Kentucky hunter, Jonathon Stuart harvested a massive kicker buck that scored 163 4/8 inches on the evening of Sept. 7 in Logan County, KY.
Stuart’s incredible passion for deer hunting motivates him to put countless hours into managing his property to grow big bucks. He loves deer management and even hopes to start a business that aims to improves deer habitat on properties so that other hunters benefit from bucks reaching their full potential. It takes dedication, hard work and a lot of time.
“Some people don’t understand the work and the time that goes into it,” Stuart said. “You can ask my wife how much I am home during the summer. I spend more time away from home during the summer than most people do during the hunting season.”
His land and deer management plans pay off. He’s harvested bucks that have scored over 140 inches in five consecutive seasons. Three of those bucks scored in the 160s. He runs trail cameras 365 days a year, and he starts putting out minerals immediately after deer season ends.
“A lot of people will say they are going out to the farm for the first time and it’s July,” Stuart said. “I’m on the farm putting minerals out in February. I have trail cameras rolling all year long, some of the cameras have never been taken off the tree they are on. I keep 10 mineral sites running from February to August, and then I switch to protein feed. It’s a constant.”
Stuart’s approach to the 2022 deer season was no different than his last five seasons. His work began in February and continued throughout the summer. In June a familiar buck showed back up on his trail cameras. It was a “kicker buck” that was a three-year-old last year, it was Stuart’s first pictures of the buck since October 2021. As more pictures came in, it was clear to Stuart that the kicker buck’s growth was far superior to other bucks in the summer bachelor group. Stuart estimated that between year three and year four, the “kicker buck” grew about 35 more inches of bone. High main beams, good mass and long tines were further along than the other bucks. Stuart knew it was the buck he wanted to focus on once deer season opened.
The “kicker buck” had been hanging out on the lower end of the property earlier in the summer. As summer progressed, the buck’s pattern became spotty. The farm has two sections of timber on each end of a corn field. A bean field kicks off on the opposite side of the corn. Two weeks before opening day, Stuart decided to hang a camera on the upper end of the farm. Within a few days the “kicker buck” and his bachelor group of other bucks showed up on camera during daylight hours. As soon as he got the chance, Stuart snuck up to the area during the middle of the day to hang a stand.
On opening day Stuart decided to hunt on the lower end of the farm where he’d had prior success during early season. Torrential rain dropped about six inches of water on the area in just over three hours that afternoon. Stuart got caught in the storm but left his stand to head back to the house for safety purposes. Stuart’s spots had all flooded out. A farmer down the road lost three cows to lightening. It was time to regroup.
“I hunted that Sunday, Monday and Tuesday on the lower end of this farm,” Stuart said. “I saw a few deer, a couple little bucks, mostly does. That rain really curtailed movement; I wasn’t getting very many pictures on either side of the farm.”
Wednesday, Sept. 7 Stuart got a picture of the big kicker buck at 6:45am on the upper end of the farm. He knew it was game on after work. He packed up his hunting stuff before leaving for work so that he’d be ready to go as soon as he clocked out.Stuart was anxious to get through the workday, at lunch he pulled up the weather channel on his computer. The wind was blowing out of the north, the barometric pressure was over 30 and the rising moon would hit at 5:30 later that evening. A hunter’s trifecta.
“That’s three strikes for a big deer hunt,” Stuart said. “I thought to myself, this might get interesting.”
Stuart got to the farm around 2:00pm, he put on his Drake Non-Typical camouflage grabbed his gear and headed to the stand.He got settled in around 2:30pm. As he was pulling his bow up the tree, two 130-inch bucks were walking right toward the stand. The bow was just dangling 10 feet in the air as the bucks made their way in to get a drink. The area was still flooded from the rain. When the bucks put their head down to drink, Stuart continued to pull his bow up the tree.
At 5:30pm, movement on the right at the edge of the corn field caught Stuart’s attention. It was the kicker buck. Several minutes went by, but the deer finally committed to coming into range.The big buck presented a 30-yard shot. Stuart drew back on his Mathew’s VXR bow, took aim and released an arrow. He watched the Rage Broadhead disappear into the deer’s side.
“I hit him a little far back,” Stuart said. “I don’t know, there are a lot of factors that go into that, it could have been my grip, resting point or maybe he moved. Could have been anything. I believed at the time that I hit him in the liver.”
Stuart called a few of his good buddies and told them about the hunt. He asked them to come and help with the recovery of the buck. His wife and young son came to help, too. When they started to look for blood, they found that it was sparse. They tracked blood for about 70 yards, but they weren’t seeing the amount of blood that Stuart was hoping to find. They decided to back out and call a local canine tracker. Five hours later they all got back on the trail with the dog leading the way.
“She kind of struggled at first,” Stuart said. “Once she picked up the trail, she ended up finding him quick. He went a long way.He went around 400 to 500 yards. We found him just a little after midnight.”
It was an awesome moment for Stuart when the flashlights hit the deer. The culmination of hard work and preparation was right in front of him. Tense moments had turned to celebration.
“It’s kind of hard to explain, when you put that much work into an animal like that and you get to reap the rewards of it, it’s a surreal feeling,” Stuart said. “I have some good hunting buddies, to see the looks and reactions, to see that they were happy, proud and congratulating me. It’s surreal.”
The “kicker buck” is Stuart’s second biggest buck ever. It scored an eighth of an inch more than his 2021 buck and is just four inches shy of his personal best. They are all special, but one thing is for certain, Stuart is laying the smackdown on big bucks.