Modern technology — GPS, cell phones, satellite imagery maps — might not be able to put a trophy buck in your sights.
But they come a darn sight closer than anything else, if you know what you’re doing.
Take, for instance, John “Parker” Hawkins of Raleigh.
The 25-year-old ECU grad and project manager/estimator for R.L. Pullen General Contractors used a trail camera to let him know a huge buck was in his area.
Ninety minutes later, he sent a photo of himself and the 12-pointer to his buddies.
“They were freaked, couldn’t believe it,” Hawkins said.
The buck’s 12-point rack, scored by Hawkins who used a Pope & Young tally sheet and flexible tape, totaled 150 net non-typical inches and 141 4/8 net typical inches.
“It may lose a few inches during the 60-day drying period, but I think I got pretty close,” he said.
Actually, Hawkins was aware of the buck’s presence during 2010.
“I found a place off U.S. 1 South in Raleigh that’s going to be developed soon,” he said. “Rubs and scrapes were appearing every day.”
His trail camera had taken snapshots of the buck in 2010 while the deer’s rack was covered in velvet.
“He was a big 8-pointer last year, with G2s of 9 and 10 inches, and he had an 8- or 9-inch sticker coming out the left side of his main beam,” Hawkins said. “But I was able to recognize him because of a 2-inch drop tine on the left side and one on the right side, plus the tips of the antlers almost touched.
“I didn’t get any pictures of him after bow season last year.”
Hawkins started off the morning of Oct. 26 by carrying his Browning A-bolt .270 rifle to a hardwood bottom and climbing into a tree stand about 4:45 p.m.
“I rattled in a 5- and 8-pointer,” he said.
Then something told him to change stands.
“I moved about 550 yards to a stand on the edge of a 10-acre field where there’s a scrape line along the edge,” Hawkins said.
He’d also been sprinkling shelled corn in the field and along the edge.
“(B)ut they haven’t touched it, and I’d put out 400 pounds. They’re eating acorns,” Hawkins said.
What really got the hunter excited was an image of the buck he saw 90 minutes before he climbed into his field-edge stand.
“I checked the trail cam about an hour and half before I shot the deer,” Hawkins said. “It was about 75 yards from the house of the nearest landowner. He’d seen the buck milling around in his back yard a couple of times recently.”
But the photo indicated the buck had been in the vicinity that day.
“At 5:45, a 5-pointer came out about 30 yards to my left,” Hawkins said. “I took out my cell phone and videoed him, then I looked 15 yards behind the 5-pointer and there he stood.”
Things happened rapidly after that.
“I picked up my gun, put the crosshairs of my scope behind his right shoulder and pulled the trigger,” Hawkins said.
The buck staggered into the field, fell and didn’t move.
“I didn’t have time to see his rack,” the hunter said. “I just shot; I saw his rack good for the first time as he walked away after I shot.”
The buck’s rack has an inside spread of only 13 1/2 inches, but its tines are long and massive.
The right brow tine is 3 6/8 inches, while the left eye guard is 4 6/8 inches, with the G2s (right and left, respectively) measuring 11 3/8 and 12 3/8 inches. The G3s are 9 5/8 and 10 2/8 inches, and the G4s are 5 4/8 and 5 0/8 inches.
There also is one abnormal points on each side (2 2/8 and 2 inches).
“All I knew when I shot was he was big,” Hawkins said. “He was pushing 220 pounds, I guess.”
The region he hunts, which is actually a Raleigh suburb but not in the city limits, has tons of deer.
“I see 10 deer every time I go, just right outside the city limits,” Hawkins said. “It’s got good cover and creek bottoms all through it. And I’ve seen dozens of deer that’ve been hit by cars, including one really nice buck that was hit on the (U.S. 40/64/70) Beltline.”
Hawkins said he suffered from “buck fever” long before the deer showed up that day.
“I started shaking right after I saw his picture on the trail camera,” he said. “I sent that to my friends, and they said ‘No way,’ but it was pretty neat sending the picture of the buck and me 90 minutes later.”
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