Shot a Buck but Went home with an Anterless Deer

This story came across the Facebook feed recently, and I couldn’t help sharing it with you here. It seems that a Georgia hunter reportedly shot himself a nice buck on January 2, only to find it antlerless when he got to it!

When hunter Mac Cole spotted the deer approaching a food plot, he took notice. When the buck paused at the edge of the plot, Mac knew it was on.

“Mac could see good tine length and a big beam, and he took the shot.”

The deer didn’t run at the shot, instead falling dead on the spot. Mac couldn’t see the buck, though, so he texted his wife (who was hunting in a nearby stand) that he had shot a buck, and asked her to approach it. That way, Mac could remain alert and ready in case the buck got up and had to be shot again.

‘She thought that I was mistaken and had shot a doe,’ Mac said. “When she got closer, she saw the antlers laying just above his head. She was holding them when I got down and walked to her.”

When she arrived, she saw a deer lying there–but it had no rack!
Clearly, the buck’s antlers were just about ready to shed, and when the deer collapsed after being shot, they just fell right off its head.

Story by Russ Chastain