GALLATIN – It has been nearly three years since Gallatin resident Stephen Tucker bagged his world record 47-point buck in 2016 during muzzleloading season on Dr. Patterson’s Farm in Gallatin, Tennessee.
Tucker saw the buck on two previous occasions before harvesting him.
“That morning, he came out in front of me but it was too dark to see,” Tucker said. “He had a scrape right behind my blind. Thirty minutes later, I heard something, so I turned to my right and didn’t see him. When I turned back around, there he was. I didn’t know what to think when I first saw him. I couldn’t comprehend what I was seeing.”
Unfortunately for Tucker plans went awry as his gun misfired from 35 yards out leaving him unsure if he would ever come across such a majestic creature again.
“My gun simply misfired,” he said. “My powder just didn’t go off. I was for sure I’d never see him again.”
That would have meant that Tucker’s gun powder somehow got wet in order for him to misfire.
Tucker indeed saw the deer again and new he had to get him his second go-round. At just 40 yards away, Tucker fired straight and recorded the kill.
“I tried to focus,” Tucker said. “When we went down there, we couldn’t find a blood trail. It wasn’t until about 50 yards that we found a good blood trail. I started to get nervous. I started wondering if I had taken a good shot. I was relieved when we found the blood and in about thirty more yards, there he was.”
The deer was taken to Poindexter’s Bait Shop for original records.
Owner Buddy Poindexter immediately knew it was a possible state record and world record.
“He was pretty speechless about it,” Tucker said. “The TWRA website would even allow him to check it in. It kept saying that it was an invalid rack-point number. He had to write a manual ticket.”
Tucker used every part of the deer, not letting anything go to waste.
“It took me about a year to go through all of it,” he said. “I tried to save some of it best I could but it was gone pretty fast.”
Since Tucker’s original measurements of 313 green, the buck has been rescored by Boone and Crockett at 315 1/8 inch with the rack being kept in the Citizens Bank Vault.
Tucker and his family will make the nine hour drive to Springfield, Missouri this Friday for his banquet ceremony at the 30th Big Game Awards.
He will come back with his full body replica before taking it to Nathan Wilson at Wilson Wildlife Artistry in Crossville.
Tucker will hold the world record for at least the next three years.
