Wisconsin Bowhunter Arrows 174-Inch Buck From the Ground During Last-Minute Hunt

Dom Flock arrowed this monster Badger State buck shortly after the archery opener on a 90-degree day. Photo courtesy of Dom Flock.

Back in 2022, Wisconsin hunter Dom Flock took notice of an up-and-comer buck that was roaming all over the farm where he usually hunts. “At 2 1/2 years old, he was already showing some good mass and character,” Flock said. “Fortunately, he broke off some tines, and then the week before gun season, he broke off a main beam, too. I say ‘fortunately’ because he looked nice enough with his full rack that I worried a neighboring hunter would shoot him.”

Sure enough, the buck made it to 2023, living primarily across the fence on a neighbor’s property, but making regular appearances on Flock’s Tactacam Reveal cameras, too, starting in early October. Flock also encountered the buck several times while hunting and passed on him four different times.

“The first time I saw him, I drew my bow,” Flock said. “He looked really nice. But I told myself that he was only 3 1/2 years old and that I’d previously shot bigger bucks. I let him go; I was really after a different buck anyway. Fortunately, he survived the hunting seasons.”

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By 2024, the buck had gotten big and mature enough to become Flock’s target deer, based on the Tactacam images. He couldn’t hunt opening weekend because he was fishing a bass tournament on opening day, and his daughter had a softball game on Sunday. But, he finished work early on September 17 and decided to go bowhunting. He rushed to the farm because he had only about an hour and a half of daylight.

“My brother was just heading into the barn to do some chores,” Flock explained, “and he asked what I was doing. I told him that I was going hunting. He said, ‘It’s 90 frickin’ degrees! You’re out of your mind.’

“After I showered,” he continued, “it was too late to go sit in the woods, but we have several cornfields and hayfields on the farm. I always make trails through the cornfields so that when I have only a little bit of time to hunt before dark, I can walk those trails and glass the hayfields. If I see a buck, I sit down and hope that he walks by me. If not, I move to the next hayfield.”

Flock had been seeing the buck since 2022, both on trail camera and in person. He even passed up the buck in 2023. Photo courtesy of Dom Flock.

When Flock reached the first hayfield, he knelt down and was there only 15 minutes before a buck walked behind him.

“It was another shooter buck that I was after,” he said. “Everything was perfect. It looked like he was going to walk right out on the trail in the cornfield and give me a 30-yard shot. Right before he reached the trail, he veered and came right at me through the corn stalks. I drew back, and when he was about four corn rows away, he stopped and looked right at me. There was one corn stalk in the way, so I couldn’t shoot. He didn’t spook; he just backed up and walked right back to where he had come from. My heart was pounding so hard.”

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After that action settled, Flock texted his brother about his encounter with the buck just four corn rows away. He looked up after sending the text and noticed that his target buck — the deer that he’d been watching closely since 2022 — had stepped out of the cornfield and into the hayfield in front of him.

Dom Flock admires his bruiser buck right where it fell in the alfalfa. Photo courtesy of Dom Flock.

“He was facing directly at me,” Flock recalled, “and I had to act quickly. If he walked farther to the left, he would have gotten my wind. Plus, there was a little knoll in the field, and if he moved behind it, I would have only been able to see the top of his back. I really like the frontal angle, and I’m very comfortable with that shot. So, I drew back and drilled him perfectly in the chest. He took off and then stopped about 65 yards away. I was waiting for him to fall, but he just stood there. It might have been only 20 seconds, but it felt like a long time. So, I put another arrow in him, and then he went down fast.”

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Flock’s buck has astounding mass, including 7-inch bases and 6-inch circumference measurements basically all the way up the beams. With 14 points, the buck grossed 174 1/8 inches, making it Flock’s largest to date. Not bad for the first 30 minutes of his archery season on a 90-degree day.