I ended the last post hoping for blood for this, my 200th post. Well, I got good blood, it just wasn't caused by me. A friend of mine and neighboring hunter, finally caught up with PegLeg - a local legend who was a very visible 4 year old this summer.
Somehow he made it through the bow season, rifle season and was on his way to make it through the muzzloader season too. This buck seemed to have 9 lives. He was shot at twice this year with a bow and crossbow - and thats all that we know of. He was probably spotted and shot at more than that. The story of PegLeg began in the winter of 2010 and Steph named him in the summer of 2011. I noticed a young buck with a gash or a laceration on the back left leg of this deer and it looked like he had been shot at. I hoped he would make it through the winter, but didn't really think that much of it. The next summer came and I placed a camera across the highway where I had the big bachelor group the summer before. Four bucks started showing themselves regularly: Whitey, Contender, Junky Brewster, and of course PegLeg. That summer we were trying to come up with names for Junky and PegLeg, when Steph shouted out "PEGLEG!" This was partly an inside joke with her parents in regards to how Steph used to run down the stairs, but also, it fit the deer since his leg was banged up. We followed him until the end of August and then lost him until the end of the rut - November 18th, when I finally decided to moved my camera into the swamp. There I caught him several times before winter's end. He shed his 3 year old antlers around the 5-10 of February, 2012. We new he was a nice 120-125 inch 3 year old and couldn't wait to see what he'd blow into in 2012. We had the most unbelievably mild and warm winter and tons of deer survived because of it. Farmers had their crops in the ground in the middle of April and things were really looking up for the crops, and in turn, the antler growth potential of some of these hitlist bucks. It wasn't until the end of July that I finally got a picture of PegLeg in John's island. He grew an awesome abnormal split G2 on his left and would easily be distinguishable from a long ways away. He was shaping up to be really massive with tall tines and really long main beams. By the time summer was over, he was looking like he would gross right around 150". An awesome four year old. I saw PegLeg once or twice in the binoculars feeding in the soybeans, but by the sounds of it, everyone was seeing him too. This buck was no secret. It was going to be a matter of time before the deer got shot. I set up a couple stands in hopes of getting close to him on the land that I had permission to hunt, but it just wasn't close enough. I only got one series of pictures of him out of velvet before his core area immediately shrank to about a 20-40 acre area. It wasn't until halloween that he started to spread out that area in search of does. I got two pictures of him on the east side of John's farmyard, which told me that he was making trips into the swamp. One was on the 31st and one was on the 7th of November. I scratched my head to figure out where he would be going during these trips - if he'd be heading north and just circling west through the swamp and ending back in his core area, or if he'd venture east after going north in to the swamp. Well, I didn't get any pictures of any mature bucks in the tamarac swamp during rifle season and the week after so I moved a camera up into the cedars over the live spring. I had about 10 days of garbage pictures and all of a sudded, BAM! there he was, looking like a giant. That was the night of the 21st of November. My hunch is that he was making trips back and forth from the soybeans to the cedars and he was spending a couple days in each place. That's when the last weekend of November rolled around. My friend saw him on camera on the 29th, saw him on the 30th, thought he may have seen him on the 1st of December and ultimately came in to the standing beans on the 2nd of December for the last time. At about 70 yards, my friend cocked the hammer on his TC and let him have it. PegLeg piled up about 50 yards away leaving no track job required. I was able to go over to his house that evening and take some really nice pictures for him.
They weighed him at about 190 lbs. He gross scored 153 5/8 and net 133 3/8". His right antler (4 point) went 65 4/8" and his left (6 point) went 66" even. His beams were 25 & 24". His G2s were 8 6/8 and 9 2/8". His G3s were 10 1/8 and 9". His mass measurements were also really good at 4 4/8 H1s, 4 4/8" H2s, 5 6/8 and 4 6/8" H3s and 4 and 3 4/8" H4s. He was 15 1/8" inside spread. A truly wonderful 4 year old buck. One more year and he would've easily grossed 165-170". Nobody in their right mind would pass him up however. I am really happy that somebody got to kill him near his prime, who knows how close I ever was to him. Especially in those 3 days right after the rifle season where I was covered up in does and fawns and yearlings. I probably wouldn't want to know how close I was. Now we need to focus on who's left: Bullwinkle, Pencil (somewhere), the 6x5, Blacknose, and a few others. It's getting slim, but there's tons of yearling and even two year olds left, which I am super excited about.
On another tragic note, our best up and comer around our hunting area, Crab 10, got shot opening evening of muzzleloader season by a neighbor less than a quarter mile from our cabin.
He was scored at 129" as a three year old. My dad is going to do the european mount, so I'll get lots more looks at him, but he had a lot more mass than I thought. He would've been a dandy next year too. Dang. And a true local deer - very killable.
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