Hunter Shoots 17-Point Buck After Watching It Grow For 6 Years

A hunter put down an enormous 17-point buck on Nov. 4 after keeping an eye on it for six years. David Miller of Boone County shared the achievement on Facebook. Miller watched the animal grow ever since he first spotted it in 2013.

"I first became aware of that buck's presence in 2013, when he was a typical 10-pointer," Miller told West Virginia Gazette-Mail. What made the buck noticeable over the years was its still-developing antler points.

Back then, Miller and his friends had rented out a property in Mingo County, West Virginia where they installed a network of game cameras to track the buck. Its rack grew from 120 inches in 2013 to 160 inches last year, Miller said.

When Miller took his wife hunting, she managed to injure the buck.

"The arrow hit a bone in his shoulder and didn't penetrate," Miller said. "The buck ran off and we couldn’t trail him."

Miller started searching for the buck and if it had survived since they couldn't capture anything on the camera. They began "looking for his skeleton or his shed antlers." One day, the buck was spotted on one of his cameras.

The buck had grown considerably since Miller had last seen it. "His tines had grown, and his main beams had grown," he said. "When I first saw him, I thought he was a different buck. Then it dawned on me — 'Oh my gosh, that's that old buck we've been watching for years.'"

Miller realized that the buck had been avoiding areas with hunter presence. He followed his gut and set up a camera stealthily. The camera made a rare daytime spotting of the animal along with other bucks, and Miller set out to hunt it two days later.

He sat waiting for a couple of hours, watching other bucks come and go. Then he finally spotted movement.

"The old buck had slipped in. He lowered his head to go under a branch, and I could see it was him," Miller told West Virginia Gazette-Mail. "He stepped out into the open about 18 yards away."

He shot the buck when its head was behind a tree.

The buck was reportedly nine-and-a-half years old.

"I am so very thankful and blessed to harvest this WV Mountain Monarch!!!! 17 scorable points and 9.5 years old," Miller wrote on Facebook.