It was the primary time Jamie Coldiron had tried for a legendary Kentucky buck that lots of his buddies and looking buddies had been seeing in locations far and extensive for greater than six years. The buck had such a large and strange rack, that they known as him “D9” — comparable in look to the entrance of a Caterpillar D9 bulldozer.
Utilizing intel from different hunters, plus path digicam images and his information from 35 years of bowhunting in Kentucky, he picked a chief spot within the hill nation to ambush “D9.”
It was the night of Oct. 16 and Coldiron was sitting 15 toes up in a maple tree in a sling-style stand on public land. He was watching a hardwood ridge hole removed from a street within the steep rolling hills of the 700,000-acre Daniel Boone Nationwide Forest in southeast Kentucky.
“I discovered a niche within the steep hills that I figured D9 could be utilizing coming from a bedding space that afternoon,” Coldiron tells Out of doors Life. “The spot was only a pure funnel honeycombed with well-used deer trails.”
Photograph courtesy of Jamie Coldiron.
Coldiron says at about 6:00 p.m. a doe appeared on a ridge above his stand and began performing spooky.
“She was feeding, noticed me, and her head began bobbing,” says Coldiron, 48, of Morehead. “About that point I heard one thing past the hole and noticed D9 at 80 yards headed my means. The doe noticed the buck, too, and that settled her down.”
Because the buck neared, it noticed the doe and headed towards her.
“As D9 obtained nearer she moved away, however he saved coming,” says Coldiron, who’s a corrections officer for Rowan County. “He stepped out from behind a tree at 22 yards, and I shot him behind the shoulder with my crossbow.”
The arrow was so quick Coldiron by no means noticed it in flight. However he believed his 100-grain B3 Exoskeletal Broadhead discovered its mark. He used a 150-pound Raven crossbow fitted with a scope. It was the primary time he’d ever used a crossbow to take a deer, though he’d arrowed many whitetails beforehand with compound bows.
“I watched him run off alone and will comply with him for 50 yards earlier than D9 disappeared,” Coldiron says. “I may inform he was harm. However I didn’t wish to push him. So, I climbed down from the tree, and messaged a pair buddies who knew concerning the buck. I advised them I obtained him.”
Coldiron waited for his buddies Tyler Crawford and Nathan Conley to indicate at his parked truck. After they arrived, the three males went again to the place Coldiron had been looking. They discovered the blood path instantly and shortly situated the downed buck solely 100 yards from the place it had been shot.
Then the arduous work started, because the three hunters dragged the estimated 200-pound buck a couple of half mile to Coldiron’s truck. They loaded the deer, then cleaned it.
Photograph Courtesy of Jamie Coldiron.
Coldiron is having the non-typical rack buck mounted by a taxidermist, who inexperienced scored D9 at 186 inches. The buck has a 22.5-inch inside unfold and 13 scoreable factors.
“My taxidermist says he’s 8.5 years previous, and we now have images of the buck going again six years,” Coldiron says. “We imagine his rack was headed downhill on account of his age. Two years in the past we figured he was a 200-incher.”
The left facet of D9’s rack is fairly funky, with a pair uncommon and enormous drop tines. One has a 4-inch base and is 9 inches lengthy. One other lengthy drop tine goes straight again behind his head.
“His rack by no means appeared like that till this yr, and we expect he had some kind of damage to make it develop that means,” Coldiron says. “D9’s proper facet at all times appeared the identical, so we all know it was the identical deer.”
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Coldiron has remained humble about his public land mega-whitetail.
“The top of an period has come,” Coldiron wrote on his Fb web page. “Plenty of good hunters have chased this deer for a very long time with plenty of blood, sweat, and tears. I spent plenty of time this yr making an attempt to pinpoint his house. My first day after him, and he got here proper by. Pure luck, however it’s a deer of a lifetime for me.”