Mike Handley posted on June 13, 2011 08:36
By Mike Handley
I’m constantly amazed at how often 200-inch whitetails are taken off tiny scraps of land that most of us overlook. I’ve lost count of the times I’ve run across someone who has found antlered gold on only 10 acres or less.
I know hunters who have tagged monster bucks on a single-acre lot; others who have successfully hunted the thin strips of woods between subdivisions. And it makes me wonder why so many people feel compelled to lease hundreds or thousands of acres, when they could just buy their own farm.
The latest case of a big buck from a small parcel happened last season in Ohio, where this kind of thing occurs often.
If Walt Fanthorp ever decides to quit deer hunting, it won’t be because of the price of gasoline or for the lack of a place to hunt.
Walking is cheap.
Walt’s 10 acres north of Cincinnati is mostly open ground, but there’s a wooded creek bottom at the rear of the tract. He hunts about 150 yards from his back door, which allows him to frequently spend an hour or two in a stand on days he might not otherwise have time to spare.
Last Nov. 13, after returning home about 4 p.m. from a business trip to Kentucky, he decided to watch the sunset from a climbing stand. By the time he was set up and looking at deer, it was after 5:00.
Less than half an hour later, he watched the 200-incher he’d arrowed stop suddenly, sit down and fall over dead. And that’s 200 BTR inches, meaning without the nearly 18-inch inside spread factored.
You can read the rest of the story (by Ed Waite) in the October issue of Rack magazine.