Alexandria’s Dustin Johnson was hunting near New York Mills on opening weekend of firearms season when some does showed up under his stand during an afternoon hunt.
That usually means a buck is right around the corner in early November and it proved to be the case that day.
“They walked across a swamp and they kind of went back into the brush,” Johnson said of the does. “I kind of waited thinking maybe there will be a buck coming. Out of nowhere this thing stood up. He must have been sitting there the whole day. He stood up and I saw this big white rack. I only had one shell in the chamber because I forgot to put the clip in.”
One shell is all Johnson needed on the buck. He pulled up his 30-06 rifle and shot at the deer from about 150 yards out.
“I didn’t even know if I hit him,” Johnson said. “I thought maybe he ran away, because the two does he got up for, they came back and they were standing around there. I got down and walked over there, and there he was.”
The buck had 13 total points and is the biggest deer Johnson has ever shot. It took him and three other buddies in his party to help get it out of the woods after the evening hunt was over for everyone.
The group of six hunters shot another eight pointer that weekend. They try to manage the land they hunt to produce some bigger bucks by passing up some smaller ones.
Johnson saw about six does, a couple spike bucks and another small eight pointer while hunting that weekend. They were all smaller than what he was looking for, but there was no questioning whether or not this one was a shooter when he stepped out.
“I knew he was big,” Johnson said. “I couldn’t tell how many points, but that was fun.”
