“About 2 PM , my wife Robin literally drove me from the house as I was in a stupor and
listless. Not knowing what to do, I called by buddy Steve Eaton, who owns a farm just down the road where we have hunted together for many years. He and his son were getting ready for the afternoon hunt and invited me to come on down,” he continued.

When Steve arrived at the farm the men talked strategy and stand location. It was a beautiful afternoon, mid forties, light breeze and clear skies. There was Steve Eaton, his son Brad and another friend Kenny Hardwick. After some serious discussion, the three of them decided to head down to the south side of the 120 acre farm which was mostly cropland and an adjacent swamp. The farm backed up to some state land that was used for flood control but did not allow hunting. Padgett would head to the north 45 acre woodlot to sit alone.

“We had prbably 25 stands hanging around the woodlot, I went to one of the stands we called ‘The Island Stand’ because it was in the center of the wooded area and on a ridge situated between two big ravines. This was a hang-on stand in a pretty decent tree and was a good vantage point. I got there about 3 PM, climbed up and got myself strapped in, I pulled up my shotgun, settled in and got quiet,” said Steve. “This was normally a good spot because the deer traveled from the farm on the east, through those two ravines and towards the flood control area to the west where they are relatively safe.”

  I watched her for four or five minutes and she was coming right towards me. Then I
saw movement farther to the left also in the pine thicket. I looked close to see what it was and all I could make out was that it was another deer with its head behind a large oak tree, all I could really see was its rump,” Steve said.

The pine thicket had been planted about fifteen years earlier by the landowner and the trees were now tall enough to provide cover, just behind the pines was a grove of mature oak trees and as is the nature of deer, they always seem to be standing just behind something, and one cannot see the head or the headgear.

“Finally after what seemed like several minutes, the deer which I thought was another doe, took a couple of steps away from the oak and I could see that it had a very large rack. He was now standing broadside to me at that point in time and all I could really see was the right side of the rack. As he started to come towards me I could see that he had really long tines that stuck up high. I quickly looked for the doe because I figured that he was following her. By now she was probably only twenty yards from me and still coming. She was walking right into my scent stream and I thought this is just not good,” Steve lamented.

“When she passed at 20 yards, the trail she was following was intersected by three other trails. She turned and headed west now to go into one of the ravines. I thought, this is really getting bad now, she was straight downwind of me, she had to smell me. I needed to look for the buck and see what he was doing all this time, so I turned and he had already come over the fence from the other farm and was now standing in amongst a bunch of maple saplings and was just thrashing one of them to death with its antlers. I could still only the one side and I didn’t see any of the sticker points or anything besides the long tines. I then turned back to the doe who had once again changed directions, she was coming right at me again. She took about 10 steps and suddenly raised her head and looked straight up at me. I knew my cover was blown, but I just froze, I didn’t even blink, but I knew it was over. She stared at me for several seconds and believe it or not, she dropped her head and started to walk away. I was afraid to breathe, she was so close,” recalled Steve.

When he came in I waited for him to fill my scope, he was about 20-25 yards away now. When all I could see was brown shoulder, I pulled the trigger. He bolted into the air and took off. I jacked in another round and readied for a second shot, just as I was about to fire again, his head started to go down so I knew he was hit hard. He went about another 10 yards and hit the ground. He never kicked or moved again.”

“Now the excitement began to build, I knew it was a pretty good sized buck, and that it was down for good, but I didn’t want to rush it, so I sat there for a few minutes then decided to get down while I still could. I lowered my gun and gear, then removed my harness and climbed down. I don’t really know why, but I

decided to walk over to where he had been thrashing that sapling and have a look.

  It was really torn up, almost shredded. I can’t believe it now but I walked about 25 yards in the opposite direction from where my buck was laying. I don’t know what I was thinking, but even now I didn’t realize how massive the rack was. I could see a couple of the small stickers on the right side, but I had yet to see any of the stuff on the left side.”

“Anyway, I couldn’t take it any longer so I turned and hightailed it pretty quick back to where he was laying and at about 15-20 feet away I realized he was a lot nicer than I thought. When I stepped along side and pulled his head up, I saw the drop tine for the first time. I just let out the biggest ‘war hoop’ ever. I figured that my buddies more than 200 yards away heard it. So I got on the phone and called Steve, and sure enough he had heard me yell. I told him it was the biggest buck I had ever seen in my life and told him to get on over here to help me get the deer out of the woods before it got too dark,” Steve said.

“Time my friends got together and got over to me it was dark, all three were very excited for me. We eventually dragged the buck to a bush-hog path and one of the guys went for a truck to load it up and haul it out. We all agreed that none of us had ever seen this buck, however, two friends of the landowner’s son had seen and shot at a buck of this size the year before. We were pretty much looking for a big typical 12 pointer that we all knew was in the area”

  The buck field dressed at 177 pounds and was aged between 6 1/2 and 7 1/2 years old. Including inside spread, the rack’s 26 scorable points measured out at 238 3/8 inches, but the official BTR score will be 219 3/8 inches. At least two points were broken off near the main beam, one would have been another sizeable drop tine and the second a pretty good sticker. The
split brow tines were unique in that one “Y’ed” out towards the front of the rack and the other “Y’ed” out to the back.

The buck was mounted by Harrison Hunting & Taxidermy of Liberty, Indiana on a pedestal so
it stands tall, proud and very lifelike.

Congratulations Steve!