Our photo gallery requires the Flash Player plugin and a web browser with JavaScript enabled.

Hunter: Joe Shults
Animal: 140" Iowa Whitetail
Location: Iowa
Weapon: Thompson Center Encore

When I got the call from Mark telling me that I had won the 2009 hunt points at Drury Outdoors I could not wait for my prize! It was a hunt with Mark on his Iowa farm. I had preference points and what a time to have them after winning this hunt and needing to draw a tag. They paid off because I drew my tag and now I was set. It was a late season muzzleloading hunt and there are 2 things you need for a successful late season hunt in Iowa and that is cold weather and food! In Iowa you can bank on cold weather in the late season and on Mark's farm you can bank on the food!

When I arrived at camp I found that I was going to get to share it with Mark and Terry's sisters Linda Lurk and Barb Brace and and their brother in law Jim Brace. I also got to meet Mark's camera man Joe Foster and his friend Adam. Before the hunt Mark brung out his laptop and was showing me all the Reconyx pictures of the giants on his farm. I was pumped and ready to go! With a soutwest wind we had 2 choices of where to hunt and we picked a 5 acre bottom with standing beans. As we were walking to the Big Game blind there were already 2 doe in the field. We slowly made our way to the blind and amazingly enough we made it without blowing the field. As we got settled in the movement was slow and late as it often is on overcast low pressure days. We had doe and turkey in the beans and finally we had our first buck come in. It was just a 2 1/2 year old.

As we were glassing the field and catching up on old times I caught movement to my right. I threw up the Nikon
Monarch binoculars and they were 4 deer. One small buck and 3 doe. Then I heard the excitement in Mark's voice shooter! As I looked it was a giant coming out of the creek into the field! As he worked his way to the beans he was on the other side of a blind that Mark had out to be able to bow hunt a section that he had sewn in Biologic's Last Bite.

As I let him feed his way past the blind I reached for my Thompson Center and put the crosshairs of my Nikon on
him and waited for him to turn broadside. As Mark was filming and making his connections I waited for those famous words that every hunter that is being filmed loves to hear "Kill Him"! When I heard them I wasted no time squezzing the trigger and letting the smoke roll ! As the smoke cleared I could see him going down in the thicket to the east of the field! My Iowa tag wag filled in just 3 hours!

As we walked to him we both were amazed at the size of this 6 1/2 year old body and the great shape he was in. After putting the tag on him and calling him in we returned to find out that Linda had shot a nice 8 pt. We all watched the footage and agreed that she had put a good shot on him. We loaded up the Hunt-Ve and went to recover him. He had made it 145 yards when we found him. 2 bucks in the same evening and it being her first buck what a evening!

I would like to thank Tracy and Mark for having me up for this hunt and thank Linda for letting me have the honor of field dressing her first buck! To make a perfect ending to this hunt on my way home I got a text from Mark telling me that Barb had taken her buck as well the next evening!

Even though I was lucking enough to kill a mature Iowa buck on this hunt my best memories will be of Linda and Barb taking their first bucks. After all hunting camp memories are as much of the hunt as the harvest!!

Previous	December 20 - Linda Lurk	December 20 - Ben Maki	Next