TSJ Series: Show-Me Big Bucks

Jim Miller, host of "Great Southwest Outdoors" TV show, is shown here with a 10-point, 157" archery buck he took at Oak Creek Whitetail Ranch the last week of October 2009.

When I first heard about a place in Missouri where serious Texas trophy hunters go to find their buck of a lifetime, I was skeptical and had to see it to believe it. Show me!

Donald Hill showed me alright and I am a believer.

Hill’s Oak Creek Whitetail Ranch in central Missouri was once a family hunting property, producing quality domestic whitetail deer. In 1992, Oak Creek was fenced and the domestic whitetail deer were herded off. Like a lot of Texas properties, Oak Creek Whitetail Ranch is an intensely managed property, 1,800 acres of prime wildlife habitat managed for superior genetics and superb forage. Unlike a lot of Texas ranchers who attempted to integrate northern whitetails into brush country only to see them wilt under our hot summer sun, Oak Creek has been successful at importing some of the best genetics in the country, including large-bodied, heavy-antlered Canadian whitetail deer during the last 18 years, and they are thriving.

Each year for the past four years, Oak Creek hunters have taken some of the largest typical and non-typical deer in the world. In fact, during the 2009 season, Oak Creek hunters took 22 whitetail bucks, that when all are certified, all will rank in the top 25 SCI whitetails of all time...seven of which should make the top 10 typical list. Given its second-to-none habitat and trophy management program Oak Creek takes 20 to 30 big-framed, big-bodied whitetails with inside spreads of 25-30 inches in the 200-plus class every year.