Person County 13-year-old kills big buck

Buck green-scored at 134 2/8-inches

November 10 was one of those dreary, drizzly fall days in Person County, but 13-year-old William Davis find the bright spot while hunting with his dad. The young hunter killed a big deer whose rack measured 138 3/8-inches gross green-score, and 134 2/8-inches net.

“We got in the stand around 3 o’clock, and it had been raining hard, but it was just a misty drizzle by then. We watched a cow-horn come in and it played around in front of us for a while. My son, even though he’s only 13, he doesn’t care about shooting small bucks. He understands what it takes and how long it takes for a buck to reach trophy-status,” said Jerry Davis, William’s dad.

“The cow-horn finally left and about 30-minutes later, a the big buck came walking out from behind a tree,” said Jerry Davis. The two were hunting from a box blind overlooking a trail in the woods on their 45-acre tract of hunting property. Jerry Davis was hunting with a .50-caliber muzzleloader, and he had to overcome a little trouble to get the deer on the ground.

“Once he had a clear shot, he pulled the trigger, but no joy. For some reason, I can shoot that gun all day long and it fires every time, but when he shoots it, it fails to fire for some reason. I told him to squeeze the trigger again. Nothing. Then I told him to squeeze the trigger again, as hard as he can this time. Finally, it fired,” said Jerry Davis.

The buck was standing about 35-yards away when the younger Davis pulled the trigger. The buck took off running. After climbing out of the stand, the father-son duo found blood right away, and began tracking the deer. It didn’t take long to find it. “It was about 53 yards from where he shot it,” said Jerry Davis.

The buck was no surprise to either of them. “We’ve got a bunch of photos on our trail cams of this deer. He showed up every single evening on one trail cam, so we knew he was out there, and my son knew he would get the chance at him if we went often enough,” said Jerry Davis.

“He’s always liked deer hunting, but he used to be more into hunting ducks; this has got him turned on to deer hunting even more now. He’s hooked good!” Jerry Davis said.

The buck was aged at 4 1/2-years old by taxidermist Shamus Longan of Non-Typical Taxidermy in Semora. Longan is producing a sneak mount on the buck for Davis.

Click here to read about other big North Carolina bucks.