Donnie Herod

The Donnie Herod BuckDonnie Herod, a fabrication technician from Rockwall, Texas, had spent more than a week bowhunting in Kansas. The hunt was one of the longest and hardest hunts he had encountered in his 16 years of bowhunting, but Donnie did not leave until he slipped an arrow through a nice Pope & Young contender typical buck. The buck was not what Herod had gone to Kansas for, but it was still a nice buck for his 2007 hunting season.

After the Kansas hunt Donnie rushed home to be with family for the Thanksgiving Day celebration and the chance to get in a few days of bowhunting back home during the rut. However, Mother Nature was not cooperating for the morning of Saturday, November 24 brought the threat of wet, windy weather as a strong cold front moved in. But the bad weather didn’t keep Donnie from the woods. As he sat quietly watching for deer movement in his stand, he was hoping that the rain and winds would not keep the deer bedded down all day.

Donnie was hunting a small piece of property in Grayson County, Texas that he and a couple of friends had been hunting for the last few years. Herod will not hunt a stand unless the wind is just right for the location. This was the first time since mid October that the wind had been right for this stand. As daylight came he noticed some new rubs that had not been there before, but it was shaping up to be a long, slow morning as nothing seemed to be moving.

Finally about 7:40 Donnie saw movement as a bobcat made his way through the Texas woods. Since nothing was happening and this was a really nice bobcat, he decided to take the well-spotted trophy. As he drew back, the cat apparently heard the rustle of his heavy rain gear. At the shot, the alerted cat spun away and the arrow missed. (It was actually a good miss because it alerted Donnie to the noise that his clothing was making.) After the shot, Herod tried to cover up the noise of the shot by hitting his grunt call and giving a doe-in-estrous bleat call.

A few minutes later, Donnie heard the sound of something coming up towards his stand through the leaves. He looked to the right and saw a buck with a wide rack and drop tines moving his way. This was a really nice buck, a chance of lifetime, and he knew he had to make this happen.

As the buck approached Herod’s shooting window, he started to draw back, only to discover that his arrow was not sitting properly on the rest. After making the quick adjustment, he came to full draw as the buck closed to within 20 yards.

The big buck stopped and put his nose down into a horse apple or something that had his attention under a bois d’arc tree. The buck was at a good angle, so Donnie released and watched him bolt. Suddenly Herod’s nerves went crazy and he started to shake from head to toe as he realized that he had just arrowed a monster. He saw glimpses of the buck as he ran off, but he only made it 50 or 60 yards before Donnie saw the buck stagger and then fall over.

Herod could see the buck down, but waited a bit to settle his nerves and make sure that the buck was really dead. Donnie finally climbed down out of his stand and walked over to a set of antlers most deer hunters can only dream of. As the hunter sat next to the buck and soaked it all in, waves of emotion hit him.“I couldn’t believe I had done this. I had harvested the buck of a lifetime here in Texas of all places. I’ve got all of the respect in the world for these big whitetails, they are survivors, but that 100 grain Muzzy put a whuppin’ on this monster.”

The 5 ½ year old buck sports 28 scorable points and has an inside spread of 20 1/8 inches, but the outside spread measures 27 1⁄8 inches. It’s a main frame 10 point non-typical.

Donnie got the rack unofficially green scored at 211 3⁄8 inches gross, and 199 3⁄8 inches net. He had heard of the Muzzy 200 Club before, and thought that he had met the criteria with the gross score, so he contacted Muzzy with the news. Donnie wanted the honor of being a member of the 200 Club, so he was disappointed when they told him that the criteria was 200 inches net, and not gross for a non-typical rack. They also told him to hang in there because this was going to be a close one and it could go ether way depending on how the official scorer interpreted the rack. So Herod had to wait out the official 60-day drying period, but this would be a long wait as he really wanted the honor of the 200 Club.

Interestingly, Donnie is not alone when it comes to racks that are so close that they could go ether way of 200 at the official scoring table. Since it’s inception the 200 Club has had over 25 bucks (harvested with a Muzzy Broadhead) that were on the cusp, but did not make the 200 inch mark in the end. Genetically speaking, a whitetail rack that will net score 200 inches is incredibly rare. For the past 5 years, there are about 60 bucks harvested that will gross score 200 inches, but on average less than a dozen bucks each year will net score 200 or better.

After 60 days Donnie got the rack officially scored and then regretfully e-mailed Muzzy. His note said, “Official score on my 28 point Texas non-typical is 196 3/8 net, and 208 3/8 gross scored by Ken Whitt, at Arlington Bowhunting World. Deer has made a couple of local news papers, and got a big write up in the sports section of Dallas Morning News by Ray Sasser. RACK Magazine is putting him on the cover next fall. Sure wish he would have made the 200 Club, but he’s still a great buck”.

Yes he is a great buck, and the people at Muzzy congratulated Donnie on his buck and for getting so close to making the 200 Club.

About two weeks later Donnie got his official certification in the mail from Pope & Young. There was also a letter that was an apology for an error that had been made in the addition of the rack’s total gross and net measurement. The corrected final score was 201 1/8 net.

Congratulations to Donnie Herod. Certified Member of the Muzzy 200 Club.