Hunter killed the buck with a 285-yard shot
Tyler Lawhorn of Newton Grove, N.C. killed a Sampson County giant buck on Nov. 23. The 10-point buck has been green-scored at 154 7/8 inches. Even though he knew the buck was a trophy from trail camera photos, he was surprised at the size when he saw it on the ground.
“My buddy and I had been hunting this deer for about two years. We never had a daylight picture of him. We went up to Ohio to hunt and we got a daylight picture of him then. I was bummed out because I was all the way in Ohio,” said Lawhorn.
Once they got back to North Carolina, Lawhorn’s buddy was hunting his stand and saw the big buck twice. The deer was too far away for a shot.
That weekend, Lawhorn was in the box stand early and the buck came into his view a little after 8 a.m. He shot the deer with a .270 from 285 yards away. But when Lawhorn got on the ground to look for the deer, he didn’t see a stitch of blood.
“I didn’t think I hit him because I didn’t find any blood. I was thinking I just missed the buck of my life,” he said.
With rain on the way, there was no time to waste
Lawhorn scoured the area, hoping to find blood. Rain was on the way, and he knew if he didn’t find blood now, he likely never would.
“I knew that if I did hit him at all, I better find it right then before the rain starts,” he said. “So I started questioning if I’d walked far enough. So I went back and walked another 30 yards or so. I looked there on the edge of the woods and the path and I saw some blood.”
He called for backup from a friend, who came to help track the deer. They found the beast lying under a fallen pine tree about 85 yards into the woods. As they dragged the deer out, it became apparent that this deer was more than just antlers.
“He weighed about 225 pounds. I would have never thought he was that big in the body. He just didn’t look that big on trail cam. We had to take a couple of breaks dragging him out,” he said.
Josh Wise at A Wise Idea Taxidermy in Raleigh is completing a mount of the Sampson County giant for Lawhorn.
Click here to check out a trophy buck killed recently in Moore County.
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