A monster buck nicknamed “Blinky” entered Todd Irwin’s world back in July when he moved in and was captured by game cameras. The buck was a monster 8-point, but Irwin, from Gluckstadt, hadn’t been able to hunt him much. Irwin’s hunting buddy, Hunter Farrell, was spending a lot of time hunting Blinky, but he hadn’t gotten a shot, either.
“I got him on camera coming through a food plot about 7:30 one morning recently,” Irwin said. “I run Covert cameras, and I thought he went back into the bottom, so I had a change of plans and went hunting that afternoon. As I walked in the wind was perfect, blowing towards the area I’d just came in from.”
Irwin got into his Summit Viper stand and climbed 30 feet high around 3:30 the afternoon of Oct. 29, but things were slow until 5:50. Blinky came across a lane and stood broadside for just a minute, looking towards the food plot. The buck circled back around and walked out in front of him at 21.8 yards.
“Thwack!” Irwin’s broadhead smacked the buck and it took off, a split second after he released his arrow, running just out of sight before collapsing.
Impressive 8-point
The buck’s 8-point rack had an inside spread of 20 inches, an outside spread of 22 ¼ inches and rough scored 150, which is about as high as any 8-point buck you’ll ever see in Mississippi.
“We’d never killed a buck anywhere near this size on our property near Camden,” Irwin said. “My mother bought the property about 4 years ago, and we’d killed some good turkeys there and a few deer, but the largest I’d killed was a 128-inch buck last year, my biggest by far at the time.”
Irwin killed his first deer with a bow when he was about 12 years old, and he’s been hooked ever since.
“Blinky” was blind in one eye, and we’d gotten hundreds of photos of him at night and only one of his eyes would shine,” Irwin said. “We saw him following some does into the same food plot on camera late last year, but we never saw him while hunting and don’t know where he came from. My neighbor, Jay Albritton, owns 120 acres next door, and he knew about the deer. The deer was bedding on his property, too.
“Everything just felt right during the hunt,” Irwin said. “Harper Farrell was hunting another stand with me, and he was supposed to kill that deer; he’d been after him so long. I would have been just as happy if he’d killed it. But I was just lucky, but it feels like winning the Super Bowl!”
Finding the deer
Farrell made his way to the scene of the shot pretty quickly and asked Irwin if he was sure that he hit him.
“I saw the arrow strike him in the rib cage and heard the arrow hitting brush as it ran away,” Irwin said. “We walked about 5 yards and Harper found some blood. We trailed him about 75 yards and stopped because we didn’t want to push him if it wasn’t a good hit. Harper kept walking towards the deer, slowly trailing blood, however.
“Dead deer, dead deer, white belly, you got him,” Farrell said.
“We found him in the creek bed.” said Irwin. “It’s a memory that will last a lifetime, that’s for sure!”
If Irwin hadn’t gotten a cell-phone text picture, he may never have hunted that day.
“I saw he was moving, so it was a no brainer,” said Irwin. “I changed plans, and it worked out.”
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