This was originally published on Nov. 14, 2024
It was opening day and Kevin Taft of Cornville was hunting on an unfamiliar piece of land. He had always hunted on his family’s property in Exeter but wanted to try a new place.
Taft had mounted game cameras at various places in the new area before hunting season opened, moving them around to get some idea of what to expect for deer living in the area.
He and his “little brother” William Cole — a friend who is family — went onto the property before hunting season to put up a treestand. They found a sturdy-looking pine that would do. When the men were about 10 feet from the tree, a big buck that had been bedding nearby took off.
“THAT was a big buck,” Cole said to Taft.
After that, Taft saw it on his camera a few times, but it wasn’t the one he ended up shooting. He hopes the buck is still around next year for him to pursue.
His cameras showed at least two other 200-plus-pound bucks. He saw the three bucks within three minutes of each other on the camera.
His buck quest had begun.
After the deer was spooked at the pine tree, the men abandoned that spot in a hurry in case the big animal came back. They found another spot several yards away in a pine grove on the main trail. They hurriedly erected the treestand and in another spot, a ground blind, and got out of there.
He wanted to bow hunt, but decided to stay out of that area until rifle season. Taft saw deer nearly every night on his game cameras. He could have shot a spike horn on the first evening of archery season, but refrained, deciding to wait for rifle season.
He never got to sit in his treestand or his blind.
Taft really enjoys the hunt and the challenge of pursuing big bucks. But his buck season was over an hour into opening day.
Taft still-walked — taking a step or two and then stopping to observe and listen — up a road. He thought he was being very quiet and stealthy. The road had been traveled a bit, so small branches were crumbled and didn’t crunch under his feet.
He saw a sawmill on his friend’s property and decided that once he had reached it, he would get a drink out of his backpack and take a small break. But as he got closer, a big buck jumped up beside him and bolted. Taft hadn’t seen it and he didn’t get a shot at it.
The buck could have gone in one of multiple directions including a nearby field, the main road or toward Taft’s treestand.
Taft still-hunted toward his treestand, going very slowly. It took him 45 minutes to go a few hundred yards. At one point, a helicopter flew over him and he took advantage of the noise to go a little faster, then slowed again once it had passed.
He reached the trail leading to the treestand, then suddenly heard another crash. He was starting to get paranoid about jumping deer.
He could see the treestand. He could also see a rack and a body going uphill. Taft grunted at the buck, trying to challenge it to defend its territory. The deer ignored him. It was trailing a doe.
Taft crouched down to make himself less visible while he figured out his strategy for pursuing the deer. He slowly scanned the trees on either side for eyes and noticed that some of the branches were beaten up where they weren’t a week before.
His foot was falling asleep when a doe went flying by. Then another doe stopped on the hillside. He started walking toward where he had seen the buck when he saw it trotting with its head to the ground. Taft grunted at it but again, there was no response.
The deer still had its head to the ground when Taft pulled up his Browning X-Bolt .308 and shot the animal. The buck didn’t know what hit it but it jumped up and ran about 50 yards toward Taft, tipping over before the hunter could shoot again. It was a double lung and heart shot.
Taft realized when he walked up to the buck that it wasn’t any of the big animals he had seen on his cameras. It was a 10-point 200-pound buck. He wasn’t sure it would reach that weight, but the animal weighed just 200 on certified scales at the tagging station.
It’s his first one in the Big Buck Club. North Rhodes Taxidermy in Searsport will mount the buck for him.
Taft plans to fill his antlerless deer tag with his bow.
“I am not a trophy hunter, but I like to hunt mature animals because they are more of a challenge,” Taft said. “It’s an addiction.”
