Huge 16-point taken after hunter runs down shooting lane to close distance.
Corey May was very familiar with a buck that was making its home on his dad’s 3,000-acre Madison Parish farm. Trail cam photos had allowed the 25-year-old May to keep tabs on the deer; he’d shown up on May’s trail cameras for two years prior.
What the camera revealed this past August was astounding – he’d grown to eye-popping proportions.
“Last year, we judged him to be a 140-class deer, based on the photos we had,” May said. “I’m glad I didn’t see him last season because I’d have probably shot him.”
Click here to see trail cam photos of this buck from this year.
May did, in fact, bring the buck down yesterday morning (Nov. 28), and the 252-pound deer it far exceeded last year’s estimate with Simmons Sporting Goods in Bastrop green scoring the antlers at 212 1/8 inches.
“When I saw the trail cam photos in August, I set out to bow hunt him,” May explained. “I had a pretty good idea the area where he was hanging out. In fact, I had him within 40 yards one morning in October, but I could never get a shot I was comfortable with.”
Once rifle season opened, May was determined to get a crack at this Madison Parish behemoth, and he hunted him every chance he got.
Then the unexpected happened; as he drove up to his dad’s camp before dawn yesterday, his headlights illuminated the trail past the camp – and there stood the buck just past the gate.
“When I drove up, he turned and trotted off,” May said. “I got my hunting stuff together and hurried down the trail to the nearest stand we have there and crawled in it, hoping he’d come back out.”
As daylight approached, May looked far down the trail where a patch of wheat was planted and saw a deer grazing; then another deer stepped out into the patch.
“They were at least 400 yards down the lane from me, and using binoculars I saw one was a doe and the other looked like a pretty good buck,” the hunter said. “By then, it had gotten daylight, and the more I looked at him the bigger he got until it suddenly dawned on me that I was looking at the big buck that was near the camp earlier.”
The two deer seemed content to stay in the wheat patch, so May decided he needed to close the distance to have a decent crack at the big buck.
“I got out of my stand and, at ground level, the deer were over a rise from me, which enabled me to run down the trail 200 yards or so without being seen,” May said. “I then slipped into the woods and paralleled the trail until I came to a ground blind we had, eased up next to it and sat down.”
Everything just fell into place at that point.
“The doe slipped into the woods, and the buck kept feeding for a moment, came toward me and turned at about 130 yards to follow the doe,” he said. “I shot, the buck hit the ground and got back up; I shot again and he fell again.”
Assuming the deed was done, May reached down to pick up his gear. When he looked back, the buck was gone.
Walking down to where the deer had been standing, May found plenty of blood that indicated a good hit. However, there was no deer to be found.
May made a mistake at that point.
“I began following the blood trail when the buck jumped up and ran,” he said. “I shot and missed, and decided I needed to give him time to die, so I went back to the camp and started calling friends.”
One friend had a good blood-trailing dog and offered to bring it, but he wouldn’t be able to get there until noon.
May couldn’t wait: He grabbed a shotgun and buckshot and continued the search.
“The wind was in my favor, so I felt if I could slip quietly and watch ahead I might have a chance at seeing the buck before it saw me,” May explained. “I was looked as far down the trail as I could see when suddenly there he was five steps from me lying under a bush with his head up.”
One charge of 00 buckshot, with another following for good measure, did the trick and May was finally able to get his hands on this magnificent animal.
The buck sported 16 points, had an inside spread of 17 inches and the rack was heavily palmated. The bases were not that large, measuring some 4 1/2 inches each, but the circumference great farther up the rack.
A wildlife biologist at the Monroe LDWF office aged the buck at 4 1/2 years of age.
This was the second trophy buck May has bagged on his dad’s property over the past two seasons. His 150-class buck was featured in January.
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