The date was Nov. 10, 2007. On the way to the farm we were hunting in Felton, Delaware, my 9-year-old son Brady was feeling a little under the weather. I thought we might have to turn the truck around and go back home.

Brady toughed it out, though, and we shared the most magical morning I have ever experienced in my 20-plus years of hunting.

We sat in our buddy stand together until about 8:30 a.m. Brady was getting really cold so I suggested we get out of our stand and still hunt down one of the old paths running through the woods. We started to still-hunt with me leading, and Brady following a few yards behind me with his single-shot 20 gauge. We had only gotten about 75 yards from our stand when I looked to my right and saw a huge buck! The buck leaped over a log and headed right toward Brady and me with his nose to the ground. He got to within 15 yards of us without noticing us. Then he started working a scrape under a holly tree.

The buck stopped at a spot where I could see him clearly, but Brady could not get a clear shot because of a low-hanging holly branch. I tip-toed back the few feet to Brady, and tried to help him find the deer in his scope. We spent several seconds trying to get Brady a clear shot. However, before Brady could see the buck in his scope, the deer spotted us and bounded off into the woods.

Naturally Brady was upset at the missed opportunity. I told him that the only thing I knew to do was follow our instinct and go back to our stand and wait it out. We arrived back at our stand by 8:45. Then at around 9 a.m., the buck came walking toward us! Brady had a clear shot this time. The buck stood broadside at about 35 yards as Brady squeezed the trigger. The deer took off like a freight train through the woods. We saw that the shot had hit its target well.

We left the woods for nearly an hour, and then returned with the landowner to help us track the deer. We found the buck within an hour of searching. He had gone about 100 yards. Brady's buck had 11 points with an outside spread of 23 inches. The antlers grossed 152 4/8 and netted 143 3/8!

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