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55 °F Forecast | Road Cams Thursday, December 9, 2004 Today's News | Classifieds | Autos | Homes | Jobs | Tempo | Health | Community | Home Delivery SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion - Politics Tempo AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map SPECIAL SECTIONS Since We Asked Outdoor Journal Menu Guide How To Guide Wellness Connection Readers' Choice Real Estate Showcase Joy Magazine Homelife Magazine Wedding Guide Passport to the Rogue Valley EXTRA Newspaper in Education Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People MARKETPLACE Find a Car Find a Home Find a Job Classifieds Place an ad eSouthernOregon Automotive Communities Entertainment Publications Recreation Calendar CUSTOMER SERVICE Frequent Questions Advertising Information Home Delivery Employment Contact Us Media Kit Network Affiliate Oregon Road Conditions & Cams Email Story to a Friend November 4, 2004 Grandpa there for grandson’s first buck By MARK FREEMAN Mail Tribune Two boys ages 15 and 10 follow their woods-hardened grandfather down a forest trail high on a ridge, then slip into a small clearing to discover one of Oregon’s grandest of creatures. There, 70 yards away, is a large black-tailed deer buck, sunning itself at the base of a fir tree. The grandfather points to the buck and whispers to his eldest grandson. "There’s your deer," the grandfather says. The 15-year-old boy, with rosy cheeks under his blaze-orange hat, has followed his grandfather into the woods regularly since he was 3. But this season is his first carrying a gun. The greenhorn steadies himself against a tree. He fires his first shot as a hunter on just his third day of hunting. He won’t need to hunt a fourth day this season. Advertisement "It’s been a long time since I’ve seen anything as big as that," the grandfather says. "He’s lucky to get him." Normal Rockwell couldn’t concoct a better moment of a hunting family passing their passion to their next generation than what Larry Rich experienced Oct. 10 with grandsons Kyle and Chris Young. Kyle, 15 of Medford, and Rich, 63, of Sams Valley, were the young hunter and sagely grandfather. The buck with four-point non-typical antlers big enough to rank among the top 25 ever killed in Oregon had Kyle’s tag on it. Chris, 10, was there for it all. And you know darn well their grandma, Suzanne Rich, was waiting in the family truck at the end of the trail. Their experiences on a ridge north of Shady Cove were cemented in history as the day Grandpa Rich help young Kyle bag the family’s biggest buck. "I think my grandpa was more excited than me," says Young, a sophomore at South Medford High School. "He was jumping up and down with a big smile on his face. "It was great he was with me when I shot my very first buck," Young says. "That makes it special." Kyle and Rich have had a special bond since birth. Kyle received more than the traditional spoils brought to the first grandson. Rich has given more than his attention to Kyle. He’s given his time. Catfish fishing trips to the Snake River. Salmon trips to the Oregon coast. Deer hunts way before kindergarten. Suzanne Rich would accompany them in the family Blazer, usually waiting at the trailhead. The pair would walk and absorb what the woods tell people who pay attention. "I enjoy the woods and I want my grandsons to enjoy the woods," Rich says. "I want to show them the outdoors, what’s all out there. "Kyle’s always wanted to go with me," he says. "So he goes." Along the line, Kyle’s parents divorced and he now splits time between his mother’s Eagle Point house and his dad’s house in Medford. Then Kyle earned his hunter education certificate last summer, setting up October for his first general-season as a buck hunter. Their first foray into the forest on opening weekend came and went in typical greenhorn fashion. "We walked for six hours through different parts of the forest and didn’t see anything other than a few does here or there," Kyle says. So the pair tried again the following Sunday, but changed tactics. The two boys and their grandparents went high into the Elk Creek drainage toward a ridge that Rich, a former houndsman, has hunted many times before. With their grandmother waiting in the truck, Kyle and Chris joined Rich on a hunt along an old logging skid road high atop the ridge. They trekked through thick brush, then a clearing and a stand of fir before double-backing into the clearing. That’s when Rich spotted the buck on a knoll. "My grandpa pointed it out to me and said, ‘there’s your deer,’" Kyle says. Kyle propped himself against the tree and shouldered his rifle. "I looked at it for a minute, then took the safety off," he says. "All I heard was, boom." Struck right behind the shoulder, the buck tumbled 50 yards down the steep ridge. Rich traversed the rocks and logs to reach the deer. Kyle scrambled down later. The buck’s body was thick. Its four-point antlers also sported rare double eye-guards. "I looked at it and asked my grandpa, ‘Isn’t that a little bigger than the other deer we’ve seen?’" Kyle says. It sure felt that way. The two struggled to haul it up the ridge. "It took us half an hour to go five yards up the hill," Kyle says. Rich, a butcher, cut the deer in half and hauled the bottom half out while the boys sat on a log. They strung a rope through the top half, then Rich and Kyle struggled together to get the buck up the hill. "He did pretty good for his first time," Rich says. "I told him, ‘it’s going to be a long time before you find anything like this again.’" Word of Kyle’s deer spread. Family members migrated to Rich’s house for a glimpse of the family record. "When we were home, I asked him, ‘Now do you realize what you’ve done?’" Rich says. "He grinned. It started to sink in. That was pretty good." But they didn’t know how good until they brought the head to Jacksonville taxidermist Dennis King, also a Safari Club International antler scorer. King gave the antlers a green score of 153½ inches, which likely qualifies in the top 25 for non-typical Columbian black-tails in the Oregon Book of Big Game Records. "I didn’t know he was that big when we first saw him," Rich says. Even if he did, Rich still would have passed the buck to Kyle. "That’s what I was out there for — for him to shoot his deer," Rich says. Reach reporter Mark Freeman at 776-4470, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life Opinion - Politics | AP News | Archives | Site Map E Southern Oregon | Classified Copyright © 1997-2004 Mail Tribune. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy | Terms & Conditions Website Feedback ADVERTISERS A D V E R T I S E R S SPECIAL SECTIONS Auto Finder Job Finder Home Finder Joy Magazine Homelife Magazine Tempo Readers' Choice Real Estate Showcase Since We Asked Outdoor Journal Moving to Southern Oregon? Volunteer Opportunities