Coker’s buck estimated at 10 years old
With a nickname like ‘Bone,” it just makes sense that Seburn Coker would be the guy to shoot a buck with four antlers – and lots of bone – protruding from its skull.
And that’s exactly what the 47-year-old from Carriere did on the rainy morning of Thursday, Feb. 5, when a deer long known as “Fish Hook” finally got reeled in.
“I didn’t even see him come out. I had my head down and I was about to give up,” said Coker, a construction foreman for Kass Bros. in Westwego, La. “It was a rainy morning. When I put my head up, he was right there.
“He came out from the side about 50 yards from me. When I put my head up, he was looking straight at me. I said, ‘Where did he come from?’”
Coker, who was in a box stand overlooking a food plot in piney woods, had endured a steady rain all morning at the Bobcat Ridge Hunting Club in Lumberton.
“I couldn’t go to work because of the rain, so I said, ‘Shoot, I’m going to go hunting, and go give it a try,’” he said.
Coker had Fish Hook on trail cam for the last two years. Last year, it appeared he had three distinct antlers. This year, he sprouted his fourth – a 3-inch antler behind his left eye.
“He definitely has four antlers. His regular antlers come out normal, then he has one extra long one on the right side with a drop tine, then on the left side he has a little one coming out,” Coker said. “They’re not coming off the main beams. They come out of his skull.”
When Coker looked up and saw the buck in front of him, he didn’t recognize Fish Hook through the rain. He fired his Tikka .300 Short Mag and the deer bolted left before crashing in a right-of-way 70 yards in the distance.
“When I walked up to him, I said, ‘Man, it’s Fish Hook,’” he said. “It was amazing. That rack is so different.”
The buck is a mainframe 7-point, with three additional points spread out amongst the two extra antlers. Coker didn’t get the buck scored, but is getting it mounted as a keepsake for a very unique deer.
“The taxidermist said he’s seen it before, but it’s very, very seldom,” Coker said. “He hadn’t seen one in a while.”
Fish Hook apparently was a wily old buck, too.
“His jawbone goes beyond the eight years listed on the chart,” he said. “The taxidermist estimated he was about 10 years old.”
Coker said everyone who sees the buck for the first time has the same general reaction.
“They’re like, ‘Man, look at that thing. That’s amazing,’” he said. “They’re tripped out.
“It’s definitely the strangest one I ever did kill.”
Read other stories about big bucks killed this season by clicking here.
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