Utah Sportsman Tag 2007

42-inch Wide Mule Deer
by Daren Hill

While horseback riding in familiar country, Rod Taylor, along with his two boys, Jeremy and Dillon, spotted a huge buck. At first glance, this buck seemed bigger than your typical Utah muley. Upon closer inspection through spotting scopes and binoculars, the image through the glass revealed a buck whose horns resembled the gnarly branches of a dead cedar more than buck antlers. For the next several minutes, they sat in awe of this magnificent animal while exchanging looks of disbelief and words that can be summed up into one simple phrase - “I don’t believe it.”

Rod and his boys soon came to the conclusion that someone needed an opportunity to harvest this once-in-a-lifetime trophy. Jeremy mentioned that Rand Newby, a gunsmith at Christensen Arms, had drawn the 2007 Sportsman Tag. All three agreed that this buck was definitely deserving of the Sportsman Tag and well worth it for Rand. With the sun sinking rapidly behind the mountains to the west, the buck bedded down below some steep cliffs under an aging cedar tree. The Taylor’s knew that they stood a good chance of the buck not moving again until dawn. They decided that Jeremy would ride off the mountain and contact Newby. In the meantime, Rod and Dillon, with the aid of a bright full moon, would stay with the buck to keep it in sight.

Eventually, Jeremy contacted Rand who was accompanied by his dad, Michael, and his brothers Dusten and Shad. Christensen Arms guide and cameraman, Andy Christiansen, made the trip as well to capture the hunt on film. With Jeremy leading, they wound their way up a gorge and into the neck of a narrow canyon laden with boulders, sage brush, and cedar trees. Rand, like any hunter in his position, was full of excitement and nervousness as he listened to the descriptions from Jeremy and thought about the sight of this enormous deer in his crosshairs.

After traversing the canyon, the silhouettes of Rod and Dillon came into view with the moon still casting an eerie glow onto the land below. After Rand settled in and located the buck, the only thing that separated the two from each other were 420 yards of uneven Utah terrain and six hours of murky moon-cast shadows. Being in this situation, you can imagine that everyone was hoping for the perfect scenario. Anything could happen in the six hours before shooting light from predators to catching the hunter’s scent. The patiently waiting men hoped that the buck would not spook and run. The hunters knew, at this point, that their skill level had taken them as far as it could. They had done everything in their power to ensure that Rand had a chance at a successful shot. As each of them took turns watching the buck, the others slept. During this time it became clear that luck would be the ultimate decider of their fate.

With the moon setting about an hour and a half before sunrise, there was a period of time where the buck was lost to darkness. As it turned out, the buck seemed to take advantage of this and moved from its original bed unbeknownst to the hunters below. As dawn finally approached, Rand and the rest of the hunters were scrambling to locate his new position. Spotting scopes that only a short time ago contained an enormous Utah muley now held an empty bed and a lone cedar.

After spending just a few minutes searching, they were relieved to see that the buck had moved off the slope it had been on and was lying behind some low-lying sage below. With the deer being 402 yards away, Rand made final preparations. The Sportsman Tag that had been drawn ten months ago, the time spent scouting, dreaming, and getting told by his co-workers not to screw it all up, came down to this next couple of seconds. While lying in the dirt, Rand propped his Christensen Arms 7mm WSM up on his pack, clicked the safety off, and steadied the crosshairs just above the buck’s vitals.

A few seconds later the stillnesof the mid-October morning was replaced by the sound of a Nosler 140-grain Ballistic Tip being hurled through the silent morning air toward the prized buck.

The buck was hit hard and didn’t move from where he lay.

As the group made their way up the steep, rocky terrain and saw up close what they had viewed from so far away over the past several hours, they were in awe of what they saw. Rand walked up to the buck and, with friends and family surrounding him, took hold of its enormous horns and shook his head with disbelief. Congratulatory handshakes and hugs quickly turned to admiration for the buck. Rand, along with everyone there, saw their vocabulary reduced to the same simple phrases the Taylor’s had first uttered some seventeen hours ago, “I don’t believe it.” Admiration quickly gave way to the excitement of the harvest with everyone recounting the events and the people that had made it all possible.

The only thing wider than the 42-inch spread on the deer was Rand’s perma-grin. A buck with thirteen points on each side will do that to a man.

The Taylor’s were right. This buck was definitely worth it.

Tags: 2007, HI34, mule deer, sportsman tag, utah

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