Prior to 2017, Tyler Stull felt like he was pouring money in a hole and wasting his time trying to shoot a really big deer off the land he was hunting.
So when a customer offered to let him hunt her 40 acres in Meade County, Kentucky, the young carpenter was thrilled over the prospects of a change of scenery and better chances to connect with a dream buck. This was two weeks before the state’s gun season opened.
The woman’s acreage is mostly cropland, but there’s a promising strip of woods. Tyler spent a lot of time scouting and hanging trail cameras. He also did a little bowhunting.
The owner’s brother had built a box stand beside one of the soybean fields.
“She told me I was welcome to use the stand. Most of the previous hunting on the property had been for meat, and nobody had hunted it at all for two years,” Tyler told Dale Weddle, who’s writing his story for Rack magazine.
On the last day of gun season, Tyler left the job early to squeeze in one more hunt. By the time he climbed into the box stand, there were only 45 minutes of shooting light remaining.
So short on time, he was seriously considering going home until he reviewed the images from the nearby trail camera. An absolute giant buck had walked past the lens at 5:00 the previous evening.
“When I saw the first picture, my heart skipped a beat and my eyes got as big as cantaloupes,” he said. “I didn’t waste any time climbing up into the box blind.”
The stand was 30 yards from the camera, which was pointed at a corn pile. The buck hadn’t stopped to eat, but it had definitely come by to see if any does were dining.
“It was overcast with a light wind and not very cold – perfect weather to kill a deer,” Tyler said. “I just prayed and prayed that the good Lord would bring the buck back one last time.”
Ten minutes later, a yearling came to the corn. Tyler then spotted two does at 175 yards.
“About five minutes later, I heard a grunt in the woods,” he said. “My heart started beating fast, and I said to myself, This is it! Then I heard something walking over the hill. Soon, a deer appeared and stopped at the edge of the woods.”
The deer’s rack was plainly visible, but Tyler didn’t know if the buck was the same one from the trail cam. He didn’t need to know.
However, when the whitetail was 35 yards away and in the open, Tyler recognized the long curved points. From that point forward, he was on autopilot.
The impressive rack has a BTR score of 183 1/8 inches.
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