Nolan Johnson can thank his buddy and fellow weed-killing, crop-fertilizing co-worker, Earl, for telling him about the monstrous whitetail he wound up arrowing in 2018. He can also tip his hat to a farmer who gave him a key to a seldom-used gate.
“Earl jumped a really big buck while spraying soybeans in the spring,” Nolan told John Phillips, who’s writing the story for Rack magazine. “When he got to the edge of a small thicket in the middle of the field, four bucks ran out of it.
“As he continued spraying around the thicket, a fifth one – the biggest buck he’d ever seen – jumped up and ran across the soybean field and into the woods,” he added.
Afterward, Earl asked the farmer, who happened to be on the sidelines in his truck, if he could hunt the area. That’s when he discovered the land belongs to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which is open to the public.
It’s part of the greater Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area.
When Earl shared the news, Nolan spoke to the area manager to make sure he could put up a stand and set out a trail camera. The farmer also gave him a key to a nearby gate, which shaved hundreds of yards off the hike to the remote corner.
The trail cam revealed seven bucks were accessing the beans from that corner. He nicknamed the largest Biggun.
Nolan erected a ground blind in a wide fencerow next to the bean field. He wasn’t able to sit in it opening day, but he was in place with his 18-year-old Mathews bow on Saturday afternoon, Sept. 29.
The wind was perfect, and Biggun kept to the script, passing within 20-something yards of the Kentuckian’s hideout.
Almost immediately following the hum of Nolan’s bowstring, the buck folded. The arrow entered where it was supposed to, but a rib altered its course, sending the broadhead upward.
A second shot ensured the deer would never regain its feet.
“One of the strangest parts of the hunt was just before I saw the big buck,” Nolan said. “I had pretty much decided to fold my chair up, leave my blind and drive home to take my granddaughter on a youth deer hunt. Two minutes later, I was holding Biggun’s massive rack in my hands.”
Those antlers score 204 6/8 inches by the BTR’s yardstick.
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