Chuck Hamstra holds a massive shed from the trophy 21-point non-typical whitetail he arrowed last season on his northwest Illinois farm. Taxidermy by Shawn Petersen. Photo by Bill Cooper.

Situated in northwestern Illinois, a stone's throw from Albany and the Mississippi River, Chuck Hamstra's farm encompasses the same rolling terrain where his grandparents settled during the early 1930s. Over the years, in addition to maintaining the family's farming lifestyle and strong work ethic, Chuck also developed a passion for hunting, especially deer hunting.

"Neither my father or grandfather were hunters, so I'm not sure what happened with me," Chuck laughed. "I must have picked up an extra gene or two from somewhere. But whatever the reason, I seem to have passed the interest on to my children and grandchildren."

The Hamstra farming landscape includes numerous agricultural fields of various sizes, interspersed with small acreage wood lots, brushy ravines, CRP lands and winding tree-lined creek drainages. In regard to whitetails, the habitat simply couldn't be much better.

The farm's home site, which is centrally located along a high ridgeline, originally included a stone farmhouse that was built in 1856. Chuck's parents and grandparents had used the old house, but unfortunately, it was completely destroyed in 1996 by a tornado. The monster storm also eliminated several nearby buildings and barns, plus two large silos. A new house and farm buildings have since been rebuilt on the same site.

With agricultural fields nearly surrounding the ridgetop location, it is fairly common for Chuck or his wife, Judy, to spot deer from the house or barn. For the most part, these are incidental sightings made at various times throughout the year, but occasionally, a buck is sighted that warrants special attention.

During the fall of 2006, Chuck was working on equipment near the barn, when he happened to see a large buck crossing one of the open fields. Gun season was open and he assumed hunters on one of the adjoining properties had probably jumped the deer.

"The buck was well over 200 yards away," Chuck said. "But even at that distance, and without the aid of binoculars, the deer's rack was obviously very large. I continued to watch the buck until it eventually disappeared into a brushy drainage ravine between two of our fields. After several minutes elapsed without the deer reappearing, I was pretty confidant that it had bedded down in the thick cover."

After contacting his sons, David and Kevin, Chuck quickly related what he had seen and where he thought the buck was located. Grabbing their shotguns, the two hunters walked to the lower end of the ravine, split up, one man on each side of the thick brushy cover, and slowly began to advance toward the spot where their dad had last seen the deer.

"The buck came busting out on my youngest son Kevin's side and he missed the deer completely," Chuck said. "Later, he told me that he'd gotten close enough to get a pretty decent look at the buck's heavy rack, which appeared to include at least two drop tines.

"From my high vantage point, I had continued to watch the buck cross two additional fields, before eventually entering a distant block of woods on a bordering farm. Earlier that day, I had seen other hunters at the same location and naturally assumed it would be only a matter of time until the shooting started. But surprisingly, not a shot was fired! I have always been amazed at how an animal the size of a mature whitetail can somehow go undetected in relatively sparse cover, especially a fairly open wood lot."