Hunter: Rhett Delaney
Points: 11 (5L, 6R)
County: Gwinnett
Season: 2020-2021
Hunt Story
My name is Rhett Delaney, and I am an avid deer hunter originally from Texas living and hunting in Georgia for years as a member of a Hunting Club in Dooly County. Amidst the many challenges of 2020, the greatest and most disappointing for me personally was losing that lease and not having a place to hunt this coming deer season. After moving into a house in Peachtree Corners in early 2020, I was pleasantly surprised to see significant deer activity on the property which backs up to a greenbelt behind the house. As any life long deer hunter would do, I placed some trail cameras out and jumped out to the closest Tractor Supply for some corn and a Big & J Protein Block. The images I saw on my trail cameras were hard to believe, I had several of the largest bucks I had ever recorded on camera and couldn't wait until the 2020-2021 season to see what they would become and possibly have the opportunity to harvest one of these majestic creatures. I made a call to the DNR to verify all of the hunting regulations for Gwinnett County and was super relieved and excited that I would be allowed to bow hunt for a once in a lifetime buck. Throughout the year I followed all of the experts' nutritional guidelines on building trophy racks and the results exceeded any of my wildest expectations. WOW!! I had a monster in my yard, and opening day of bow season couldn't get here soon enough. I had many offers from my hunting buddies to come by and take that buck after sending them numerous still and video images but of course "Big Boy", as my son called him, was #1 on my hit list. I set up a ground blind in the backyard, and although I had hoped to harvest "Big Boy" on opening day, it took longer than anticipated, but on the evening of September 22nd, one month from my 50th Birthday, I watched "Big Boy" rub a tree for over 5 minutes in the woods before he finally stepped out and gave me a broadside shot at less than 20 years. My greatest fear urban hunting was inadvertently wounding a deer and not being able to recover a deer I shot, so I was patient and waited for the perfect opportunity to take the shot and "Big Boy" would only go 15 to 20 yards before he expired next to the creek. Many might joke and say urban hunting is easy and there is no excitement in that, well I would disagree, the adrenaline was pumping and I was super excited about the year-long anticipation build up to ultimately harvesting this trophy buck and a great start to the 2020-2021 deer season.
