Whitetail goals

Whitetail. The all-American species. Although, from my perspective, they don’t quite hit the same buttons as Mule Deer do in adventure and sheer difficulty, I get amped for a good Whitetail hunt.

I’ve spent a little time in the Midwest searching for mature cranker bucks, and that is where I’ve had my most luck. This year I had a goal to take my biggest Whitetail in my own home state of Wyoming. It really is a tall goal as Whitetail tend to stick on private property and access is always difficult but I had a couple strategies up my sleeve that would help me find an older aged buck.

My biggest whitetail from Iowa

Once I secured the tag, the homework started. Finding every sliver of public land I could in areas that hold higher densities of deer and little hunting pressure. I would go early mornings and late evenings and sit on stand as the rut intensified and gauge the quality of deer in the area. It seem like that each day went by in mid November, the bucks got older and bigger hanging with the does. Now it was up to me to keep my finger off the trigger while some beautiful bucks were within range, and on public land.

On November 20, I slid into my glassing spot at very first light with just a few deer out roaming on the public land. It was a fairly quiet morning with a couple decent bucks that I was familiar with. With each day moving forward the bucks must’ve been aggressive because they would show up with one less point that had been snapped off in a fight, most likely, the night before. I was starting to wonder, what are the chances of a giant old mature buck making its way onto the public land without any broken tines? It was a workday and I promised I’d be in the office by 9:00, and so I gave myself a few more minutes of sitting, when I noticed a deer step out of the greasewooded jungle. I put my binoculars up assuming it was one of the bucks that I had seen already, but this dude looked different.

Immediately, I noticed heavy beamed frame with something else going on that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. He swiveled his head and I saw it, forked eye guards!

Heavy beams, good width, long times, forked eye guards, atop of a heavy, big bruiser body! I slid backwards and ripped my rifle from my backpack, laid into position and at 200 yards put a 140 grain EDM through the boiler ! 

I had done it! My biggest whitetail. A Wyoming Warrior with massive antlers, flat molars, and pinheads for incisors. His eyes almost milky-like an old, veteran gun-dog. Long scars draped his shoulders from years of fighting. He was the perfect buck and I couldn’t be more happy to have taken him before he succumbed to the next harsh winter .