With a doable new Ontario report whitetail, it looks like a great time to revisit the story of Hugh Reehill’s deer — which was shot in 1958, however not acknowledged as a report till 1996.
The Lindsay resident was searching within the Parry Sound space with members of the Peterborough-Lakefield Hunt Membership as a part of an meeting of family members and buddies that included Elmer Flynn, who would turn into his greatest pal. Members needed to apply to affix, and if accepted, solely obtained a spot when an current member dropped out. It took 4 consecutive hunts to realize full membership.
Peterborough-Lakefield Hunt Membership
Reehill’s first yr was 1958. Not figuring out the lay of the land, he requested camp captain Wallace Thurston to decide on a look ahead to him. After a 20-minute stroll, he settled right into a swail in a clearing with a small ridge to the north, basic Canadian bush to the east and south, and within the west, a thicket of four-foot spruce timber.
They have been searching with canine and Reehill quickly heard barking steadily rising in quantity to the purpose the place he obtained himself able to shoot.
The canine stored transferring previous his watch, nevertheless, and their excited barks started to fade.
Disenchanted, he relaxed till he heard a twig snap from the spruce thicket. Glancing up, he may see — simply above the tree tops — a set of antlers transferring his means.
Because the animal superior, the unfold of the rack indicated it was a moose, not a deer. Let down once more, and with nobody in camp holding a moose licence, Reehill sat again to observe the moose come via, but it surely by no means did seem. As a substitute, a powerful whitetail buck trotted into the swail and was downed with one shot.
Again at camp, the remainder of the searching celebration weren’t that impressed with the deer. They identified that Reehill had truly shot a bigger deer the day earlier than. In actual fact, nobody had any second ideas about together with it within the conventional “draw for deer” the place everybody took dwelling an animal, although not essentially the one they shot.
Fortuitously, Reehill drew his personal quantity, and if he hadn’t, what would turn into an Ontario report may need gone unrecognized.
Dad’s trophy mount
Quick ahead to 1993. Nick Flynn, the 35-year-old son of Elmer Flynn, has grown up seeing, and listening to the story of, his dad’s pal’s trophy. He makes certainly one of his common visits to Reehill’s dwelling to speak about searching and the night wraps up with Reehill telling him — as he often did — that he desires him to have the mount. Extra exactly, he informed him to “get it the hell out of right here” since “you by no means know what may occur to it.”
Flynn sensed an urgency in his voice this time, and took the deer head, studying later Reehill had been identified with congestive coronary heart failure.
The mount was put in at Flynn’s home close to Buckhorn to start impressing any hunter who noticed it. Now, nevertheless, nobody was referring to the actually large deer shot the day earlier than. The enthusiastic, unbiased responses of individuals seeing it for the primary time affirmed the opinion he held for it since he was a teen…this was an enormous deer.
Precisely how large can be confirmed three years later at a Basis for the Recognition of Ontario’s Wildlife (FROW) Massive Buck Night time. It eclipsed the earlier report by 10 inches, largely on the power of its outstanding symmetry. No deductions have been made for variations in major beam size. Each measured 27 6⁄8 inches in size, and it totalled 1882 ⁄ 8 inches.
Mount survives shut calls
Extremely, the mount survived two shut calls.
Reehill had the deer on show in a Lindsay-area fishing lodge that was damaged into. Thieves made off with a dozen or so bass and muskie mounts however didn’t hassle with the deer.
After that occasion, Reehill thought of preserving it on the distant camp. Fortuitously, he didn’t as a result of in 1970, the Ontario authorities purchased a number of camps close to Reehill’s and burned them to facilitate development of a brand new freeway. Though the Peterborough-Lakefield membership was not bought, it was mistakenly razed by staff.
Initially revealed within the Jan.-Feb. 2024 challenge of Ontario OUT of DOORS
