Last week produced some of the finest deer hunting I've ever experienced.
Bill Heavey, the humorist for Field & Stream magazine, came down from Maryland last Friday for an immersive Arkansas hunting experience at Old Belfast Hunt Club in northern Grant County and at Prine's Sportsman's Club in Monroe County.
Heavey, an avid bowhunter, is inexperienced at hunting with rifles. His baptism would come the hard way, in tower stands overlooking vast cutovers and in elevated boxes in dense woodlots.
We camped at Old Belfast on Friday and Saturday, and it was very cold. Mike Romine and Zack Smith erected an Arkansas wall tent for us, a portable garage with a cabin tent inside. It was good, but we accepted an offer from Larry Romine to stay in his camper.
We spent Saturday overlooking a cutover awash in high grass, brambles, brush and log litter. It looks open from the stand, but it's a nasty wilderness when you're standing in it. Pine thickets bracket the cutover on three sides. We saw does and a young buck cross early, and then the field grew lifeless.
"Think we ought to try to rattle one up?" I asked, reaching for the antlers in my backpack.
"Couldn't hurt," replied Heavey, shivering.
My rattling sequence lasted about 90 seconds. About five minutes later, a bright heart shape appeared at the edge of the thicket about 230 yards away. I raised my binoculars and whistled softly.
"Dude, I'm looking at the biggest buck I've ever seen in Grant County," I said, trying to temper a tone of urgency.
It was an 8-point buck with a rack that spread well outside the ears. The main beams were tall and thick, with three long, tall points on each side and two smaller points. I estimated his rack to be in the 120-130 Boone and Crockett range. The buck stood like a sculpture next to a doe scanning the field for the sight of a rival.
Finally, it entered the field and stopped.
"He's standing wide open," I said. "Get him now."
Heavey raised my Ruger Model 77 in 6.5x55 Swedish, but he couldn't find the buck in the scope. He turned the magnification up and down trying to get oriented.
"Too late," I said. "He's going back into the thicket."
So it went for the rest of the morning. The buck came to the edge and went back in. Occasionally it walked a few yards up the thicket line, but Heavey never got a bead on it.
We returned after lunch. We met Alfred Romine at the gate, along with his grandson Noah, 7. Noah is a guileless small lad with a thick shock of snowy hair, the picture of innocence and sincerity.
"Hey Noah, check this out," I said, unsheathing a massive Smith & Wesson 657 revolver chambered in .41 Remington Magnum and wearing a big Nikon scope.
Noah looked like young King Arthur gazing upon Excalibur for the first time. His eyes looked like moons as a crescent smile touched both ears. His face glowed.
"Can I have it?" he asked?
"You don't want no part of that, boy," Alfred said, laughing. "That thing'll break your arm."
Noah seemed to believe it would be worth it.
"What made you want a gun like that," Heavey asked later.
"I bought it the day I learned I had cancer," I said. "It was a little promise I made to myself, you know, to get well so I could hunt with it and enjoy it.
"I have a few guns I would never part with. That Swede you're holding is one of them. This pistol is another."
We continued to play cat-and-mouse with the Cutover Buck. I texted Mike Romine and asked if he wanted to hunt with Heavey Sunday.
"Sure," he texted back.
"You need to be on this stand," I replied.
I turned to Heavey.
"I won't come here again until you or Mike kills this buck," I said. "It's his stand, and if you get a shot, he needs to be here to give you his blessing. He will, but it's his gift to give, not mine."
Heavey nodded.
The game continued in the same fashion for them Sunday. I killed a doe and cleaned it in the rain when Heavey and Romine arrived.
"Nothing screws up a good deer hunt like killing a deer," Romine said.
Later, at Prine's, we discussed Monday's strategy with Bob Rogers and Matt Saffell. They recommended we hunt their stands, which are next to the White River National Wildlife Refuge boundary.
"Bucks come off the refuge in the morning and chase the does around Goose Pond," Rogers said. "The wind should be right to give you a good chance in the morning.
I passed on easy shots at two does that morning. I saw another doe and a buck of undetermined quality slip across a clearing 150 yards away. Heavey was about 300 yards away but saw no deer.
We hunted different stands overlooking small food plots in the evening. I was only there for about 90 minutes when a decent 8-point buck trotted right up the plume of my scent trail. It lingered under my stand and turned toward the woods. I declined to shoot believing the best was yet to come.
Shortly after, three does and a cow-horn spike crossed a draw at the far end of the food plot. They met up with a buck that chased one doe all over a distant clearing for about 15 minutes.
At about 5 p.m., a young 6-point buck entered the field, a non-shooter. I was convinced deer were about to flood that field, but I was mistaken.
Heavey, 300 yards away, saw no deer.
Tuesday was dead, and Wednesday felt even worse.
"I don't feel like I'm missing anything not being out there today, "Heavey said as we drove to the airport.
On Thursday evening, Romine sent me a text.
"I just killed the buck of my life."
I texted Heavey.
"Romine just killed the 'Cutover Buck.' "
Heavey asked for details, but I had none to share.
"Mike is uncharacteristically at a loss for words at the moment," I texted.
"Awesome!" Heavey replied. " If anybody was worthy of that deer, he's the guy."
Sports on 11/23/2014