Less than an hour after climbing a tree and pulling up his rifle on Dec. 13, 2016, Mississippian Josh Clark lowered it again in preparation to leave.
The clock was ticking on the last day of the Canemount Wildlife Management Area's primitive weapons hunt, and Josh wanted to look at something else, preferably a deer.
The hunter from Iuka had already devoted a day and a half to the place he went Wednesday morning. He'd chosen the location after stumbling across an impressive rub line while scouting the first day.
He thought he'd found the perfect pinch point for deer traveling the steeply corrugated hills above the river - rough country if you want to walk a straight line. Some of the gullies are 60 feet deep.
Josh had driven the six hours to hunt the WMA the previous year, but he'd been drawn for Zone 1 (of six). His 2016 permit was good for Zone 3, which was foreign to him.
Following the advice of the owner of the cabin where he was staying, he began scouting land near an oxbow. The suggestion was right on the money, though it wasn't immediately obvious.
The first evening, Josh saw a couple of does and a spike. He saw nothing on Tuesday. His main reason for going back to that spot on Day Three was to collect his climber, though he wound up sitting in it for about 45 minutes.
"When I got off the four-wheeler, I started spraying buck bombs," he said. "I ran out of one can and got another to spray all the way to the stand."
He also went for broke, rattling and grunting with abandon.
When nothing responded, he became desperate to make the most of the few remaining hours. After lowering his .35 Whelen rifle 20 feet to the ground, he stood. Before he could grip his treestand, however, he caught a glimpse of antler.
A buck was approaching. A good one.
Josh frantically hoisted the rope tied to his rifle.
"I knew I didn't have long," he said. "I just dialed my scope about halfway up and found an opening.
"It took me two or three days to understand what I'd shot, a 200-plus-inch deer on public land," Josh said. "Not many people can say that."
The grand whitetail is a poster buck for the BTR.
When the news spread soon after Josh shot it, newspaper and tabloid writers claimed the whitetail could shatter Mississippi's Typical record. What they didn't realize is that more than 17 inches of the estimated score came from non-typical points.
Abnormal growth and unmatched typical points are not included in a B&C gross score. In addition, side-to-side differences are subtracted to arrive at a net score.
The BTR recognizes every inch of antler, however. The 9.4 percent of irregularity - all the stickers and kickers - merely puts the deer in Buckmasters' semi-irregular category, where it sits in the No. 3 spot for Magnolia State rifle kills.
The buck's BTR composite score is 203 4/8 inches.
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