The journey to my first whitetail began when the owner of the company that I work for called me into the office. He had a “favor” to ask of me, he wanted me to take his friend’s son-in-law elk hunting. Now anyone that knows me will tell you that I hunt hard and often, and I also have a hard time telling the boss no, so I agreed to talk to this guy. I called him and he introduced himself as Jeremiah Upp, a professional archer from Lancaster, Ohio. He and I talked elk hunting a bit and we instantly hit it off. Jeremiah informed me that he would only have three mornings to hunt, as he was coming here for a vacation, and would have to spend the afternoons with the family. I thought to myself “no pressure, all I have to do is get this guy an elk in less than a day’s worth of hunting”. Luckily for me with the help of my father, Harold, we have secured some of the best hunting in the West; consequently I wasn’t too worried about the task at hand.

On the third and final morning, I got Jeremiah into some bugling bulls down in the oak brush. We pushed these bulls hard until about 10:00, along the way Jeremiah learned that in the oak’s a bull can be thirty yards away, and you can’t even think about a shot it’s so thick. Earlier that morning Jeremiah had told me with this being his last morning he would take a cow. However once he heard those bulls bugling he changed his mind, for a while.

We were closing in on a draw ahead, and I knew these elk would hit a wallow there. So we quickly sneaked out to the edge of the draw and set up. Jeremiah was in front of me about 40 yards so I could pull a bull past his position. As the morning dragged on, it became apparent that these bulls were content to stand out there and scream at us. With a cow only 25 yards away, Jeremiah shrugged his shoulders and let an arrow fly at her. Upon impact the arrow zipped through her, and she went maybe 10 yards before falling.

After that Jeremiah and I had made plans for him to make a return trip the following year. In our phone conversations he had invited me to Ohio numerous times for a whitetail hunt. I was a bit apprehensive at first, but after killing one of my 190 gross mulies this year, I was going to Ohio to get some “REVENGE”. The month of October found me spending countless hours with my Mathews Legacy shooting whitetail 3-D’s in the back yard. Luckily for me, I have spent a lot of time in a tree stand here in Western Colorado hunting for both mulies and elk. I am one of the few from the west that utilizes tree stands as much as possible, as well as my favorite tactic, stalking. There is nothing like putting the sneak on a P&Y buck, all of your senses versus his keen eyesight, an unbelievable sense of smell, factor in, that during an early season hunt he is usually part of a bachelor group of bucks, so there are probably any number of eyes peering in your direction. It doesn’t get any better than knowing that you faced him on his level and came out the conqueror….until November 9 th.

My first morning was spent in a stand that Jeremiah and his father Ed, had taken many P&Y bucks from. Jeremiah had positioned this stand in a saddle between two draws. He assured me that when the bucks were chasing does, this would be the place to be. Being from Western Colorado there is not a lot of opportunities to rattle for deer, as our hunting season takes place before the rut. I had seen a few does earlier that morning, but no bucks. So around 8:00 I decided to do some rattling. I was a bit nervous at first, but have been rattling for Elk for years (sounds crazy, I know, but I will save that for another story). I had rattled for about 10 seconds when directly in front of me, about 150 yards away, I spotted movement. It was a buck! With only four days to hunt, I was planning on shooting the first respectable buck that gave me a shot, and this one was definitely respectable. Being an eight pointer that would score in the 120’s, I slowly put the antlers down and grabbed my bow. By this time the buck was within 85 yards and closing fast. There was a pine tree of to my left side he seemed to be heading for. There was another pine tree directly in front of me that split into three large branches about five feet from the ground. He seemed to be playing hide-and-seek behind it. I had always heard whitetails were spooky animals, but this buck was being extra cautious. At about 60 yards he came right toward me staying behind the three-branched tree the whole time. He slowly came in looking for the two bucks who had made all of the ruckus, and was now a mere 30 yards away. He then topped the hill that he was coming from and realized there weren’t any deer around. He then turned and went back the exact way he came, never offering a shot. At about 50 yards I grunted at him, and he glanced in my direction and then disappeared.

As I sat there, I replayed the whole scenario over again in my head. What had I done wrong? I had done everything just as I would have with a bull Elk. I had stopped calling when he was at roughly 100 yards, just to make him look for me. I didn’t get caught moving or anything, and then I thought, sometimes they just get away! I sat there pondering the morning hunt for about thirty minutes or so, and decided I would try rattling again. I clashed them together for a few seconds, and from the same direction the first buck came I caught movement. I just assumed it was the same buck, when suddenly the sun hit his antlers. It was a good thing I was wearing a safety harness, because I almost fell out of the tree with excitement! The buck was about 80 yards away and I still had the antlers in my hands. He closed the distance to about 60 yards as I grabbed my bow, and all of a sudden I felt the wind on the back of my neck. That’s a terrible feeling for a bow hunter, but we all have been there. Needless to say, he didn’t stick around long. I thought to myself, that’s probably as close as I’ll ever come to a real-life “booner”.

I explained to Jeremiah that this buck was one of incredible proportions, and he said I probably wasn’t used to field judging whitetails. That evening Jeremiah put me on a stand that was down on the point where those two bucks had come from. I saw a few nice bucks, one with the right side of his rack broke off, and a few does. Jeremiah was trying real hard to put me on some bucks, and we decided the next morning I would sit there again.

