A Little Credit for What He Grows
4 Comments Published by David Blanton on Tuesday, June 19, 2007 at 7:02 AM.
Yep, the dog days of summer are upon us here in Georgia. The temperatures are high, rain is scarce and the humidity is just starting to showoff and flex its muscles. And outside of wild pigs, there’s not a lot to hunt.
The good news is that the new hunting shows start airing again in less than two weeks on all the outdoor networks.
We’ve got two and a half months before our first trip of the year so we’ve been “seriously” practicing with our bows. But what helps get me through the summer the most are the emails from my buddy, Dr. Richard Reid, from Grenada, Mississippi. Well, I don’t think it’s the emails themselves as much as the attachments… the digital photos of bucks in velvet.
Richard’s diligence in the field feeding the bucks and regularly harvesting the photos each week keeps me fired up about the season ahead. Just knowing and seeing the bucks growing their “headware” is enough to motivate me to be as good as I possibly can with my bow.
Last year, I got to watch “Sydney’s buck” grow into a very impressive Mississippi 9- pointer. We had so much fun trying to guess what that deer would score as it continued to grow. In the end, we were able to determine just how good we were at field judging bucks because Richard’s oldest daughter, Sydney, killed the buck a few days after her younger sister, Sloane, missed it.
It is absolutely one of the best and most enjoyable hunts on Monster Bucks XV.
As I watch these bucks grow inch after inch of antler, I continue to marvel at the process, and one thing I’ll never understand is why “official” scores of whitetails are listed in the record book as “net” scores after all deductions of drop tines, kickers, splits, etc.
I can tell you this much. All of the well-known, serious deer hunters discuss their bucks in terms of “gross” score, counting all the inches of antler that animal grew. There really should be no deduction for an extra point or an unmatched point.
Forget other scoring systems such as water displacement or even those that don’t give credit for the spread of a set of antlers, just count the total inches of antler through tines, circumference and spread and count the gross score. What do you say?
David,
I agree they should not deduct any thing off because it is not the person fault that one tine might be bigger then the other tine. Also what gets me through the summer is watching Monster Bucks all the time.
I wish I could see a big buck like that.
God Bless & Good Huntin,
Kristle Oberlander-Georgia
I agree 100% David it has never made sense to me that a buck with a 6" drop tine has those inches deducted from its score. A drop tine or any kickers, stickers etc. give the buck that much more character, not take away from it.
I am so glad someone agrees!
Scott Withers - Michigan
That is why buckmasters came up with its own scoring system that still catagorizes the deer as typical or non-typical but gives it a gross score and that is it.
as i have said before, nets are for fisherman. if the deer grows it, it should be counted, and will be counted if i kill it.