Whitetail

On Oct. 2, Stephen “Chuck” Crowell, a 35-year-old walleye fishing guide from Eaton, Ohio, arrowed a giant whitetail in Wayne County, Indiana. He spent months trying to get intel on this deer after a UPS driver showed him a photo of the massive deer. The buck, which scored 266 4/8 inches, is the new...

Whenever we drank coffee at breakfast or beer at dinner, my late friend Tom Heberlein and I liked discussing how and where hunters preferred to die. Such talk at Old Tamarack—Heberlein's hunting shack near Mellen, Wisconsin—was usually light-hearted. As Professor Heberlein knew too well, death isn’t...

I was 20 feet up a tree on a picture-perfect October morning, watching my favorite oak flat. It was overcast, and the weatherman was predicting rain in the afternoon. I expected the deer to be up and moving ahead of the front, possibly moving between the neighbor’s cornfield and the trees dropping...

On October 2, the second day of Indiana’s archery season, Tyler Westell was at his wife Becca’s first ultrasound appointment. They have a baby due in February, and while Tyler was excited to see his baby, he was also anxious to get in a tree. Becca knows what it’s like being married to a hunter. She...

Update: On Saturday April 25, volunteers discovered Kaden Sites’s body near Tabeguache Creek about 1.5 miles from his truck. Authorities do not suspect self harm or foul play at this time but noted that the investigation is still ongoing. “There was always a measure of hope that Kaden would be found...

Jason Kline has been hunting a once-in-a-lifetime whitetail in northwest Ohio for the last four seasons. That pursuit came to an end this weekend when Kline finally got his hands on the buck’s rack—but it wasn’t the conclusion he hoped for. Kline found the long-expired buck while shed hunting on...

Jody Dalton killed a massive whitetail with his bow in Wyoming County, West Virginia, on Nov. 6, 2020. He speculated it would beat the current state record of 188 ⅞ inches but needed to wait 60 days to get an official score. On Jan. 13, 2021, official scorers measured the buck at West Virginia...

Here’s a tragic reminder that wearing blaze orange and knowing your target are so important. Last week during Ohio’s week-long rifle deer season, a father accidentally shot and killed his son during their annual hunting trip in Delaware County. The incident occurred while the father-son duo was...