“I blew the decision twice extra, and he took a number of steps in my route. Then I blew three extra occasions, and he began trotting to me throughout the pasture”
Dustin Stanford kneels subsequent to the 14-point buck that he recovered with the assistance of two blood-tracking canines (pictured.) {Photograph} by David Ogg
Dustin Stanford had an excellent begin to the New Yr. On the primary day of 2024, the hunter from Shannon, Mississippi, tagged a pleasant 8-point on a small piece of personal land close to Tupelo. Two days later, on Jan. 3, he went again to the identical property and climbed into the identical stand to see if he might notch his second buck tag of the season. (Mississippi regulations enable hunters to take three bucks per season.)
The tree stand was located on the sting of an open, grassy subject. He’d seen some smaller bucks and does cross by the sector throughout his hunt on New Yr’s Day, and the rut was nonetheless in excessive gear. However he noticed little or no motion all afternoon.
“I didn’t see something till about 5 p.m., once I noticed a deer 400 yards away,” Stanford tells Out of doors Life. “I obtained my binoculars on the buck and noticed he was big. He was on the transfer, although, and had no intention of turning my method.”
Stanford, who carried a bolt-action rifle chambered in .300 Win Magazine, wasn’t snug taking a shot from that distance. He frightened for a second, uncertain of what to do subsequent. Then he remembered the grunt tube he’d introduced alongside, and he blew it twice.
“The buck stopped and regarded my method,” Stanford says. “I blew the decision twice extra, and he took a number of steps in my route. Then I blew three extra occasions, and he began trotting to me throughout the pasture.”
The deer made a bee-line towards Stanford’s tree. When it obtained to 50 yards, it turned barely and provided him a quartering-to shot. Stanford raised his rifle, took goal, and fired.
“I knew I hit him, and he ran proper in entrance of me and into a giant thicket,” he says. “I set my rifle on my lap and referred to as my spouse Melinda and advised her I’d shot a monster buck.”
After ready a couple of minutes, Stanford climbed down and walked over to the place he’d shot the buck. It was getting darkish, however after getting a flashlight from his truck, he lastly discovered a blood path. He adopted the path into thick cowl, and it led him to a spot the place 5 completely different deer trails break up off in all instructions. So, he backed out and referred to as his searching buddy Lee Herndon, who related him with native deer tracker David Ogg.
Ogg met Stanford on the property round 9 p.m. He introduced alongside two blood-tracking canines, Copper and Lucy, they usually obtained on the path straight away.
“These canines knew their stuff,” Stanford says. “They discovered the buck about 100 yards from the place the 5 trails break up, in a number of the most gosh-awful thick cowl conceivable.”
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Getting the small-bodied buck again to Stanford’s truck was the simpler half because it weighed lower than 140 kilos. However what it lacked in weight it made up for in antlers. Even with three tines damaged off from combating throughout the rut, the rack nonetheless had 14 scoreable factors. Stanford’s taxidermist green-scored it at 152 7/8 inches.
“This 14-pointer is by far the largest buck I’ve shot or seen, and it’s actually put the deer searching drive in me,” says Stanford, who began chasing whitetails 12 years in the past. “I’m going to hunt exhausting by the top of the season on Jan. 31.”
