It may well have been a free range deer....of course free range deer can be fed like any high fence operation deer so... The hunter probably knows the truth, if he really thinks it was a totally natural deer then I'm happy for him but I still believe someone fed that deer something unnatural. I guess that's fine, I feed deer still (corn and beans and 100 acres of plots) but I still ain't getting any deer close to that. That just makes me believe all the more that something like these animals is not a very likely occurrence. I'd still offer my congrats, it's still cool. Then again I still enjoy seeing the unreal monsters on deer farms so there is that.
High protein diet and mineral. don't quote me because I'm pulling these numbers out of my butt but I'd guess probably 75% of deer ranch results come from their diet alone. The other 25% is genetics and no pressure. Deer like that one are not that valuable on the deer farm market, 300" animals have come to be considered meh at this point. Animals at 500+ are not unheard of now. Most are trying to get rid of the freak nasty junk though and are breeding more goal oriented for typical antlers. The high quality diet makes it hard to grow perfect straight typical racks.
Sorry covey, I had lots of respect for you but now your sounding like a little kid that a bully took his toys away.
I have seen three deer in my lifetime that were close to that big. All three were just freaks. No one had fed them anything special other than what they got from the farm crops. It just happens. The original world record for sure wasn't given hormones or any special feed. I can and does happen. Sent from my Moto G (5) Plus using Bowhunting.com Forums mobile app
How do you know what they had been eating? Did you follow them around 24/7/365? Which original world record? Can you say with 100% certainty that those deer, any of them or all of them, hadn't been helping themselves to a cattleman's feed bunk and mineral? 200ish inches I'll believe can happen naturally. Maybe the very occasional freak larger than that but at the rate 200+inchers are killed now days and one guy claiming to have seen three approaching 300 (comparing to the featured one in this thread) I'd say something is suspicious at least.
It happens. Yes, they may very well be helping themselves to cattle feed and minerals. Much like the squirrels help themselves to your birdseed. I have no intention of starting a debate about freak deer. I know I have seen some huge deer in the wild where there are no high fences and no one owns thousands of acres to keep the deer on their own property and secluded. Whatever the case may be and how they got that huge is not known to me. I just know when I'm out hunting and see a deer that huge walking and I know it didn't come off a deer ranch...it's a special day. Sent from my Moto G (5) Plus using Bowhunting.com Forums mobile app
Here’s a picture of the rack at taxidermist and the official score sheet Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
This is a world record. They put it under a microscope. Not saying it isn’t possible but i think it would be hard to get away with. At least in the long run. The truth usually always comes out. It’s in human nature to talk.
As far as I know it wouldn't disqualify it if it was a free range deer being free fed high protein supplement....unless it's illegal to feed deer in that state (it may well be idk). Even if it was, doesn't meas it wasn't fed and if no one knows it'd be hard to prove. For that matter like I said he could have been helping himself to open fed cattle feed and mineral. Or it may have just been a freak mega deer.
I’m not sure if this has been said already but you sound like a child that had his toys taken away by a bully.
