T-Bone Tags Out With A 186

I’ve always said that when it’s your time, it’s your time.

Hunting personality Travis “T-Bone” Turner, of Hogansville, has struck again. His latest Georgia giant whitetail grosses 186 and was killed with a muzzleloader on the evening of Oct. 11. Just three weeks ago GON reported that Travis shot a 160-inch 10-pointer with his bow.

When Travis Turner gets this buck scored at one of GON’s Truck-Buck scoring events, it could very likely end up being the new No. 3 muzzleloader buck for the state.

“I’ve taken two bucks a couple of times over the years but never this early and never, never, never bucks of this size,” said Travis.

Like the Pope & Young he killed on Sept. 25, Travis knew his latest buck was on the property.

“The night I shot the 160 with my bow, I was getting trail-camera pictures of this buck an hour before dark 350 yards away from me,” said Travis. “This deer was up more during daylight than the other one. I wanted to kill this one with a bow, but there were so many deer with him, I would have messed it up, especially trying to film it.”

This buck was 6 1/2 years old and put on 25 inches of bone since the 2019 hunting season. Travis said his son had nicknamed this buck H.O.G. 2.0.

“We had a deer I killed with my bow four or five years ago, and he had a real tight rack, he looked real similar to H.O.G. 2.0,” said Travis. “He said, ‘Dad, that deer looks like the Hands of God, it looks like he is praying, so let’s call him H.O.G.’ Then when this one came along, he said ‘Let’s call him H.O.G. 2.0.’”

During the muzzleloader opener, H.O.G. 2.0 was still on a pretty consistent pattern, preferring to feed from a protein feeder filled with Big & J attractant. However, Travis knew he was running out of time to kill this buck, at least on this pattern.

“I knew we had to capitalize for several reasons,” said Travis. “One, I am going to be starting to travel. Two, acorns are raining like crazy, and the deer are changing their patterns. Three, the closer we got to the rut, the deer would be busting up and chasing does. I knew the pattern was going to change drastically here within the next 10 days.”

Even though H.O.G. 2.0 still had his mind on one of the protein feeders, killing him at one of those feeders wasn’t an option.

“The feeder was at the core of the property,” said Travis. “You always get nighttime pictures at those protein feeders. I keep those out all year long so they are used to traveling through the property, and we try to keep the pressure real low.”

To actually make a plan for killing the buck, Travis said he pulled an old trick that he learned from Glen Garner, a local hunter who has eight record-class bow-bucks and is a current land manager for some top-end properties in Harris County.

“Based off trail-camera pictures you try and gauge where he is bedding,” said Travis. “You just back up and keep trying to get closer to the bedding area without going into it. Put little appetizer piles of corn or whatever bait it is and try to get daylight pictures, and that is what I did.”

Travis has a spot on his property for rifle hunting with a Redneck blind that sits on top of a hill, and there are four or five narrow lanes cut in like spokes on a wagon wheel. Travis discovered that the buck was crossing at the end of one of those long lanes before dark as he headed for the protein feeder 250 yards away. However, where the deer was crossing was too far for a muzzleloader shot from the Redneck blind. In addition, there was no suitable place to hang a stand for a bow shot without possibly spooking the buck.

“I popped up a ground blind on Sept. 9 that would get me within 125 yards of the area where I thought I could get him,” said Travis. “I have a skid steer, and I put two or three rootballs around the ground blind, and it sat there for over a month. The trail cameras told the story, they did the hunting for me.”

Even though trail-camera photos revealed that H.O.G. 2.0 was moving on opening day of muzzleloader season, Travis sat at home because the wind was wrong and west Georgia was experiencing remnants of a hurricane. However, on Sunday evening, Oct. 11, the wind was perfect, and Travis and his buddy and cameraman Brian Schmeck were in the ground blind set up.

“Fortunately he came out a solid 45 minutes before last night, and we got a shot at him,” said Travis. “I couldn’t see anything from the smoke of the muzzleloader, but Brian said I hit him really good. We called our producer Cowen Stone who came up to film the recovery. I wanted to do a group recovery because Brian has a lot of interest in this deer, as well. If it wasn’t thick, we would have seen him go down. He didn’t go 30 yards.”

Travis and his good friend Brian Schmeck.

Travis’ buck has five points on the left and 10 on the right. The 15-pointer has 25 inches of abnormals and grosses 186. With minimal side-to-side deductions, H.O.G. 2.0 is expected to net around 180. If that score holds, it’ll be the new No. 3 muzzleloader buck for Georgia.

“It’s just been phenomenal year, I am just super duper blessed, I don’t take it for granted. We enjoy doing all the right things to grow deer, but I never expected to take two deer like this, I really didn’t,” said Travis.

Both of Travis’ bucks are entered in the Truck-Buck contest. We’re excited for him to bring the racks to one of our February 2021 scoring events and see what they score.

Y’all keep up our buddy T-Bone on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. You can also visit http://tboneoutdoors.com.