Hunter: Wilder Hall
Points: 9 (5L, 4R)
County: Crisp
Season: 2019-2020
Hunt Story
Wilder had killed a 4-point on opening day of youth rifle, so I had told him it was big buck only. Well we had a spot where this buck was coming in quite often, every couple nights. Wilder really wanted to go, but I told him we had to wait on a good wind. Well about 5:00 we started getting the wind we wanted. So we threw our clothes in the dryer with a no scent dryer sheet and started getting ready. We left the house at 5:45 and were in the stand at 6:05. It was very hot and muggy, and we were both sweating. We went over the game plan and how we would set up if a shooter came out. About 6:35 Wilder wanted to blow the grunt call since we were buck hunting, so he hit two loud grunts. We watched dove drink water but saw nothing else till 7:05 when another buck came out that normally travels with the shooters. He is a 10 that got busted up pretty bad. We weren’t going to shoot him, but we decided to get Wilder ready in case he again had a buddy. Well before we could get set, we look up and see a big grey body. He looked twice the size and a completely different color than the other buck. Well we got Wilder’s 6.5 Grendel up on the rail and him in the scope. The buck walked straight at us for maybe 25 to 30 yards and would not give us a good shot. Wilder said he didn’t know how he was going to shoot because he was shaking so bad. I told him this was the real deal and to take deep breaths and compose himself till the buck gave us a shot. Two steps later he turned full broadside. I told Wilder to get on him and shoot when ready. About 2 seconds later Wilder fired the shot, and the buck did a donkey kick and ran off with his closest front leg stiff. We backed out for an hour even though Wilder had said he saw his legs pop up through the scope. I had heard him crash and knew it was a good shot. We got my brother Ben Hall and a couple buddies and went to go find him. We didn’t find any blood on the way to where we thought he fell, but he was laying there dead when we got there. It was a perfect shot. I don’t think he could be any more proud and neither could I to have been there to experience that with him.
