Crossbow Hunter Arrows Giant Buck out of 6-Foot Stand

Chris Smoot was already having a season most hunters would only dream about. After 14 years of applying, he had drawn a coveted eastern Kentucky elk tag, and he took a trophy 7x7 bull.

Once he returned home, he turned his attention to big whitetails, and one buck in particular. Smoot had permission to hunt the farm where the buck was living, and had tried it off and on over the past six seasons. The place was close to his house and easy to access, making it a handy backup spot for quick hunts. The only problem was that the farm was a working cattle farm with very little cover. Bucks traveled through the place, but mostly during the rut, making it more suitable for rifle hunting than archery. Over the years, Smoot had realized that it really wasn’t even worth running cameras on the property until things picked up in November.

After already tagging a trophy bull elk, Chris Smoot turned his attention to whitetails in his home state of Kentucky. Image by Chris Smoot

But some good deer do live in the area. Last year, after filling his Kentucky tag, Smoot got trail camera photos of an absolute giant from the farm. He hoped the buck would return later this season and that he would still have a tag when it did. But this year, things started coming together sooner, after Smoot got a call early in the season from the landowner. “He told me he had just seen the largest buck he had ever seen in his life while out working on his tractor,” Smoot said.

Since the landowner wasn’t a hunter, Smoot wasn’t sure how big the deer might be, so he ran over and hung a cell camera. One week went by without a photo of a good buck. Then two. Smoot started to wonder if the deer had just been passing through. On the third week, while on his elk hunt, Smoot realized one morning that he had enough cell service to check his cameras. He pulled up the app and was shocked to see a monster buck, the same one from last year. The deer was still massive, but had maybe lost a few inches from the year before.

When the landowner called to tell Smoot that he had seen the largest deer of his life, he hustled to get some trail cameras out on the farm. Image by Chris Smoot

Once he got home from his elk hunt, Smoot quickly hung more cams. The buck showed regularly on only one camera, and always at night. Finally, he got a photo on a second camera that was 100 yards from the busy camera. It took the buck one hour to go between the two cameras.

After talking it over with a buddy, Smoot decided to hang some additional cameras on a nearby section of the farm he had never hunted. There were two small, 1-acre thickets on that section of the farm, some of the only cover around. Within 6 hours of hanging the cameras, Smoot was getting photos of the buck, so he and two buddies went to hang a stand near the camera. The only issue was that there were no mature trees in the area. The only tree big enough to hang a stand on was low, so the stand ended up only being about 6 feet off the ground. It was that or nothing.

The only available tree to hang a stand from was small, allowing for only six feet of height. Image by Chris Smoot

With a 24 degree temperature drop forecast a few mornings later, Smoot knew he needed to be in the stand. He could only hunt till 9 that morning, and after not seeing anything by 8:40, was contemplating climbing down.

He texted his buddies Andrew, Derek, Jared, Landon, and Shae that he was calling it a morning. But when he looked up from his phone, Smoot was surprised to see a small buck walking down the trail. Behind the buck came a second deer. As soon as he saw the rack, Smoot knew it was the buck he was after. And it was standing just 30 yards away.

“I slowly raised my crossbow and knew the buck could see me shaking,” Smoot said. The buck was standing facing him and gave him no shot. Finally, after what seemed an eternity, the buck turned and started to walk. That is when the nerves really hit.

Smoot willed himself to calm down. When the buck stopped at 23 yards, he took aim and fired. The shot looked good and the buck took off, disappearing from sight. Smoot quickly texted the buddies that he had just shot the big buck. Jarred said he was on his way to help with the track.

After shooting the buck, Smoot quickly texted his hunting buddies to help with the track. Image by Chris Smoot

After waiting 90 minutes, Smoot got down to look for his bolt and check for blood. He had gotten a pass through and had good blood on both sides of the trail. They followed the trail for 120 yards until they came to a fence. It was clear the buck had jumped the fence and stood on the opposite side for a bit. Blood was pooled on each side of the trail. They continued following the trail until they reached the thick CRP area. Jarred scanned the area through binoculars and saw the buck bedded in the thick brush, head up, still alive.

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The two backed out. Smoot returned with Andrew at five that afternoon. The buck wasn’t there. And there was no blood in the bed. As they searched for sign, they heard something and looked up to see the buck crashing away into the thicket. They decided to back out again and come back the next morning.

“I was sick to my stomach all night. I don’t think I slept at all,” Smoot said. After checking with neighboring landowners the next morning to make sure it was ok to search for the buck on their properties, Smoot, along with Derek and Jarred, headed back to where they buck had been bedded the previous afternoon. There was no blood to be found. The three searched the surrounding area for the next three hours. Smoot was discouraged and heartbroken. He decided to head back to the truck for a bottle of water.

That’s when his phone rang. It was Jarred. “He asked if I had checked the little cedar thicket about 900 yards from where we had last seen the buck. I told him not yet, and I wasn’t sure he would have gone that far. He said come on over, let’s check it just to be sure. I probably should have known something was up,” Smoot said.

When he got to the thicket, Smoot started down the trail. He looked up to see a white belly, then turned to see his buddy grinning like crazy. “My emotions just took over, it was a mixture of joy and relief,” Smoot said. Jarred had been walking near the cedar thicket when a hawk had screamed and flown away from the ground inside. When he had gone to investigate, he had found the deer. When they rolled the deer over, blood poured from the cavity. The shot had been on target, but had hit a rib going in and glanced back, taking out the liver and one lung. The wound had clotted up and stopped bleeding while the deer was bedded.

The giant buck had a 6x7 frame and weighed right at 300 pounds. Image by Chris Smoot

The buck was huge, by far Smoot’s biggest to date. The 6x7 mainframe green scored a whopping 191 4/8 inches but the body was even more impressive. The buck’s neck measured 27 ½ inches and it weighed 296 pounds, absolutely massive for a Kentucky deer. The buck had multiple tines that measured over 11 inches and 6-inch mass that carried the length of the main beam. The taxidermist estimated the buck at 7 years old and Smoot has sent off a tooth for age verification.

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“I don’t even care about the score, this buck is so special, and finding it with the help of good friends made it even better,” Smoot added. “I just want to thank the landowner and my good friends Andrew, Shae, Derek, Jarred, and Landon for helping me and being a part of this hunt. I couldn’t have done it without them.”