My
deer hunting began late in life at age 27 — 30 years ago. I hunted my grandpa’s
farm where on the average I saw three to four deer per week. They were mostly
does and a few small bucks. In 1988 and 1991 I did manage to get lucky enough
to take two Pope & Young bucks, one was a 131- 4/8-inch 8-pointer and the other
was a 22-inch wide 8-pointer with a seven inch drop-tine.
I think I got them because
no one hunted there before me and that allowed the deer to mature. After those
two deer, I never saw another big buck throughout the next eight years of bowhunting.
18 years ago my son, Colt (age two at the time), was with me while I cleared my
first food plot. It was a three-acre bottom that I planted with Imperial
Whitetail Clover. Within the first year I noticed a considerable increase in
the number of deer I was seeing. It went from thee or four per week up to three
or four per hunt. Yes, there were nights I didn’t see any, but not nearly as
many as the 12 years prior to planting my plot. My plot wasn’t pretty. It had
many weeds and yet it still drew deer in like moths to a flame. After fighting
the weed problem for three or four years, I finally gave in and did a soil test
and added lime and fertilizer as recommended by the Whitetail Institute.
My plots
went from weedy to a lush green carpet that looked so good I was tempted to put
salad dressing on it and eat it myself. During the first few years my friend
Rick and I added a few more types of plantings, including Alfa-Rack, No-Plow,
Secret Spot, Winter-Greens, Pure Attraction and Tall Tine Tubers. The variety
gave the deer something extra and, again, deer sightings went up and we were
seeing more bucks. Some of those bucks were really nice. We went from seeing 7-
pointers on average to 10-pointers, however it took us a while to actually put
a big one down because we hunted using a first-come-first-serve hunting
technique. Which meant, sure, we can hold out for a big one, as long as he gets
there first! We did take a couple bucks scoring in the 120s. 11 years ago, my
cousin’s husband, Jeff, shot a super-nice 13-point non-typical with his
muzzleloader as it was leaving our food plot. His deer scored 164-1/8 inches.
The next year, I decided that instead of shooting four or five deer a year, I
was going to take my does and then trophy hunt. That year I took a super-nice
buck which was a mainframe 10-pointer with six non-typical points making him a
16-point non-typical scoring 164- 4/8 inches net Pope & Young points. That
deer was taken within 20 yards from where Jeff took his last year and we
believe the two bucks were twins at birth since they shared so many of the same
traits. No doubt, these two monsters were the results of our food plotting
efforts. Colt and I have taken many nice bucks since, including a 166-inch 11- point,
a 179-inch 9-point, a 179-inch 10-point and several others. Enclosed are three
photos of some of the bucks we’ve killed. Thank you, Whitetail Institute, for
helping with our ongoing success! Thanks for everything.
