Hunter: Herb Pierson
Points: 11 (6L, 5R)
County: Wilcox
Season: 2016-2017
Hunt Story
We have been watching this deer on camera for three years. He was a large deer the first year with an OK rack, but not the trophy yet. Last year we were all very disappointed when he grew a very deformed right side. His left side was a perfect 5 points with very long tines, but the right side was a hand-like cluster. His body was huge. As we are a trophy management club we were very disappointed and named him BIG UGLY. We thought about harvesting this animal but no one saw him; as a matter of fact he was never seen during the day. The pictures were all at night. Well, when he showed up in night pictures again in 2016 we were very happy to see a magnificent 11-point trophy. After two weeks of hunting in very warm weather the temperatures final dropped on November the 5th. With the cooler weather some rutting activity was seen on the 6th. Monday morning, November 7th, was my last morning hunt, so I decided to grunt and rattle more aggressively. Shortly after some hard rattling I noticed a deer running across the newly planted pines to my right. When I finally got the deer in the glasses, I could see it had a rack but it was quartering away with his nose to the ground, so I really had no idea how good it was. Everything was quiet for the next 20 minutes. About 7:15 a.m. all of a sudden there were two chases occurring slightly to my right. Two small bucks chasing one doe and a third pushed another into the hardwoods. Then I noticed a larger deer about 150 yards away at the edge of the hardwood, standing there watching. I glassed and saw that was a large buck, so I picked up my rifle. As I got the deer in the scope, he turned 180 degrees and I could see he had a big rack. That's when I decided to take my shot. I wasn't sure if it was BIG UGLY or another big buck. But when I got to the deer it was BIG UGLY , 250 pounds and 166 1/2 inches. This deer's 2014 shed was found, and it had a piece of skull attached to it, which explains the deformed 2015 rack, but it healed and he made a great come back.
