO. Morning hunt was a beautiful hunt - light wind in our face, bluebird sky and cool temps. I sat in a marshy cattail filled draw overlooking a cut hayfield that butts up to the river and a small 20 acre woodlot. Saw 6 does and 1 buck. Had chasing and grunting in the woods in front of me but they never came out into the field. My preacher friend from North Dakota was sitting in a wooden ladder stand overlooking a small CRP field. He had a small creek to his back and the CRP in front of him (surrounded by cedar bedding area). He saw a couple deer moving through the CRP that morning, but no shots.

At 11:00 we got together and ate some lunch in a different ground blind. We then decided to try another farm about 20 minutes away. I would put him in a permanent stand on a large oak flat and I would go hunt "the bowl". We arrived at the farm around 1:00. It is a very diverse farm - agriculture, river, hay fields, and stands of timber and brushy fence rows - all squeezed into 120 acres. We chose to go hunt across the river. After driving across the river, we made our way through the thick willow undergrowth and crawled up the old river bank. There is about 100 yards of Osage Orange (Hedgeapple) and other thick trees between the old river bank and the ridge. We made our way through "the bottoms" and up the ridge to the oak flat. I put him in "Matt's stand" a large permanent stand in 3 oak trees. It overlooks a semi open oak flat and also gives visibility to the ridge that we walked up. The stand faces the long running ridge. And is up high enough that you can shoot part way down the ridge also if the bucks "cut the ridge" rather than walking the top of it.

[Old school]

I got him situated in the stand and I told him I'd come back and get him by 3:00 and we'd go try another 80 acre farm for the evening if we didn't do any good here in the afternoon. I then followed the ridge down 200 yards to a spot we call "the bowl". It's where a feeder creek comes into the main creek and 2 ridges converge forming "the bowl". I had only been settled into my blind for about 30 minutes when I heard a gun shot. I knew it had come from his way and figured it was him who shot.

I waited till 2:45 and made my way over to his stand. When I arrived he was out of the stand and said that he had shot at a really nice buck and thought he had put a good hit on it based on how it responded to the shot. He told me that he wasn't in the stand even 30 minutes when a small buck approached and locked on to him - he couldn't tell if it was a legal buck (has to have 4 legal points on one side) as the sun was in his eyes and the buck didn't hang around long. It had a rack about out to the ears he said. He said that must have not been the deer The Lord had for him so he settled back in watching the ridge. Just a few minutes later he caught sight of a "white flash" bisecting the ridge - it was the sun reflecting off the rack of a nice buck. It hesitated between 2 trees and he shot. 70 yard shot through the woods.

[Old school]

We walked over to the spot and about half way there we saw a small finger sized branch hanging off an oak tree about 10 feet up that had been clearly hit by his bullet. Not a good sign. I asked about the deer's response to the hit and he said it kicked like a bucking bronco. At first I thought - heart shot. Maybe the bullet was deflected low and he hit heart. Then we got to the spot of impact and there was a bunch of white hair everywhere with some very small pieces of flesh attached to it, but no blood. I told him - this is not good, you've grazed him low - but with how he reacted you had to hit something solid on him. We proceeded down the ridge and the leaves looked disturbed to the left, so that's where I slowly went, still looking for first blood. I traveled about 50 yards when I saw blood on the ground in front of me - dark red blood and quite a bit of it. Suddenly 60 or 70 yards in front of me it sounded like a something was crashing away from me but not going very fast, I could just see a deer erratically going up and down, but couldn't get a clear shot through the heavy brush so I just watched and listened - the crashing suddenly stopped so I knew it was either bedded again or standing looking at its back trail, I just couldn't see it. I whistled and motioned for my friend to come over to me. He had gone to the right looking for blood when I went left. He slowly made his way over to me.

I explained to him what I had heard and seen and that the buck was somewhere up in front of us about 70 yards - actually it was right at the mouth of "the bowl" now. I noticed blood on the brush around us on the trail and it was only about 2 feet up off the ground - I told him he may have hit the front leg and grazed the underside which produced all that white hair at the impact of the shot. I was concerned that if we kept pushing the deer we would push it onto the neighbors property within 150 yards and I didn't want to do that.

[Old school]

I had him stay there and I circled back and up the ridge and made my way back to the top of "the bowl" being careful to stay back in the woods away from the ridge line so I wouldn't spook the buck. I then made my way to the ridge and started slowly working my way on top of it back towards my hunting partner who was down in the bottom. I hadn't gone 50 yards on the ridgeline when the buck jumped up in the bottom and dove into the dry feeder creek bottom and started trying to come up it towards me - I shot him in the chest at 75 yards with the .300 mag. He flipped over and layed down by a big log - I put another into him while he was laying there broadside. He was dead in seconds. I whistled and hollered for him to come over and see his buck. Quite the afternoon of hunting. His initial shot had entered the front leg and broke it, cut belly hair and flesh, entered and exited the opposite front leg and broke it as well. Glad we were able to find the buck and quickly finish him off. Next time I will take more pictures of the scenery to go with the story - it would be much better that way for you all.

--Mitch

[Lefty]

Great story. Im sure the story will be repeated a lot of times.
Those are some long brow tines