Mike Jordan DIY Bowhunter

Welcome to another episode of Whitetail Rendezvous. This is your host Bruce Hutcheon. And I'm pleased to bring a friend from Colorado that loves to hunt elk, loves to hunt whitetail. His name is Michael Jordan. And Mike comes from the city of Pueblo. He's got his wife Andrea and he's got two children, Bella and Brady. And he's been hunting for a long time. They attend a Christian church down there in Pueblo. And one of his favorite things to do is chase big whitetails and big bulls either in the Rocky Mountains or along the Arkansas.

Mike, welcome to the show.

Mike: Thanks, Bruce.

Bruce: Say Mike, when you sent me that picture a month or so ago, I was pretty astounded because when I first looked at it, I thought you had shot just a humongous whitetail deer because I didn't see the split fork on the backside of his right antler. So let's just jump right into the show and tell people about this magnificent, I'm going to call it a hybrid for lack of a better word, just a gorgeous, gorgeous deer you took out in Eastern Colorado.

Mike: Yeah, I would probably tend to agree with you. I would think it probably is considered a hybrid. But the story on that, I was hunting with Gage. And Bruce, you know Gage. And we were hunting on a farm that I actually insure. And we spotted this buck probably about 150 yards. And luckily he was in a milo field, and luckily there was a fence line. And with the winds the way it blows in Eastern Colorado, it blows some tumbleweeds up against that fence line and we were able to use those tumbleweeds to walk behind and get within range. And ultimately I shot the buck at 33 yards in the milo field and that was that on the buck. He scored a 196. He had a broken tine in the back that problem would've put him over 200.

Bruce: Amazing, amazing deer. Now had you seen this deer previously on that property? Had you scouted it? Tell us what led you to hunt that property.

Mike: To be honest with you, we hunted probably a bigger buck that morning in a cornfield over towards Wiley. And this farm is probably about 30 miles east of Wiley. And so after we hunted there and had an opportunity at the buck. But I just didn't have a shot that I felt comfortable with. So we went over there. And to answer your question, I never did see this buck before. I've been over in this area a few times and I've never seen this buck. But we just went over there and spotted him out and put the stock on him.

Bruce: How old a buck do you think he is, Mike?

Mike: It's hard to say. I'm not an expert on aging deer. But I would say probably five or six years old, somewhere in there.

Bruce: Yeah, what do you think he weighed?

Mike: That's kind of weird, because as big as his back was, his body wasn't very big at all. Gage and I threw him in the back of my truck pretty easily, just the two of us. And I would say probably maybe 350 pounds, somewhere in there.

Bruce: Yeah, because from your photo that I'm looking at, it's difficult to see. But it's just an amazing, amazing deer. Now how many deer have you taken along the Arkansas?

Mike: That would've been my second one. I was with Gage, it's probably been three years prior, and I killed a 182 out there, a muley. So this is definitely my biggest one that I've killed.

Bruce: Now in your travels up and down that river card, or river valley, do you see big whitetails just driving down a road on fields or are they pretty hard to see with all the cottonwoods and everything in the river?

Mike: It's a funny story, Bruce. I actually had a chance and I had my heart set on a muley. That's ultimately what I wanted and that's why I drew the tag. But I had a chance. I had a 170 whitetail. Had 35 yards that I could've shot and I passed on him because I had wanted a muley. But to answer your question, yeah, there's definitely a lot of whitetails out there as well.

Bruce: How hard is it to get landowner permission to get down into the cover d...