Stephen Outlaw kills Randolph County buck “Split”

Randolph County buck

Randolph County buck was infrequent visitor

In 2020, I hunted this deer non stop, and had a lot of day time pictures of him, but I never got to see him in the stand. In 2021 I never did get any pictures of him. So I figured either someone had killed him or maybe he was hit by a car. But then he showed back up a week before the 2022 deer season.

I saw him in the field with a bachelor group, so I put up my tac cameras, and started getting pictures of the bachelor group he was with. But I got no pictures of him until the day before opening day. I had a lot of pictures of him through September and there was only one daytime picture of him.

When October came around, I had no pictures of any of the bucks, not even Split. I thought he had already moved to a different area. Then I decided to take my saddle and got into a tree about 200 yards from my corn pile because I found an acorn tree that was attracting a lot of buck activity. During that hunt on Saturday Oct. 8, I saw him coming through the woods towards me eating on acorns. I ranged him at 46 yards but I didn’t feel comfortable taking a shot, so I watched him feed until he walked off.

26-yard shot

Fast forward to the next Saturday Oct. 15. I had intentions on hunting that same area and I made my buddy go with me. We both got our saddles and climbed up into a tree together and I honestly didn’t think he was gonna show up. Then it happened, I looked up and saw him about 60 yards walking straight towards us. So I grabbed my Mathews Z7.

He came in at 28 yards eating on acorns. I drew my bow back and he stepped behind a tree, and I held my bow back for about a minute straight. Then I decided to let it down until I got a better shot. About a minute later he gave me the opportunity at 26 yards, so I drew my bow back and let the arrow fly. The Magnus Stinger broadheads did one heck of a job. It was a perfect heart shot. He ran about 40 yards and done a back flip and that’s when me and my buddy started celebrating the biggest deer I’ve ever shot and probably will ever shoot in my life.

–Stephen Outlaw

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