Joey Campbell

The Walgreens buck… where do I begin with this deer.

Well, it all started back in 2024 deer season when I believe I first saw this deer. I had a new 8 pointer with good brows and small G3’s show up on camera last year around mid October and stayed until the end of November before he disappeared. Didn’t think much of it; just hoped he survived for the 2025 archery season. Come September 2025, one of my good buddies sent me a video of this deer over 2 miles away from my property behind a convenience store. I thought I recognized him but wasn’t exactly sure. It took stalking trail cam photos from 2024 rut to learn that it was a deer I had passed last year. He didn’t show up this year on my cameras until the end of October hitting a mock scrape and vine I set up in my food plot. All season playing cat and mouse with this deer daylighting while in class or I’m in the tree and he won’t show up. He disappeared last week and I thought it was over figuring he’d go back to his summer/winter pattern 2 miles away… until today happened.

He showed up on camera around noon locked on a doe. I was working outside when I thought I heard a deer moving in the brush to my left, I looked, and it was a doe. I went back to working and didn’t think much of it until I heard a grunt. Peaked around the corner and it was him. 20 yards behind this doe broadside. Me, no bow, no gun, nothing waiting for him to move so I can go grab my bow. I went inside and grabbed my bow and release, came back out to see he had pushed the doe into the back of my property. Over the next 45 minutes to an hour, I managed to stalk on foot, up to within 50 yards of him, climb on top of a stump, and wait until he gave me a good broadside shot. Ended up following his doe on a trail 40 yards away from me where I stopped him and took the shot. The rest is history. I was on the phone with another one of my good buddies over the entire course of the stalk where he witnessed all the rollercoaster of emotions. Definitely one for the memory bank. Thank God for Archery hunting whitetails!