The third-largest whitetail felled during the 2018 season came out of Indiana.
At 254 4/8 inches, Adrian Luntzel’s buck is the Hoosier State’s new crossbow record. Among all harvests there, it comes in at No. 6.
Adrian – Al for short – knew the deer existed. After he’d heard rumors, one claiming the buck was a 250-incher, he set out of couple of trail cameras that confirmed the legendary animal was not only living and breathing, but it was also passing through a 270-acre tract he could hunt.
A friend owns the land in Scott County.
Al set up his first trail cam in September, and he retrieved photos of the giant 13 days later. Soon, he added a second camera in a backup spot and got more images.
“On Oct. 29, the day I shot the deer, I got set up about 4:30 in the afternoon. It was perfectly calm,” Al told Dale Weddle, who’s writing the story for Rack magazine. “I was sitting, looking at a little grassy field surrounded on three sides by woods. There was a lake on the other side. The lake caused sort of a natural funnel past my stand.”
An hour into his vigil, Al heard a deer grunt from within thick cover to his left. It was startlingly loud, but he never saw the utterer.
When another hour had passed, he heard what sounded like bucks fighting, and he decided to throw his own grunting into the mix.
Soon after he used his grunt call, the rattling stopped and the bull of the woods came to the edge of the thicket and began thrashing limbs, showing its dominance.
“I think it had kicked butt back in the woods and was coming to the grunt call, thinking: You’re next,” Al laughed. “I had my crossbow up and ready.”
In no time at all, the deer was 20 yards from the crossbow pointed at it. Al had to wait for it to turn before he could squeeze the trigger.
“When the buck squared up to jump a ditch, it turned sideways,” he said. “I was ready, and everything just happened automatically. I shot, and the arrow disappeared into the middle of the deer’s chest.”
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