Big buck

[Coldfeet]

Last year during the rifle season I went into town after a day of hunting to buy some groceries and stuff. On my way home I saw a massive buck cross the highway about 50 yards in front of me and he ran into a corn field that happens to be owned by a friend of mine that I work with. The next time we met I told him about the buck that I saw. "At least 12, if not 16 points on it." I told him. "Yeah, I found a nice shed last spring." was his response. I'm sure many of you reading this probably are a little skeptical at this point, but read on....

A couple of months ago I was at work and I was paged to come down and see this friend of mine. When I got there, he had a big smile on his face. "Remember that buck you told me about?" he asked. "Sure", I said. "Do you think it might have been this one?" and then he pulled out a shed that he had just found the day before in his corn field. My eyes almost popped out of my skull! The biggest buck I've ever taken was a very nice 8 pointer, and I've always wanted to take one that was at least 10 or more, but this shed, only half of the rack, had 10 points by itself!! There was a single drop tine toward the front, and other than that it was perfect. I'm not going to try and give you numbers such as the circumference of the base or the length of the tines since I myself have absolutely no idea how to score a rack, but I would guess that this one would score nicely. A few weeks later I was walking by and he called me over again. "I think I found the other half." he said. "9 more points. And I have one from last year that I think is from the same deer since it has that drop tine on it. That one has 7." I asked him if I could bowhunt at his place and he laughed and shook his head with an emphatic NO. I've been bugging him about it since and I've now convinced him to allow me to hunt there after the rifle season since he wants the first chance at it. (I haven't told him and I don't plan on it, but I just looked in the Platt book and noticed that the north end of his property borders county land, so I'll be out there anyways, probably tonight if I can talk the wife into it.) The reason I am telling you about this is because I can't get the thought out of my head, and because my friend's wife told me today that she saw the buck this morning about 1/4 mile down the road from her driveway. She almost hit it. "Bigger than the ones at Cabella's" she told me. Man I hate being at work during the hunting season.

I suppose most of you don't believe this. To that I say: GOOD!! I don't want anyone else trying to take that buck anyways. And for those of you that do beleive it, I won't tell you where it is. All I can say is that it is within a one hour drive of Bemidji. Could be 10 minutes away, could be 59, and it's somewhere within a 360 degree radius. If by some stroke of luck I actually stick an arrow in it, I'll post pictures, but I'm not going to get my hopes up. I will, however try to convince my friend to bring the sheds in so I can post pictures of those.

If anyone else is scouting out a monster, or missed one in the past, please share your story. You don't need to give particulars about the area you are in if you don't want to share that, I know I sure don't.

[BDR]

Cold feet, It's fun to have a possible target in mind when your out there. GOOD LUCK!! And hopfully your screen name wont come true when that biggun is standin in front of you!

[Mayfly]

Sounds good coldfeet...You know, I am hunting southeast from Bemidji. I hunt close to a place called Nevis. I've seen some pretty big bucks in the area. I think i'm farther than 60 miles but I like to think that my woods also holds an elusive monster! Good Luck

[rodbuilder]

Coldfeet,

Good luck in your pursuit. I too live in the Bemidji area (near Potlatch). I hope you get this beast. If you do, PLEASE show a picture here or at least post it on the bullitan board at Bluewater Bait. Would love to see this critter...dead or alive!

Good luck!

[huskminn]

Coldfeet,

I have had the great pleasure of following three big bucks in my life...all of them before I moved to MN. Never got one of them, unfortunately.

One of them I hunted archery only--the landowner wouldn't let me hunt rifle as others already had permission. That was fine, though, as they were bad hunters and that whitetail buck lived through 6-7 seasons with them as my only competition. I had two chances at him with my bow--one in the first season I saw him and one in the third and final season I saw him. The first shot, he was a 5X5 then, I had the drop on him and a meadowlark flushed in front of me as I drew my bow. The deer, 8 yards away, raised his head to look at the bird, saw me and bolted all in the same motion. I had a clear shot and had practiced running shots with my bow, so I released when he was about 12 yards from me, crossing. My arrow was right on target and stuck in a 3" oak tree as the deer crossed just behind it. That was one of about 5 small scrub oak trees in the entire grassy draw. In all my days of hunting, I've never seen a buck run so hard for so long without ever looking back. I think he knew he was lucky--I had just made him a much smarter buck.

I saw him three times the next year, twice on some abandoned RR tracks on neighboring property and once on the property I hunted. Never had any opportunity for a shot and couldn't seem to create one. He was a symmetrical 6X6, probably 19"-20" wide and proportionately high.

The third year, he was still around and slightly higher and heavier, still a 6X6. I patterned him and he was bedding in plum thickets on a side hill surrounded by a cattail slough below. One could approach him from a wheat field above, but there was no chance for a shot as the thickets were too thick and noisy. Approach through the cattails was impossible....he could see you coming from a 1/2 mile away.

So, I enlisted the help of a friend of mine who was a neighbor of the land I hunted on. With binoculars, we confirmed his presence in the plum thickets. I had jumped him from there three times in two years and he always took the same escape route and, about a 1/4 mile away, would stop to look back on a small knoll above a brushy draw.

I sneaked into position along his escape route at the point where he always stopped and sent my friend on a long walk to circle around the buck and jump him from the plum thickets.

The plan worked perfectly. I saw him run from the heavy cover 1/4 mile away and watched him head in my direction before he disappeared from view. I prepared myself for his arrival. It took longer than I anticipated, although it was probably only 25 seconds. I saw him come trotting to the top of the knoll and, when he reached the point where he normally stopped to look back, he simply continued running. He ran passed me at about 25 yards and I was at full draw. I had not practiced running shots at that distance and I had too much respect for this buck to let an arrow fly. He never knew I was there.

Over the course of the years, I could have shot him 5-6 times with a rifle. People in the area talked about him--they knew he was around, but obviously nobody took the time to get to know him. He activity was almost strictly nocturnal and he bedded in unapproachabel cover. He ran first and asked questions later.

That same fall, during rifle season, a neighboring farmer shot the buck in an outlying, weedy corral near the RR tracks. The farmer made the 75 yard shot using the corner of his barn as a rest. The farmer had heard about this buck and, after the buck had been using the RR tracks just 150 yards from the guy's house for 3 years, the farmer finally had seen the buck on his place. He decided to buy a deer license and woke up on the first day of the season, looked out his kitchen window and saw the buck bed down in his old corrals. He grabbed his rifle, sneaked out the side door and walked towards the corrals, used his barn as a shield, poked the rifle around the corner of the building, took aim and shot the buck.

It was a 6X6 (a six pointer, where I come from) with a 20 1/2" spread and the back tines were 12.5" and 13", respectively. Almost perfectly symmetrical. One fine buck, in my book. He felt safe in a spot where he had never been hunted and, finally, one day he got hunted there, too.

I wish you all the luck in your pursuit of this buck. You will have to put your time in or have more than a little luck on your side, or perhaps both! It will be great fun, though, and I can't imagine how excited you'll be sitting in the predawn darkness on that county land on opening day.

Good Luck!!

[This message has been edited by huskminn (edited 10-22-2003).]