Enormous Buck Starts Ohio Deer Season in Spectacular Fashion

Craig Meyers is a serious deer hunter from Michigan, so when several friends who hunt in southeastern Ohio offered him an opportunity to work, manage, and hunt a 380-acre parcel, he jumped at the chance. Craig — who also does habitat deer land work (Trophy Land Management) — was looking forward to see what he could do with a property he’d never stepped foot on until 2022. Growing up, it was instilled in him by his father that his first deer must be taken with a bow. At age 12, thats just what he did by taking a spike buck. From then on, the deer hunting fire has never stopped burning.

With the new Ohio property being a six-hour drive from his home, Craig wanted to learn as much about the land as he could. Through the social media circles, Craig began chatting with Rich Hixson, who runs Trophy Bucks of Ohio and Phoenix Media there. The two discussed what seed blends and combinations would work the best in their food plots for that region.

In March of 2023, Craig and friend Paul Conrod took a trip to the property to pull soil samples, scout, and look over possible food plot locations. The two also set out gravity feeders loaded with protein. The summer of that year was so dry in the region that it took three days to work up the four acres of food plot sites on the farm.

In 2023, the farm now had established food plots consisting of clover, chicory, and a brassica blend. That fall, a mature buck Craig had named Frank was a regular on the farm. He was often seen with another buck that Craig had named Krabs.

Krabs had distintive crab claws at the end of his beams on each side, supporting an estimated 140-inch rack as a 4-year-old that year.

That fall, Craig actually passed up Krabs at 20 yards, while putting a tag around Frank's antlers — a mature 9-point that grossed 151 inches — and Paul followed suit by taking his best buck off the farm as well. His went 162 inches, and both hunters were pleased with a great fall.

As soon as the season was over, the work began again of providing the deer on the farm with protein, minerals, and water stations around on the property. Craig explained that their efforts were beginning to pay off with a better quality of deer utilizing the land.

Throughout the summer months, trips from Michigan to the Ohio farm were made to top off feeders, put more minerals out and place some trail cameras.

Craig was anticipating gettting pictures of Krabs in the summer of 2024 to see what he’d turned into. Those trail camera images showed he’d jumped up to a 180-class nontypical by the fall of that year.

"I was walking to my stand one afternoon when I stopped to see a small 4-point buck 15 yards from me," Craig said. " Another deer was behind a autumn olive bush and I couldn’t quite see it. Finally the buck hiding showed himsel enough that I instantly recognized it being Krabs. He was so much bigger in person!"

But with the 2024 season coming to an end, Krabs had eluded the hunters again.

Moving to January of 2025, Craig began his scouting by looking for sheds off Krabs. Though none were found at the time, one shed of Krabs was located later in March, but it turned out to be from his  2023 rack.

The same work in the summer of 2025 continued for Craig and Paul, once again filling feeders, placing minerals and putting out some more cameras. When July rolled around, Craig was excited to see even more development from the his top target.

As Craig was scanning through several SD cards, he was astonished to see Krabs had blown into a fully-grown giant — now supporting two long droptines on each side of the wide rack. From that moment, Craig said he was all-in on this particular deer.

“I couldn’t believe a deer of this caliber was on property I was hunting," he stated.

Not skimping on anything, Craig did everything he could do to put the odds in his favor — cleaning out blinds, freshening up mineral sites, water stations, etc.

Krabs was becoming regular on camera as summer progressed into fall, and Craig felt like he could capitalize on him if the deer stayed on his normal summer routine. When opening weekend of the Ohio bow season arrived, Craig was ready to give it a go.

His first sit of the season came on September 27th with the wind was a bit iffy, but Craig was still anxious to be chasing Krabs. Sitting over a favored food plot the big deer was frequenting, several deer soon began to feed out in the plot. A buck that was often seen with Krabs entered the field with some smaller bucks, but the big deer was nowhere to be found. Thinking Krabs might have seen his access or gotten his wind, Craig sat in complete darkness a full 45 minutes after dark as to not scare any deer when he exited.

Knowing conditions weren’t optimal, Craig hopped in his vehicle and drove the six hours back to Michigan. While at home, Craig watched his cellular cameras to monitor Krabs as best he could. Knowing he’d need a south wind to hunt a particular blind, Craig figured the deer bedded nearby as trail-cam photos showed the deer exiting a particular location each night in the food plot.

The weather turned unseasonably warm and Craig knew this would be a problem in the box blind he’d be hunting. To alleviate the heat, Craig purchased two small portable fans off Amazon and a few gel ice packs to take along with him in the blind. Not wanting to take any chances of getting winded, he also took along some blue painters tape and covered every window seam and crack — even purposely taping up the door he’d entered the blind in.

Sitting in the sauna-like blind that evening and battling the excuriating heat, Craig watched as a doe was the first deer to enter the plot to his southwest. Looking back to his west, he spotted a 140-class buck entering the plot, followed quickly by several more bucks not long after that. With the windows beginning to fog over with condensation from the heat, Craig finally spotted Krabs at 60 yards feeding his way. He knew he wanted to get him to 40 yards before attempting a shot.

As the buck fed closer and closer, Craig slowly opened the window just enough to get his crossbow in position.

"I ranged him several times," Craig said. "48, 46, 41..."

Confident in his abilities at 40, the hunter steadied his crossbow on the buck peering through his scope and counted his pins to himself — 20, 30, 40 — and centered the 40-yard mark on his intended target. Then Craig took his shot, solidly hitting the buck. The giant buck crashed toward Craig’s blind before making it out of sight. Figuring the buck was down, Craig soon took up the heavy blood trail. 

"I was in complete shock," Craig explained.

Upon walking up to the deer — after a phone call to family members and friends, of course — Craig simply sat there in silence with the deer for several minutes.

The Ohio giant sported a 25-inch inside spread. With a green gross score of 225 1/8 inches and net of 217 4/8, the kill should sit atop the Perry County, Ohio record books among non-typical bucks.