Odd-Ball Tactics for Mature Whitetails

My Ruger M77 7x57 lay across the five-strand barbed-wire fence I was crawling through. I had one foot on either side of the wire that was stretched tighter than a guitar’s strings, and a sharp barb was sunk into my brushpopper jacket. I glanced toward where I wanted to go, and there he stood: mahogany antlers, long tines that were easily 8 to 10 inches, and a spread beyond his pitched forward ears. It was the buck I’d hunted for the past two weeks, and he was staring right at me, the creature trying to crawl between two barbed wires. Hmmm…

Sometimes it pays to think outside the box on mature whitetails, like this Texas buck tagged by the author after catching him crossing a fence. Image by Larry Weishuhn

If I moved rapidly, no doubt he would bolt and be gone before I could grab my rifle to shoot. But if I did nothing, I likely would lose the one chance I had of taking him.

We stared at each other. A spectator could’ve had a good laugh. But me? I did not see much humor in what was happening. Time seemed to stand still. Then, hoping this buck might be curious like others I had encountered, I moved my right hand and reached for and removed my silver belly western felt hat. The buck stared. In slow motion I lowered it, and then with all my might I flung my hat high into the air. The buck’s gaze followed my upward soaring hat, giving me enough time to fall through the two wires, without losing too much skin and clothing, grab my rifle, roll into a shooting position, get crosshairs on the buck, and pull the trigger. It wasn’t your typical way to take a big mature whitetail. But sometimes, you’ve got to be creative!

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On that same ranch in the South Texas Brush Country lived a buck I dearly wanted. He was an ancient, gnarly 8-point which I had first seen while conducting a deer census. As the ranch’s wildlife management consultant, part of my compensation was permission to take a buck of my choice. I never targeted the bigger antlered bucks, but always the oldest I could find.

Over his 70 years of hunting experience, the author has used several off the wall tactics to help him tag trophy bucks. Image by Larry Weishuhn

The buck lived a half mile from camp. I hunted him every legal way possible: sitting, rattling, still hunting, baiting, scents, and lures; if it was legal, I tried it without success. Weddo, the vaquero who lived on the property, knew the deer I hunted. Each day when I returned to camp he asked whether or not I had seen “Rojo’s buck.” I had not.

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“Senor Colorado (I had red hair back then), I’ve seen him several times, right where you’re hunting him! I cannot believe you haven’t seen him!” I wondered the same.

One morning I climbed into a windmill tower to watch a large prickly pear flat interspersed by small mottes of bean-laden mesquites, blackbrush and guayacan. I had just settled in, when way in the distance I could hear Tejano music, then the sounds of a pickup truck that had seen its better days 20 years earlier, all sorts of metallic sounds. The closer it got, the louder it got.

I knew it was Weddo checking cattle water. As he got closer, I crawled from my perch and headed toward the two-track he would soon drive down.

As soon as Weddo saw me, he raised his hands, configuring antlers. He stopped and turned down the music. “Senor Colorado, I saw him again! He’s right there, where he always is!”

Hmm. I started putting things together and formulated a plan. I still-hunted my way to camp, looking for deer and javelina. And then back at camp, I drove my pickup to the ranch’s “Use Again Trash Pile.” There I found old 5-gallon buckets and shards of rusted tin, which I threw on my pickup bed where it would bounce up and down. I put rocks in two of the buckets and tied them to the bumper so they would drag behind. Then I headed to where Weddo had seen the ancient 8-point earlier that morning. While in route I tuned my radio to the local Tejano station, turned the sound up as loud as it would go, and started singing along as best I could.

There stood the buck, totally unbothered, and almost exactly where Weddo had told me he’d seen him. Rolling to a stop, I grabbed my rife, found the buck in my scope, planted crosshairs on his shoulder, then pulled the trigger. Now, before anyone condemns me for shooting a deer from a vehicle, I will remind you that in Texas, on private property, it’s completely legal. Is it ethical? Shooting from a vehicle is not something I would normally do, but these were extenuating circumstances. I had hunted the buck for two weeks, every day, all day long. Given similar circumstances, I would likely do the same again. Sometimes one has to try slightly different tactics.

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As a hunter with 70 years of experience, I have learned that you sometimes have to dare to do things a bit differently. I fooled that buck by pretending to be something I was not, sounding best I could like an old rickety pickup driven by the local vaquero who loved loud Tejano music.

Years ago, while working as a wildlife biologist on many different ranches throughout southern Texas, I met Abner Sanchez. Abner came from a wealthy family. He did not need to work but he loved working cattle and hunting whitetails. Back then he often traded “day work” for hunting rights.

I was privileged to spend time with him and visit his home, which was filled with mounts of monstrous whitetail bucks. It took some friendly prodding over several weeks to learn his secret.

“I drink a lot of coffee and water while I’m hunting.” Said he with a sly smile, “Makes me urinate a lot!” I looked at him questioningly, but he continued, “Every time I walk by a scrape, I personally freshen it! Makes the bucks go wild and makes them come back more often, and, quicker. I wait for them to “X-out” my scrape. Try it!”

This Texas buck swung by to check out a scrape the author had just “freshened up.” Image by Larry Weishuhn

While hunting that fall, I drank a lot of coffee, tea, juice, and water, particularly as the whitetail rut approached. Then while hunting I “freshened” every scrape I came across, but especially those close to where I hunted. In more instances than I can count, bucks appeared in less than an hour of my freshening “their” scrape. That technique worked back in the 1970s, and it still works today. Several times, while guiding hunters near scrapes, I’ve excused myself after setting up to go and “freshen” things. In most instances the hunter simply shook his head upon my return, wondering if he was hunting with an idiot. Many of those same hunters became believers after mature bucks showed up at those same scrapes a little while later.

The scrape technique works, as proven by this trophy taken by the author over a freshened scrape. Image by Larry Weishuhn

Sometimes, when you’re after a big buck and nothing normal seems to be working, an oddball tactic is in order.

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