DEER DRIVE NETS BIGGEST BUCK
Bill Cooper
Anticipation reached epic proportions for Dian and me as the 2008 deer season opener approached. We had been invited to a media deer hunt hosted by outdoor icon Ray Eye. To sweeten the pie, the hunt would take place in deer rich northeast Missouri near the town of Rutledge in Scotland County.
Our road map indicated that Rutledge lay northeast of Kirksville, not far from the Iowa line. Dian and I both quickly realized that we would have a good chance of taking the biggest bucks of our lives. Dian giggled with nervous excitement, because she was a newcomer to deer hunting, having taken a doe the previous year. She definitely had “big buck” on her mind.
The only kicker to our deer hunting bonanza trip turned out to be the fact that Dian and I could not arrive at camp until Thursday after the opener. We had been assigned to cover an operation run by Kevin Small, a well known deer hunter and guide. Small operates KT’s Trophy Hunts and controls hunting access to over 6,000 acres. His strict management policies help produce big bucks for his clients. Small requires hunters to take bucks of 130-inches or better.
Dian and I arrived at the lodge around 1p.m. on Thursday where we were met by Small, his wife, Kathy and guide Casey Clatt. After quickly stashing our gear, Kevin gave us a run down of hunter success. By Monday afternoon 18 of his 20 deer hunting clients had downed bucks which scored 130-to-144. Our anticipation spiked.
Small’s next statement peaked my interest. “Bill, I saved a special spot for you,” he said. “It is a 10-acre patch of woods surrounded by cut soybean fields. There are two bucks that hang out there, 160 and a 180-class buck.”
I couldn’t believe my good fortune. “I’d rather have Dian hunt there,” I said to Kevin. “She has never killed a buck, much less something of that caliber. “Besides, it would make a great story.”
“Done,” Small responded.
The wind howled outside the lodge. “What do you guys want to do this afternoon?” Kevin asked.
“Well, we have doe tags. We’d like to get a little meat for the freezer. There’s not much time left before dark, so hunting does will work fine.”
Small hauled us a few miles north of the lodge and placed us in a covered box blind near a pond. Soybean fields surrounded us on three sides, each sloping down to a point to a brushy draw. The spot looked like perfect north Missouri deer habitat.
The wind continued to howl flapping a piece of tin on a nearby stand. Thirty minutes before dark a half dozen does came out of the draw 125 yards away. I had my CVA Optima muzzleloader along. Dian placed the crosshairs of her scope behind the shoulder of a doe and fired. The doe dropped at the report of the Remington .243, but jumped up and ran into the brush. “She won’t go far,” I said. “I’m gonna take one of the other does.”
I settled on a fat doe and slowly squeezed the trigger. My cap didn’t fire! The deer fled at the “snap” of the hammer. I later discovered I had left too much oil in the breech and it had saturated my cap.
Small arrived just before dark to pick us up. We went to look for Dian’s doe, but failed to find a trace of blood. She had clipped the doe high on the back, scarcely a flesh wound. Our evening doe hunt had turned out to be a real bust, but not because of a lack of deer.
Dian spent the next afternoon on a stand at the edge of the 1-acre tract of woods where the two monster bucks hung out. She bubbled with excitement when Small and I went to pick her up after shooting hours had ended. “I saw one of the big bucks,” she said. “It was huge,” she said.”
“Why didn’t you shoot it?” Small asked immediately.
“It was walking straight away from me,” Dian responded. “I didn’t want to shoot it in the butt.”
When Dian showed Small and me, the next morning, where the buck had been standing, we both looked at one another. “You coulda shot that buck down through the back, Dian,” Small stated.
“I just didn’t feel good about the shot and I sure didn’t want to wound that big buck and then have it get away,” Dian moaned.
“You did the right thing, babe,” I reassured her. “It is always bet to pass up a shot if you do not feel good about it.”
After lunch on the second day of our hunt, we traveled to Small’s uncle’s place to recheck everyone’s rifle. A couple of other guys who were hunting Small’s properties tagged along. We quickly discovered that Dian’s scope had been pumped off, thus explaining her high shot on the doe.
We had just completed shooting when one of Small’s nephews pulled into the bean field and jumped out of his pickup quickly. “Kevin,” he yelled. “I just saw a huge buck cross the gravel road a half mile west of here. It went down into that two-acre brush patch out in the middle of the soybean filed.”
“Let’s go, guys,” Kevin ordered. “We’re gonna have a deer drive!”
Small stationed a shooter 100 yards off of the west end of the brush patch and dropped me 100 yards off the south end of the brush. Casey Clatt handed me his .25-06. I had left my rifle at the lodge. The other three in the party drove to the north side of the brush patch and parked. I could see all three of them as they started the drive.
When the first man entered the brush, a doe immediately walked out of the brush on my side and turned west. I caught glimpses of orange vests as the three drivers edged through the brush.
Only a minute after the first doe appeared, a second doe bolted out of the brush in the same spot running as hard as she could go straight at me. Behind her came a buck with a brushpile on its head. It looked enormous.
The pair of deer closed on me fast. I yelled in hopes of turning them. It worked. I dropped to one knee and quickly found the buck in my scope. I could see a farm house in the background about a mile away. I held my fire. Then another farm house. I held again. At last the buck hit a dip in the cut soybean field. A solid bank lay behind the buck, giving me a safe shot. I will never forget how that bug buck looked in the scope, stretched out running as hard as it could go.
I settled the cross hairs a few inches back on the buck’s massive chest and slowly squeezed the trigger of the .25-06. I saw the buck hump up and knew I had hit him. Forty yards down the field, the buck began to stumble and piled up in a cloud of dust.
Everyone had seen the big buck tumble and yells echoed from all corners of the field.
We all quickly hustled to the buck to admire the grand animal. Small later rough scored the buck at 150, the largest of 19 bucks taken on his lands that week.
That hunt turned out to be one of the most exciting of my life. And Dian says, “I still know where those two monster bucks hang out!”
We may have to organize another deer drive. Thousands of hunters across the U. S. will use the same tactics to push untold numbers of deer to awaiting hunters. Deer drives are the source of many campfire stories. I only hope drives continue to occur across our great land and that hunters continue to harvest one of the greatest game animals on earth, the white-tailed deer.
To book a hunt with KT’s Trophy Hunts search the same on the Web or call (660) 651-0655.
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