I awoke the next morning to the sound of the wind howling and it was unseasonably warm out, not exactly ideal deer hunting weather. Jeremiah was going to hunt this morning on a stand past my position, and we agreed that if the wind kept up we would meet up at about 9:30 or 10:00 and call it a day. We split up and as I was preparing to get in my stand , I glanced to my left and not more than 30 yards away was the young buck with only the left side of his rack left, this being my first whitetail hunt, I debated whether to shoot him or not. After much deliberation, I decided I would pass on him. After he moved off, I climbed into the stand and got comfortable, with the wind howling, I didn’t think I would be here too long. I decided, after sitting for an hour or so, to hit my grunt call a few times…, nothing. The wind was blowing so hard I wondered if anything could even hear me, so I made the decision to just hold on and ride the wind out.

Suddenly, I saw a doe about 100 yards away off to my right. As she moved forward she would look behind her occasionally, and then I spotted movement. It was a buck, and a “shooter”. I was sure he would hear my heart pounding out of my chest; I took a deep breath and tried to calm my nerves, and started looking for possible shooting lanes. He was a very clean eight-point, maybe around 125 inches. I watched the doe and when she got to a good shooting lane, I hit her with my rangefinder, it read 38 yards, I couldn’t believe it, just moments before I had guessed her at around 60 yards. The combination of being 25 feet up and the doe being an additional 30 feet below the base of my tree made her appear much farther than she truly was. My initial thought was that my rangefinder must be on the “blink”, but then I decided to trust Bushnell on this one.

The eight-pointer was 30 yards behind the doe and in hot pursuit. I began to focus on the buck, being careful to pick a spot high behind his shoulder. Suddenly the buck froze and looked behind him, something else was coming. It was a buck, and a huge one. I had to make a decision, shoot the eight-pointer that was nearing my shooting lane, or wait for a shot that might never happen. Some may call me crazy, but I have always been told “a bird in the hand is better than ten in the bush”, and with only two days left to hunt, the eight-pointer looked good enough. What happened next was, I think, more fate than luck.

As the eight-point approached my lane, I drew my bow. At 40 yards I knew I would need a standing still shot to feel good about it, and anyone that has ever been lucky enough to hunt the dense hardwoods of Ohio will tell you, sometimes you can’t even see 40 yards, let alone shoot. The bucks attention was now squarely on the doe, who had stopped to eat acorn’s. Whenever he was 5 yards from my lane, he suddenly ran toward the doe, darting through my shooting lane. I grunted to stop him, but I had no shot, so I let my bow down. As the eight-point neared the hot doe, he grunted at her twice. This was more than the big buck could handle, as he displayed in a stiff-legged strut. With his ears pinned back, he approached my lane; I came to full draw and tried to relax.

When he reached my lane, I grunted, and to my surprise the buck looked in the opposite direction of me. I slowly let the pin settle, and as the shot broke I lost the arrow in the dark trees, but I heard that familiar “thump” of arrow hitting home. I wasn’t sure where I had hit him, until he took two steps and I could see the blood pumping out of him. He took another two steps, stopped, and before I could even nock another arrow, his feet began to “dance” and he fell headlong into a big oak tree, tumbling out of view. I immediately had to sit to keep from falling out of the stand. I waited and listened, and when I couldn’t stand it any longer, I got out of the tree, being careful to take my time. I went to where he was when I shot, and quickly found hair, blood, and my arrow. The arrow had went completely through and stuck in an oak tree. I quickly followed the blood maybe ten yards, when I spotted a patch of white on the hillside below me. I raced to the buck. His rack was folded under him, and my initial thought was he had broken his rack when he hit the big oak tree. However, when I rolled him over his antlers came flying out. I have shot many P&Y mule deer, but this was clearly the biggest buck I had ever taken. I have never had one of those out-of-body experiences, but this was as close as this red-neck bow hunter will ever come to one. I sat there for about thirty minutes just admiring him, and thinking how lucky I had been this year. This was my third animal in less than two months. I had taken a 170 gross mulie buck and a 5-point bull back home in Colorado earlier. One would think this was where the story ends, but not so.

I met Jeremiah at 10:00 and told him what had happened, after high-fives and taking many pictures we headed back to the truck. When we got there, there was a guy parked by us. He was preparing to hang a stand on the farm just north of us. Jeremiah knew him from the local archery shop, his name was Corey Snoke. Corey asked if we had shot one, and I told him that I had shot a monster, possibly a “Booner”. Corey told us that 11 days earlier he had hit a big buck over on the farm he was hunting, but had never found it. Corey explained he had hit the buck too high, narrowly missing the spine. After searching for days, he presumed the buck must still be alive. Corey offered to help us get my buck loaded, so on the ride I told him all that had happened on this hunt. When we got there we hopped out of the truck and Corey’s jaw almost hit the ground. This was the very buck he had arrowed 11 days earlier, upon closer examination my buck had a wound from Corey’s arrow right through his back straps. I thought Corey was going to throw-up after seeing the buck up close.

After getting back to Jeremiah’s house we put a tape to the buck and came up with a whopping 186 5/8.There are a lot of people I would like to thank for helping make this happen. My Father, Harold Byers, who introduced me to archery, some 25 years ago. Thanks to Evan Baize for the Mathews legacy, sorry Ev, but you’re not getting this bow back. Most of all, my wonderful wife Cassie, who has endured my hunting addiction for the last 10 years. She used to be a widow every fall, but she finally just broke down and bought a bow in order to see me. And last, but not least, Jeremiah Upp who without him I wouldn’t of even had a stand to sit in. I know this was hard to swallow, but turn about is fair play. “REVENGE” is sweet!!!