Big
buck is testimony to Institute’s success
By
Ray Scott
Founder,
Whitetail Institute of North America
In early February of last year
one of our hands, Albert Osborne, made a discovery that not only amazed all of
us at the Whitetail Institute but also serves as testimony to the effect of
everything we do here.
As I drove down the winding
lane to my house that day, Albert was coming out of our 100-acre research
enclosure and waved. Thinking it was just a greeting; I waved back and continued
down the lane to my driveway. But by the time I parked and got out of my truck,
Albert had pulled into the driveway behind me on a four-wheeler.
Albert, who is also the
Institute’s Assistant Shipping Manager, is a strong, quiet man with a heart of
gold. He has worked for me for five years so I knew he felt the situation was
important, even though he didn’t say a word. In his massive hands was a deer
skull and rack the likes of which I’ve seldom seen.
It wasn’t until later,
after Albert had washed off the muddy tines and I had another opportunity to
look at it, that the immensity of the rack hit me. It was gigantic. Seven points
on one side, eight on the other, five tines over 10 inches in length – two of
them more than a foot long – the length, mass and configuration of the rack
were remarkable. Our Managing Editor, Dave Henderson, measured the rack at 218
5/8 under the Boone & Crockett system. Dave is also a certified scorer for
the Buckmasters full-credit scoring system, but suggested that since Buckmasters
headquarters is just down the road, we ought to have Buckmasters Trophy Records
Vice President Brian Hicks put a tape to the rack also.
The Buckmasters system takes
into consideration virtually all of a rack’s mass with no deductions. But it
does not include the inside spread like the B&C system. Hicks scored the
rack at 196 6/8 for the Buckmasters Record Book.
Remember that this deer had
lived its entire life in a 100-acre high-fenced enclosure adjacent to my house.
There could be no mistaking that fact. The acreage is surrounded by a 9-foot
deer-proof chain-link fence that keeps all our deer in and other deer out. It is
constantly patrolled. There are no holes. The deer could not have come from
anywhere else.
Now, I drive past the
enclosure virtually every day and always stop at the bridge and glass that
enclosure to watch the deer. I have photographed or just observed the deer
inside the enclosure countless times from our specially designed photo blind.
But I had never seen this
buck with this rack.
Neither had Albert, who does
all the cultivation and fertilization in the enclosure. No one – not the guy
who cuts hay; not delivery people; no one on the Institute staff who travels
those roads every day – not one living soul had ever seen this magnificent
rack before Albert found the skull.
When I showed it to my son,
Steve, the next day his immediate reaction was: “Pop, this isn’t one of your
April Fools jokes in February, is it?”
When I assured him that it
wasn’t; that the buck was a lifelong inhabitant of our research enclosure and
thus the beneficiary of our plantings and nutrition research, Steve was
obviously excited. Wilson’s reaction was the same and, as vice presidents of
the Institute, they urged Albert and me to take a polygraph test so that the
world could believe this tale.
A couple of days later I
scheduled an appointment with polygraph expert Cecil Johnston in Montgomery,
Ala., who I’d used to interview contestants in our early days with Bassmasters.
Johnston, the former president of the National Polygraph Association, is a
highly regarded expert used by the likes of F. Lee Bailey in criminal trials. We
wanted the best; we wanted the story to be completely sterile.
After Albert and I had each
gone through 2.5 hours of interrogation and interpretation, our claims were
certified as true. The results are on file.
The enclosure was built in
1990 and was the original site of the Whitetail Institute’s nutritional
research. After installing the perimeter fencing, the 100-acre area – that’s
the size of 10 football fields laid out together – was completely sterilized.
That means we ran hunting dogs and rifleman through it relentlessly, chasing out
all of the native deer. Then we burned it, completely purging it of all animals
before closing the gate.
If you are familiar with the
Institute’s history, you probably already know what we did next. We introduced
40 fawns – 20 from Montana and Alberta and 20 from Alabama woodlands. The idea
was to give both subspecies the same nutrition and determine how much the
eventual size of the animals was determined by genetics and how much by what
they eat.
All of our products have been
used in the enclosure over the years. In addition, several new nutritional
products that are in various stages of development are used in the enclosure.
The land is about 60 percent wooded and we dug two water holes in designated
areas. 4 or 5 acres were planted with Imperial Whitetail Clover, Alfa-Rack and
No-Plow was added a few years later. And all of the native browse was treated
with our IMPACT Product. Imperial 30-06 Minerals and Cutting Edge nutritional
supplements are also made readily available in the enclosure. The area was
pretty much a guinea pig for our products.
At the end of the first year
we took all the deer down, measured antlers, took hair samples, blood samples
and measurements. We did note originally that there was a big difference between
the two groups. The northern deer were simply bigger. I’ve come to believe
that at least part of that is because they were dropped earlier than the Alabama
fawns and had been growing longer. After that, however, the gap started closing
rapidly. By the fourth year, the difference between the two groups was very
difficult to determine. Remember, these deer had all grown up on the same feed
and browse. The nutrition had almost overcome any genetic differences. We also
were able to disprove the old once a spike – always a spike theory.
After five years we
discontinued the research. I don’t know how scientific it was, but it was good
enough for me. We’d found what we wanted to know.
Although we haven’t yet
found the lower jaw of the big buck to age it, I can tell you that he wasn’t 8
or 9 years old – he was definitely the offspring of the animals we originally
put in there. He’d had his day at the Whitetail Institute’s buffet table –
a free range of Imperial Whitetail plantings mineral, nutritional supplements
and IMPACT treated browse.
I’ve got to think that he
is some pretty profound testimony to what we feed these animals.
As I said before, Albert
spends more time in that enclosure than any other person, and he’d learned the
hard way that nothing can ruin a tractor tire quicker than a shed antler. So
he’d taken to scouring the fields before spring planting. He would usually
just throw the sheds into the woods, or bring some of the larger ones to our
equipment shed.
But one day last fall he
found a rather impressive pair of 5-point sheds that were dropped 25-30 feet
apart. They were the first sheds I’d ever seen him bring in, and I asked that
when he found time would he do me a favor and go deeper in the woods to see if
he could find anything else.
Just a couple of days later
he came in with a bizarre find – a single spike with 26 inches of beam. This
deer could have been a true killer when the animals sparred during the rut.
Steve and Wilson had each seen the deer once when it was alive, but I’d never
seen it.
Despite the fact that I live
right next to the enclosure and just about every time I drive past I put glasses
on it, I’d never seen that deer. So one day in October I took a couple of
hours and rode a four-wheeler through the enclosure. I rode every square foot of
that 100 acres thinking I wanted to kick up every animal that I could.
I didn’t see one deer.
That just underscores how
elusive whitetails can be – and why no one ever saw that big boy while he was
alive in the enclosure. Once a buck has survived a couple of years he gets super
cautious. He’s going to wait until the moon is right; until the wind is right
– until everything is in his favor – before he moves.
Where Albert found the skull,
he also found the bones of a doe very close by. Bones from both deer were
scattered in a 20-30 foot radius, probably by
buzzards feeding on the carcasses. When I showed the skull and rack to
taxidermist Tony Ellis in Montgomery he was confident, judging by the small
amount of rodent nibbling on the bone, that the buck had been dead no more than
a year.
Albert’s buck, as we’ve
come to call massive whitetail, will soon be mounted and will serve as sort of a
mascot for the Whitetail Institute of North America. We are the pioneers and
leaders; the first to take the time to research and contribute in a significant
way to the well-being of these animals.
Albert’s buck is a monument to what we’ve achieved.