Deer Creek State Park, located in south central Ohio, consists of 3600 acres. One third of which is water, and the nearby Deer Creek Wildlife Area contains another 3700 acres of timber and meadows. Ideal deer habitat.
The weather was really lousy with rain, moderate to heavy at times, cold, with high
winds that at times could blow you over. Certainly not a good day to be in a tree stand bow hunting. Enter Randy Cook from Washington Court House Ohio, a third shift
worker at a nearby car parts factory. It was mid-day, it was miserable. “I kept thinking
that the rain would stop, I mean today is the peak of the rut in Ohio, it’s Veterans Day.

I just felt the need to be out there hunting, even though the weather was not cooperating” claims Randy. So he loaded up his gear and headed out for the afternoon. By the time he arrived in the parking area it was about 1:30. He saddled up his gear and made his way into the Wildlife Area. He was heading for a special area that he had scouted previously, it was about two miles from the road . As he neared the perfect spot, he would have a medium size stream to his left, open woods in front, then heavy thicket to the far right. He had felt it was a good spot, lots of sign with plenty of rubs and scrapes about the area and he figured that the thicket was a ‘for sure’ bedding area. Randy then set out several film canisters filled with Jack’s Scent near some of the scrapes and rubs. He also estimated the distance to each from where he planned to set up on the ground.

“I have scouted and hunted this area before, some last year and a lot this year, I knew there was a nice buck in here, whether he would be here today was another matter,” Randy stated quite matter-of-fact. After getting his ground blind set up and his crossbow readied he settled in for the afternoon. “I tried rattling a couple of times and tried my Primos Estrus call, nothing was happening except I was getting wet and cold,” he continued. “About every 30 minutes I would rattle the antlers in hopes of getting some action, but all I got was more rain.

I have been hunting about 22 years and this is the biggest buck I have ever seen. I got out my tag and filled it out then came the knife and I got it field dressed and ready to drag. It was very heavy, had it not been for this other fellow and another guy that soon came along, I might never have gotten it out of the woods. It was too heavy for me to even budge,” Randy emphasized! The buck dressed out about 230 pounds.
With the gracious help of these two hunters, virtual strangers to me, we dragged the
deer most of three hours to get it out of the woods and into the back of my car. Hunter
and deer then made the trip to the local check station, Frosty’s Bait and Tackle near the
entrance to Deer Creek. Of course, it drew a crowd of onlookers and well wishers. And
it was much later that evening before Randy finally made it home to family. Since then
there has been a steady stream of visitors coming to check out this trophy buck.

Randy’s father called me Friday evening about measuring the antlers and we made
arrangements to do the deed on Saturday morning. This very incredible Ohio buck came in at 182 7/8 inches BTR and adding a 19 3/8” inside spread, we get a very impressive 202 2/8” composite score. This buck is estimated to be between 4 1/2 and 5 1/2 years old and it had the mass to prove it, nearly 40 inches of circumference. Not to mention the 27 plus inch beams. (This is the second 200 plus buck I had scored in just 2 days, gosh when will my turn come to take one of these Buckeye Monsters, author).