Give ‘Em “One More Year”

Dex Worley with “Blade,” a Wilkes County buck he killed with his bow on Oct. 5 last season while hunting from a ground blind on a millet field. The 8-point buck had about 126 total inches of antler. Below is a picture of Blade the season before when Dex passed on the buck to give him another year to mature and grow.

By Dex Worley

We all have that dream of killing our own buck of a lifetime. Everyone loves to watch the monsters on television, and I think a lot of hunters find themselves just wishing that one day it could happen to them. Listen to me my fellow hunters, I’m here to tell you it can happen. 

I began hunting a piece of property in 2010 that was a 460-acre cattle and tree farm in Wilkes County. It had the mix of a little of everything on it. There were beautiful oak trees with great crops of acorns and fertile fields. Northeast Georgia and Wilkes County isn’t an area known for big numbers of huge bucks like some other counties. The previous hunters that leased the land before I began to hunt it dropped the lease. I was lucky enough to get the property because they said there were no big deer on the property. They had been hunting it for years, but when you walked in their cabin, it was full of racks from deer with only 80 to 100 inches of antler.

The first year I had the property in 2010, I started planting food plots all over the property. We turned up a lot of dirt. We cleaned up some logging roads, and we started utilizing every piece of the property we could.  I only harvested two bad genetic bucks in 2010. I had a few of my friends come in and harvest more management bucks for me. We had some great potential, but we needed to get some of the bad out.

When 2011 came, we had been keeping food plots year-round, and we started to see a great increase of the deer population on the property. I began to put trail cameras out in the beginning of June. 

I knew I had some good deer on the property that were bigger than I have ever harvested. I was lucky enough to harvest a 125-inch deer and a 130-inch deer in 2011. Ever since then, I have developed an addiction to growing food plots year-round and managing my deer herd. I try to let the younger bucks walk, especially the ones that I believe have potential to being something great in years to come.

Last year, I had two bucks that were great examples of what just “One More Year” can do for a buck. 

I’ve been watching a deer I named “Realtree” since 2011. He was just a basket rack 8-point back then, but his tines almost touched up top. It looked like the rack in the Realtree logo. In most big-buck states, he would be known as a management buck. I decided to keep watching the deer. From 1 1/2 to 3 1/2 years old, he never got better than 100 inches, but to me he looked like he might be something more one day. 

This Wilkes County buck named “Realtree” had about 100 inches at 3 1/2 years old (right). The next season, the buck was harvested by Trevor Williams, and the 8-pointer grossed 131 inches with 22 4/8-inch beams and 10-inch G2s and G3s.

What would you know, this deer turned out to be an awesome northeast Georgia buck. Realtree matured a lot, and after seeing him on camera during the 2014 season, he made me lose sleep at night thinking about him.

The other young buck I had on my property I named “Blade.” During the 2013 season, Blade was just a typical 8-point with around 100 inches of antler, about like Realtree was at 3 1/2. Heading into the 2014 season, Blade had greatly improved from the previous year. 

You never know what that buck might become unless you give him that one more year to mature. I’ve seen it with my own two eyes, and you would not believe the deer herd you can have if you manage your property.

I have a lot of hunters tell me, “If I don’t harvest the deer this year, someone else will.” This can happen, but even if that might happen, to me it’s still no reason to shoot a buck that’s not the size you really want. 

I had a nice deer I had been watching for two years, and when he was 3 1/2, he was more than 160 inches. I loved this deer. I named him Splitter because of his split G2 tines. He was a great deer, and I was lucky enough to encounter him two times in bow range, but it never worked out. My neighbor harvested him before Thanksgiving later in the season. You just have to remember this can work both ways for hunters. Someone near you can have great deer on their property. You might get lucky enough to harvest a buck they passed the season before. 

The best thing we can do to increase all of our percentages of having better bucks is to forget, “I don’t shoot him, someone else will.” 

Instead, remember, “One More Year.”