When George Taulman called me this past summer to inform me that I had drawn a muzzleloader tag for Kansas I was pumped. Immediately visions of a big antlered whitetail coming by my treestand as I sat overlooking a funnel area on a wooded river bottom filled my thoughts.

However after talking with George for a couple of minutes I was informed that the country was wide open and that we were probably not going to be hunting out of tree stands. Even more surprising was that he said that we were going to hunt mule deer. “This county is full of deer both whitetail and mule deer, but I think we can get a really big mulie on the ground if we work hard.” George stated.

I will have to admit that at first the thought of going after mule deer instead of whitetail puzzled me, but as it would turn out it that decision put the largest horns on the wall that the Waddell household has ever held.

Brent Weinland, a local farmer who grew up hunting and farming the Unit 2 country was to be my guide. Brent now works for United States Outfitters and his experience in this area, and hard working attitude has sent many of USO clients home with bucks that they had been dreaming about all of their lives. Chad Sanders was going to capture the whole Kansas experience with the Realtree camera.

The Kansas hunting camp was full of hard core hunters from all across the country who were all also lucky enough to draw a Kansas deer tag through USO’s licensing service. I knew from the start that this hunt was going to be a good one.

Brent informed me that the area that we would be hunting was wide open, with not a tree in sight. It was flat country that rolled off into to small rocky ravines or coulees. The hunt was to be spot and stalk. We would get up on the highest points of each ridge glass the area and then move on to each nook and cranny of the property until hopefully we found the right buck.

Brent said that earlier in bow season that he had seen a huge mulie that he felt for certain would go 200 B&C or better. This was the buck that we would try to find. We had seven days to do it and we were ready for action. Brent did say that he felt our most important day to find a kill the buck would be the first time out. The opening day of rifle season for residents and non-residents made him fair game.

Our optimism was high as daylight approached on our first morning out. Sitting on a small knoll we found ourselves searching every square inch of the ground that lay ahead of us. The pre-dawn light played tricks on us at times and made every rock look like a monster mulie, but after about 10 minutes or so we decided to move on to the next canyon. We had only seed a couple of does.

We did this for around thirty minutes and then we found what we had been hoping to find—a monster mule deer buck with about 15 does.

My heart skipped a couple of beats on the sight of the brute. Sanders slowly but quickly got the camera set up to start rolling tape. A doe that was with him noticed us and became cautious at around four hundred yards. After getting some good footage of the herd of mule deer the spooky doe retreated taking with her the others. Slowly, all of the deer disappeared out of sight into the next cut.

The hunt was on and we quickly came up with a game plan that we thought was full proof, but we soon found out that is was not. Time after time we tried but could not get the huge mulie in range. When we got the monster in range we could not get him on tape. Frustration set in.

Finally after seven hours of playing cat and mouse, we figured out the right combination. By cutting off the herd as they traveled threw a canyon it allowed us not only to get some fantastic footage but it also got the huge buck within 140 yards of my Thompsom Center encore muzzleloader. When I squeezed the trigger I knew right away that it was a solid hit by the reaction of the buck. He traveled only about 70 yards before going down.

Later we scored the buck out at 199 3/8 B&C gross points. He was a brute! It was my first mule deeer and I was simply overwhelmed.

Kansas proves every year that it is paradise for the outdoorsman. Not only does some of the biggest whitetails in the county come from there but the mule deer herd has been a sleeper for years. I have had two experiences with mule deer in Kansas. My first was when I vidoed Jeff Foxworthy kill a 193 class buck on Monster Bucks 7. The other was the hunt that I just described. One thing is for sure—I hope to one day hunt big mule deer there again.