Hunter hunting along a marsh

Tyrel Z Caldwell

Information

  • Date Taken: 10/26/2017
  • Time Of Day: Evening
  • Method: Compound Bow
  • County: Allegan County
  • Property: Private
  • Dressed Weight: 286

I was ready to pack it up and head in and for some reason I thought “I’ll give it 10 more minutes” at this time it was 6:20 pm and when it came to the end of those 10 minutes. I was sitting in this make shift tree stand I had made out of a skid. Nailed to this 4-5 inch thick little tree I cut the top off about 6 ft up. As I sat there right at 6:30pm I suddenly heard some movement to my left. I turn my head and to my surprise this ridiculously huge buck sticks his head threw this 7-8 ft tall bush and tall grass about 35-40 yards from me next to this old died tree on the edge of this small field and all I can see of him is his thick 8 point rack and his huge horse size head and right at that moment he snorted and from the chilly night air it looked like thick smoke like a freight train bellowed from his bull like nose. The only shot I have is the base of his neck as he stood looking straight at me with the rest of his body covered with the surrounding vegetation. I didn’t even think it was like a unconscious movement like breathing…in one fluid movement I turned my body slightly to the left as I pulled back my “older than dirt” Pearson compound and as soon as my hand and release barely touched my cheek I pulled the trigger on my release and my arrow left my bow. It found the right side of the base of this monsters neck and in it went, the entire arrow vanished inside the beast. He did a back flip and rolled back into heavily dense woods and then silence. I’m thinking “hell yeah he dropped right there!” So I sat for about 25-30 more minutes and walked over there, pulled the vegetation back to view my buck and to my surprise NOTHING THERE!!!! What is this….this can’t be happening… I searched and searched for blood and NOTHING. Well long story short i searched and searched for this monster until I couldn’t go on. It’s now 4:30am Oct. 27th, 2017. I call my wife and say I give up I can’t find it. So as I slowly make my way there the thick woods I come up to a little trail that runs threw a small group of trees. Looks like the easiest route so I walk threw and to my surprise there’s that Big Buck! Died laying right on top of a doe scrape. Just a very small amount of blood on his tongue hanging out his mouth and not a spot anywhere else on him. I found half of the arrow broke off in his chest cavity when I dressed him out. The broad head had passed directly threw his heart and the half of the arrow was sticking threw his heart still. I took out my rope to drag him and tied him up and wrapped it over my shoulder and went to drag him out and as I threw all of my 230lbs into dragging him out my rope snapped and I fell on my ass. I laughed for a few minutes and said to myself now what….so I went and grabbed a friend’s truck and snaked it threw the woods and about 50 yards from the beast this damn truck gets stuck in some clay. I fight and fight to free this truck and to my relentless effort it just sits there and spins the tires till it runs out of gas….. AWESOME WHYNOT RIGHT…so again I walk back up out of the woods AGAIN. Which to my defense is about a mile. Get another friends truck and a tow strap and a gas can. Get back out there and free the truck and hook this beast up to the hitch with the tow strap and drag his big a$$ up out the woods and like wench I wrapped the strap around his neck and over a LG branch in tree and connect to the ball on the hitch, and slowly pull him up as far as I could with the truck and really get a good look at him and my jaw drops. This is the biggest bodied whitetail deer I’ve ever say killed in my life in person. Granted his rack could be bigger but for the size of the deer and the size of his rack and all his rack is damn near perfect besides a half inch or so that he broke off doing god knows what on one of his tines. He dressed out at 286 lbs. Big beautiful 8 point!!! In the picture of him hanging with me standing next to him he towered over me. Note in the picture his back legs are not even fully extended and I’m 5’8 and with my hunting boots on I’m roughly 5’9-5’10 and this deer makes me look like a toddler lol. Well that’s my big buck tail from this 2017 whitetail bow season in gun plain township in allegan county Michigan.