Jared Hebert and 14-year-old daughter Lunden had an agreement when they headed to their East Baton Rouge Parish hunting club Christmas day: Lunden would be allowed to shoot a doe for her first deer, but there were stipulations attached to her killing a buck.
“I told her, ‘If it’s a buck smaller than anything I have on the wall already, it’s for you. If it’s larger than anything I have on the wall, it’s for me,’” the elder Hebert said.
Lunden quickly knocked out her doe that afternoon, and the father-daughter team celebrated her baptism into the hunting community.
The two Perry hunters also were able to make plans for their next hunt.
“Walking in, I noticed a big rub on a willow tree,” Jared Hebert said.
He had killed a nice 8-point the week before from the exact same stand, so he knew the fresh rub was from a new buck. He also suspected it was from a bigger deer.
So they go up early on Dec. 26, but only saw a few deer off the stand.
That afternoon, they decided to go back to the same shooting house, but to take a little different tack on their approach.
“We parked the four-wheeler 600 to 800 yards from the stand,” Hebert said. “I had heard some deer blowing from around the four-wheeler (during the morning hunt).”
They made the long walk and settled into the box stand about 2:30 p.m., and soon the deer were filtering out into the food plot.
“We had 10 or 11 does, a small 8-point and one other 8-point that was just outside the ears,” Hebert said. “I was looking at that (larger) 8-point to let (Lunden) shoot.”
His eyes were glued to the binoculars to assess the deer and ensure it was something he wanted to allow his daughter to kill. In the meantime, Lunden was checking the woods.
“She said, ‘Daddy, look at the deer coming out of the woods,’” Jared Hebert said. “I thought she was looking at the same deer, so I said, ‘I see it.’
“But she said, ‘No, Daddy, look at that other deer.’”
Hebert swung the binoculars, and almost dropped them.
A much bigger buck had stepped onto the green patch about 125 yards out, and it didn’t take much looking to know it was a shooter.
“When I turned and looked at it through the binoculars, I knew it was one I wanted to shoot,” Hebert said.
It also didn’t take young Lunden long to figure out who would be pulling the trigger.
“She said, ‘That’s one for you, for sure,’” Jared Hebert said.
His .300 Winchester magnum was eased into position, but it took a few minutes for the deer to get into position.
“It was facing right at the stand, so I would have had to shoot through the brisket, and I didn’t want to do that,” Hebert said.
So he waited, and the deer eased closer and closer.
“It probably took four or five minutes for it get to the does, which were about 60 yards from the stand,” Hebert said. “When he got to the does, he turned broadside and stopped.”
The gun belched, and the buck sat back on its rear haunches and then launched in the air. It hit the ground, and disappeared in a little dip in the ground.
Lunden was the first to get to the deer, as her father wondered exactly what he had killed.
“When she picked up the horns, I could see he was ridiculous,” Jared Hebert said of the 230-pound deer.
The rack held 12 points around an 18 1/8-inch inside spread. Three brow tines accented the right side of the rack.
The buck roughed out at 165 inches Boone & Crockett.
Visit the Nikon Deer of the Year contest to see more bucks killed this season and to enter your own photos. Only registered users are eligible to win the monthly and grand prizes, so be sure and sign up today!
User reports also can be viewed on our deer hunting forum, which everyone is encouraged to join.