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Buckmasters Magazine

The Ultimatum
It was the second day of his second year hunting in Illinois, and Jarrod Toms was hot, tired and discouraged. He'd been lugging a stand and his bow since lunchtime. It was getting late, and he still hadn't found the right spot. Jarrod's wife had told him the night before that if he didn't bring home a big deer this time, it would be his last trip to Illinois. He'd passed up several bucks the previous year, never notching his tag. It was time to get serious! His buddies dropped him off in an area where they had seen pretty good sign a day earlier, but the rolling hills, open timber and farm fields just didn't provide many setups to his liking. Finally, at 2:30, Jarrod found a spot that looked promising: a deep ditch where two trails came together before spilling out into a bean field. The sign there was the most impressive he'd seen. He quickly set up his stand, hooked on the safety harness and waited for what he figured would be yet another fruitless outing. "At one point, I heard something behind me," Jarrod said. "I slowly turned around, even though it didn't sound like a deer." A fox squirrel at the edge of some Osage-orange trees was playing with one of the ch...

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Parting Gift
Gene Figge had no way of knowing that the 2004 season would be his last to hunt the Jersey County, Ill., farm his family had enjoyed for nearly three decades. About a month after deer season ended, the landowner died, and the property was sold. The new own...
 

You Don't Wanna Go in There
When Davis Smith of White Hall, Ark., lost his deer lease to a group of guys with deeper pockets a few years ago, he felt like a fish out of water. He tried swimming with several small hunting clubs after that, but he never found one he really liked. Davis...
 

Nobody Said it Would be Easy
I got into the deer hunting game late. Until a friend offered to teach me the ropes in exchange for sharing the hunting rights on another buddy's Clark County, Ohio, farm, I'd always been content to hunt small game. Lynn's property had been my rabbit, squi...
 

Hooked on Kansas
As my friend, Todd Leighton, and I pulled into the hotel parking lot on Monday morning, Nov. 10, 2008, Another buddy of ours, Jason Kindzia, was packing up to depart. He'd harvested a 135-inch 9-pointer the previous day and was about to leave Kansas for Iow...
 

Hunter Hotline
Prior to last November, Derek Thompson had pretty much convinced himself that seeing or shooting a big buck wasn't going to happen where he hunts in Ross County, Ohio. Truth be told, he wasn't having much luck with little bucks either. A busy signal seemed...
 
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Mike Handley / RACK Editor / BTR Chairman

Mike Handley

Veteran journalist Mike Handley has been the editor of Rack since its 1999 launch as a subscription-only magazine. The 48-year-old Alabama native also is executive director of Buckmasters Whitetail Trophy Records and painter of wildlife. Mike has pursued big game in 15 states, two Canadian provinces, Finland and South Africa. He’s living proof that man can survive repeated bustings by long-faced does, a diet formerly laden with pork fat, encounters with black mambas and presidents of the 21st century. He also snores.

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