During the late bow season in 2006, Jason Fizer found a chewed and weathered antler that led him on a hunt across the Ohio River hills in search of an elusive split-tine buck. He finally bagged it, less than 100 yards from where the big shed was found!

Jason Fizer's incredible crossbow buck features a split tine on the right beam and a total non-typical score of 191 2/8. Photo by Tom Cross

Adams County has a reputation for producing big bucks. It only makes sense that one of the state's top whitetails would come from this rural southwestern county along the Ohio River. As it turned out, the largest buck harvested in 2007 in Adams County turned out to be the big 14-point non-typical that Fizer finally ran into on Nov. 9 of that year.

When he bagged his Adams County monster, Fizer had been hunting for only a few years. He credits the persistence of a close friend for his start in deer hunting.

"My buddy, Jesse Fisher, talked me into going hunting with him on Thanksgiving Day in 2006," Fizer said. "He had an extra crossbow I could use. That first time out, I ended up shooting at a doe and missed. But that pretty much had me hooked."

The next year, instead of borrowing his buddy's bow, Fizer purchased a used Horton crossbow and practiced with it every day during the summer.

"Late in the 2006 bow season," Fizer recalled, "while I was walking out of the woods one evening, I found a big shed antler with an unusual split tine. Whether that shed was from that year or the previous year, I don't know. I thought about that shed all summer and started hunting back there early the next archery season. But I never saw that buck -- or much of anything -- for a month."

Jason Fizer heard plenty of reports that a tall, split-tined whitetail had been seen roaming in the vicinity.

One early morning in late October, Fizer's father was driving to work at a power plant near Aberdeen when he saw a monster buck cross the road in front of his truck, near the place when his son had been hunting. He told his son Jason about the big deer.

Early one morning a few days later, Fizer's mother was driving to work and also saw the whitetail buck cross the road in that same area. (Continued)

In addition, Jason's split-tine buck was starting to receive some unwanted local attention.

"Four or five people in Manchester saw the big whitetail cross the highway," he said. "And a few local deer hunters were also looking for that tall-racked buck."

Even the owner of the property where Fizer was hunting observed the big whitetail in his backyard a week before Jason tagged it. "He watched it long enough to count seven points on one side," Fizer recalled.

A CHANGE OF PLANS
He hunted all through October, but became frustrated at not finding any sign of the buck. Toward the end of the month, he began looking around for another location.

"Somebody told me they'd spotted some nice bucks on the next ridge," Fizer said. "But I also endured some beginner's bad luck. A couple of times, I couldn't locate my tree stand in the dark and had to wait until daylight to find it. I'm sure that messed me up."