Alexandria hunter killed massive deer during hunting trip to the Mississippi Delta.
Jimmy Riley knows bucks. It’s his job, since he’s the head guide at Giles Island Hunting Club, one of the South’s premier outfitters, and a star on Mossy Oak’s “Deer Thugs” on the Pursuit Channel.
But even he was stunned at the antler dimensions of a Giles Island Buck killed Thursday (Dec. 20)by client Joshua Bruce of Alexandria, La.
“I measured him at 242 6/8 inches gross,” said Riley. Say what?
“Yep, 242 6/8 inches,” he repeated.
One more time?
“242 and 6/8,” Riley said, laughing this time. “Granted, that’s not a professional score. It is a gross green score done by me with an official scorer giving me help over the phone. He had a picture and was helping me.
“I’m sure when an official scorer gets his hands on it, the score will be different, maybe higher and maybe lower. I got 242 6/8 inches gross, and it’s my opinion that when the net score is figured it may lose 17 or 18 inches, but I’m betting it will go 225 net, non-typical.”
That would put Bruce’s 20-point buck in the top 3 of Mississippi’s all-time list of non-typicals taken by hunters, behind Tony Fulton’s massive 295 6/8 inch deer (1994, Winston County, gun) and Tracy Laird’s 236 ⅛-incher (2003, Adams County, archery). Richard Herring sits third at 225 inches (1988, Lowndes County, gun).
There’s a pick-up in the mix. Don Rogers found a 30-point in Winston County in 1987 that scored 251 6/8 inches.
If the gross of 242 6/8 inches holds up, it would rank behind only Fulton (311 4/8 inches gross — Roger’s find grossed 264 inches).
“It is one heck of a deer, and it was the No. 1 buck on the Giles Island hit list,” Riley said. “At least that’s what we were hoping. There’s a long story behind the buck, and we weren’t sure just how good it would be this year.”
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