Well ol Hawkeye's four year quest came to an end the day before the 2002 deer hunting season would be over. At around 4pm the 12 point made its way along Rays shooting lane to a small clearing of oat grass. For 3 minutes Ray watched the big buck munch and thought he would never bring his head up as he was rear to Ray's position but then the head did rise and Ray squeezed the trigger of his Winchester 30-30 lever action and caught the big lad right behind the left ear.

The buck turned out to be a 7 year old with his teeth all but worn out. The biologist figures he would maybe have died this winter of starvation and surely would not have made it next year. From his lean state we know he did a lot of breeding before succumbing to Ray, so the gene pool is regenerated.

This particular buck had been seen many times around the farm over the past four years and we knew it was only a matter of time before someone would meet up with him, we just didn;t think it would take 4 years, but the wait was worth it, The buck field dressed 176lbs and we know if he had of been shot about 4 weeks earlier he would have topped 200, the green score is 161 B&C points with the antler on both sides measuring 7 inches in circumference between the burr and the G2 tine, a massive and impressive rack to say the least. Congratulations to a fine gentleman and a dedicated hunter. Removing this buck was a sound management decision and his offspring should grow to be fine animals themselves.

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