Hunter shot buck from a box blind
Jordan Tucker of Morven N.C. killed his biggest buck in Anson County on Nov. 2. It was a buck he’d seen on trail cameras throughout the past two years. The buck has been green-scored at 167 net inches.
Tucker was hunting on private land that’s loaded with food plots. The big buck started visiting this year in September, and came in regularly. But all his visits were during the dark of night or for only a few minutes of daylight in the early morning.
On the opening day of muzzleloader season (Nov. 2), Tucker climbed into the box blind that morning. He watched over a dozen bucks, including some that most would consider shooters. But he didn’t see the one he was after, so he never clicked the safety off. He went back that afternoon, hoping his target buck would show up.
“This was before the time changed, so it was getting dark around 7 p.m. I got to the stand around 4 p.m. and saw 15 to 20 deer. The one I wanted was the last one to come out,” he said.
The buck was milling around in the food plot, working its way toward a corn pile. With about 30 minutes of daylight left, the deer finally stopped, quartering toward the hunter at about 150 yards. Tucker shot the buck with his Thompson Center Pro Hunter, and was sure he’d hit it.
The buck walks away
“Once the smoke cleared, I expected the deer to be laying there because I felt good about the shot. But it wasn’t there. So I looked around and saw it standing on the edge of the food plot, just kind of wobbling. I could see it wobbling and I was waiting for it to fall down. Then it turned and walked off,” he said.
The deer walked and walked and walked. When it was 500 yards away, it stopped on the edge of the food plot. Doubts crept into Tucker’s mind at this point.
“I thought to myself ‘Gosh, I don’t know if I hit him or not.’ So I got down and came back home and got supper. Around 9:30, my friend Blake Leviner, my wife, my parents, and another buddy. We went to the spot I last saw him, and my wife spotted blood first. I walked around that spot a little bit and all of a sudden, it looked like a paint bucket went through there,” he said.
Tucker breathed a sigh of relief then.
“Blake went into the woods off the edge of the food plot about 30 yards and said the deer was there. He was bigger than I expected him to be. His rack looked big on the trail cameras, but it didn’t look near as big as what it did in real life,” he said.
Tucker hit the deer in the shoulder and the bullet pierced both lungs. He’s hoping to get his mount back in time to make it to the Dixie Deer Classic in the spring.
Be the first to comment