Father’s fingerprints “all over” big Orange County buck

Kenny Snyder of Efland and his wife, Rhonda, have enjoyed a run of successful deer hunts for trophy bucks in recent years.

Although Kenny has enjoyed watching Rhonda reduce the population of wall-hanger bucks population in Orange County, he was able to drop one of his best deer ever, a 145-inch 10-point buck, on Nov. 25, 2014, with a .270 Browning rifle.

Seated in a tripod stand at the edge of a harvested corn field, he watched three does nibbling at ground grain. In the fading light at 5:10 p.m., three small bucks entered the field and chased does around the stubble and into the woods.

“I began to glass the field with my binoculars for other deer that might be lurking in the shadows,” Snyder said. “On my first pass, I was shocked to see a big-framed, tall-tined buck poised like a statue about 30 yards back in the woods, directly across the field from me.”

Snyder guessed the buck had been there all along, “tending” one of the does from the security of the woods while the younger bucks gave chase in the open field.

“It was clear he didn’t know the party had migrated away from the field and into the woods, because he seemed frozen there,” Snyder said.

Guessing the buck had no intentions of walking into the open before dark, Snyder found the 165-pound buck in his scope at 130 yards and anchored it with a single shot.

Snyder taped the 10-pointer’s rack at 145 1/2 gross inches with an inside spread of 16 1/2 inches, 23-inch main beams, 4 1/2-inch bases and 10 5/8-inch G2s. The right beam had a broken off G4 and chipped G2 and G3 tines.

“He could have grossed over 147 in his pre-fight days,” Snyder said.

Snyder said the experience was special because in January 2014, he lost his father, his mentor and life-long hunting buddy.

“My father was also grandfather to my nephews, Alex and Kyle Lloyd, and a second father to their dad, Andy Lloyd,” Snyder said. “The area where I bagged the 10-pointer also was my dad’s favorite place to hunt on the farm. And I shot the big buck from a tripod stand he and I had set up several years ago. This buck also was standing 10 yards in front of a buddy stand where my dad and I had spent many an afternoon.

“I think this hunt had my dad’s fingerprints all over it.”