I made it up to the property in record time. When i got to the corner of the alfalfa field they were congregated in, I found this:





The story goes as follows, Luke and Isaac were walking back on our property to get in their stands. Isaac went right around the lake, and Luke went left. Luke hadn't gone far at all when he heard noise over his left shoulder. He turned slowly to find himself face to face with Freak Daddy at 10 FEET. I later went back and paced it out, it was exactly 10 feet.

Luke quickly brought his shotgun up and took 3 shots as fast as he could. Freak Daddy then took off to Luke's then left across the alfalfa field. What happened next is kind of a blur according to Luke. He called me, then Isaac. He then tried searching for blood and couldn't find any. He then went and made sure that he had in fact shot, and found 3 empty shell casings. Isaac then started searching the alfalfa field, and quickly found him.




What happened next was just plain crazy. Someone had gotten ahold of my dad and he and my mom and I all got there at the same time. Friends and family also showed up in the field over the next twenty minutes as we stood around talking and congratulating. We ended up getting him gutted and into my truck eventually.






We got him checked in at "Fin Feather Fur" in Ashland, Ohio where they have a youth big buck contest. At the fin we drew a crowd of 20 plus people on Sunday night at 5 PM. Pictures were taken, interviews with the DNR were set up, and the initial measurements were taken.

Late Sunday night, we finally got the buck to my cousins processing shed that we butcher all our deer at. Of course there was a crowd there as well. This is where we put the first unofficial tape to him and came up with the amazing total of 205 2/8 gross non-typical. 23 inch inside spread and the left antler scored just above 93".




The story couldn't have ended any better. If it wasn't I who could take this buck, then im glad it was my own brother and not some hunter i didn't know. After he was killed, we had hunters contact us saying that they too have been hunting Freak Daddy for a numbers of years. There have also been still photographs taken of the buck from a number of different locations and a host of trail camera pictures taken this summer from a property over a mile away from where Luke killed him. The range a dominant buck like this has is absolutely amazing. Were talking square MILES. Freak Daddy alone was seen in locations 3 miles apart. The astonishing thing is that it began and ended on the same 40 acre piece of property that my family has owned since the 1930's.

Three years of chasing one buck came to close on December 6th, 2009.

Now its time to find a new "Freak Daddy"