Big Buck 411 Blog

Whack-a-Deer

Whack-a-Deer

By Mike Handley

For Derrick Blakeley, choosing where on the family’s third-generation farm to usher in Kentucky’s 2018 rifle season was easy. He went to the clover and turnip plot where he’d spotted a monstrous 10-pointer a week earlier.

The particular homemade stand had been there for a long time.

“The food plot I was hunting is shaped like a turkey’s foot, with the stand near the heel, facing three different prongs,” Derrick told Dale Weddle, who’s writing the story for Rack magazine. “The open area had been cleared out with a dozer years ago.”

Derrick’s brother, Troy, dropped him off on the nearby main road that very chilly morning so he could walk to the stand. He saw three deer, an 8-pointer and a couple of does, before leaving for lunch.

The hunter from White Plains, Kentucky, returned at 2:15 to finish the day.

A half-hour before sundown, the familiar 8-pointer and its two girlfriends came out to feed about 100 yards down the turkey foot’s right toe. They didn’t hang around for long.

The wide-racked buck he’d hoped to see appeared in the center toe a few minutes after the other deer had vanished. Actually, it stuck its head out of a thicket, only its head, about 90 yards from the stand.

Derrick didn’t want to shoot the deer in the neck, but it was clearly going to be his only option, as the light was quickly fading and the buck grew antsy.

When he squeezed the trigger, the deer collapsed.

A neighbor, Darrell Hatfield, helped Derrick retrieve the animal via front-end loader.

Boosted by its 24-inch-wide inside spread, the Hopkins County buck’s BTR score is 194 7/8.

— Read Recent Blog! In Lieu of Breakfast: For Bo Ezell, skipping breakfast to go squirrel hunting is a no-brainer. Swapping a fork for a deer rifle, however, is a tough call.

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