‘Cried and cried' after taking Wisconsin bruiser ranking high in National Deer Contest

Teresa Davis became a hunter later in life than many, but few things exciteher more than bow hunting for whitetail deer.

And the huge buck she took in October on a Wisconsin farm thrilled her nearlybeyond description.

“I just cried and cried forever,” she said. “It was such a huge, amazing deer… a deer of a lifetime. I couldn’t believe it.”

With the buck, Davis is one of the adult leaders in the Harvested Typical BowDivision of the Outdoor Channel National Deer Contest powered by Buckscore. Itand hundreds of others taken around the country can be found at nationaldeercontest.com.

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Her buck, an 11-pointer, scored 173.36 on Buckscore.

“My daughter in law, her sister sent me a link for the contest and said, ‘Youreally need to send in your deer,’” Davis said. “We’ve had the most fun withit.”

She has only been an active hunter for about 20 years.

“My husband got me into it,” said Davis, 53, who lives in Andersonville innortheastern Tennessee. “We started shooting in bow tournaments, and now I wantto hunt. I love it, can’t get enough of it. I’m the one who is wakingeveryone up … ‘We got to get going! We’re going to be late!’ I want to get outin those woods.”

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In October, Davis and her husband Frank made their yearly trek to hunt on afarm in Buffalo County, Wis., an area rich with monster whitetails. A day aftertheir arrival, they first entered the woods for a late afternoon hunt.

“Frank put me in a real good bottleneck,” Davis said. “There were severaldeer milling around. Then right before dark, this big guy steps out.

“I don’t believe he was in rut yet, because there were two doe with him andhe wasn’t paying any attention.”

She made the shot at 42 yards.

“I lost sight of him right away. There were really deer everywhere and ofcourse when I shot, they all scattered in every direction. And I wasn’t able tosee what direction he ran.”

Davis and her husband searched until dark then decided to wait until the nextday. She hunted that second morning, but her mind was still on the big buck fromprevious evening.

“I knew I had hit him good,” she said, “but I was still worried.”

At about 9 a.m., the owner of the farm drove his ATV to within sight ofDavis’ stand and waved.

“He asked me, ‘Are you having good morning,’” Davis said. “I was like, ‘I sawa button buck.’ He said, ‘But did you shoot one?’ I was, ‘No, but I shot a bigone yesterday evening!’

“He laughed and told me my deer was lying in a field on the next farmover.”

It was an 11-pointer – 10 points with a sticker – and weighed a hefty 218 ½ pounds field dressed, likely more than 250 pounds when Davis downed it.

“My husband had placed trail cameras in the area, but we hadn’t even checkedthem yet,” said Davis, a human resources associate at Oak Ridge AssociatedUniversities. “I was in the right place. He came out of nowhere.”

Davis and her monster buck were soon the talk of the surrounding area, and apicture is posted on the wall at the local country store.

However, there are even bigger sources of pride closer to home.

“I’ve killed the biggest one in my family – that’s my husband, my brother, myson, father in law,” she said, laughing. “There’s been a lot of talk about it inthe family. There’s also been a couple younger girls at church that have stoppedand asked me about it, and that has given me the opportunity to talk with themabout hunting. It’s great.

“It’s a deer of a lifetime. I’ll never forget it.”

Davis’ buck and hundreds of others from across the United States can be foundat nationaldeercontest.com. The contest is thefirst-ever, national white-tail deer scoring and photography competition. It isfree to enter and has categories for youth and adult hunters, as well as inarchery and firearm – with typical and non-typical divisions for each.

The contest continues until Jan. 31, 2013.