Bowhunting ShowTime A 194 48” Iowa GIANT! A 20 Pt Buck

Welcome back to another episode of Beaumar Bowhunting. On today's episode we are chasing a buck we call Showtime. Many of you may remember this buck from our episode The Hunt for Flame, that giant 213 inch monster I hunted in 2022. Let's roll that origin story and some of that footage from the hunt where we encounter Showtime. I could tell this buck was extremely high scoring already, but even if he was five I truly believe he needed one more year and it would be Showtime for him. When I said that out loud I chuckled, well that's what I'm going to call him, Showtime. And Showtime is getting a pass this year. Obviously this was a very difficult deer to pass but I knew with one more year this buck could blow into a mega giant. So time and time and time again I passed Showtime. He's got a chance to go 200. Let's see if he can do it. I know what you're all thinking, Josh you're an idiot I can't believe you passed that deer. Well right now as I look at him run over the hill I unfortunately agree with you because that is just insane. But I never thought in a million years I would do what I did on November 28th. Let's dive into that moment. After hunting insanely hard all year for Flame I would finally get my chance on November 28th. Are you kidding me? That's Flame. When I went full on Flame to take my shot at 55 yards Showtime was standing right in front of him. In fact my cameraman made a mistake and he thought I was shooting Showtime. So when I took my shot I literally shot over top of Showtime hitting Flame and dropping him in his tracks. I don't know how many people have ever done this but it was a first for me. We stopped hunting that farm for the rest of the season in hopes to give Sanctuary to Showtime. But he was a long ways off from being safe. We are surrounded by hard hunting neighbors and guys that drive deer during that season. But I had to stick to my philosophy and always bet on the deer. One rule that I live by in the woods is you always bet on the deer. So we kept a close eye on the cameras anxiously hoping for pictures of Showtime to confirm he didn't get killed. But the last picture I got of him was on December 22nd and then one of the worst arctic storms ever hit Iowa. Temperatures are plunging far and fast as the storm forms ahead of a Christmas weekend and that wind chill advisories will affect about... Dropping temperatures to a staggering 40 below zero with wind chill I grabbed a spud bar and broke through 10 inch thick ice to create open water for the deer to drink. Yes it refroze within minutes but the ice was thin enough for the deer to break through and get a drink. But the arctic storm moved through and there was still no sign of Showtime. So when shed season came I searched my farm over for his sheds. I wanted to find out if he was alive or dead and on March 8th I would get my answer. I'm walking across this ridge and look at that magnum freaking monster. Oh holy smokes! Oh my gosh! Look at this beast! This is the beast we passed early this year. This buck is going to be a giant. Finding his sheds put the wind back in my sails as I worked through the spring and summer prepping the farm for season to come. Just got that done. That's a lot but man it looks good. I couldn't wait to get cameras out and see what Showtime turned into. And finally on July 14th I got my first trail cam video of him. With it being so early you could already see he was going to be a giant. He had points starting everywhere including a drop time. And when he finally finished growing in August he finished into an absolute beast. He had incredible mass and too many points to count. All the farm work was done. All the food plots were prepped, planted, and were growing. I couldn't wait for season to get started. Finally October was here and season kicked off. But the first cold front wasn't until October 7th. So I waited and decided October 7th was going to be my first sit of the season. Oh boys! First sit in Iowa. We're after deer I call Showtime. Let's roll some of that trail cam footage. So you guys can probably see why I'm so excited right now to be sitting where there is a deer that is as big as Showtime. At this moment he's my only shooter so it's him or nothing right now. Okay so strategically with cold fronts typical rule big cold front you want to hunt grain. They're going to the grain plots. Today I'm not doing that. I'm hunting over a green plot because it's been historically dry and I'm thinking moisture wise the food plot I'm hunting over is really really dense in moisture. So I'm thinking he's going to come here get a drink and eat at the same time. There's no water source here but it's so rich with water he's going to get the water he needs daily just from this this food source and then I think he'll go to the grain. So that's kind of my plan. It's a gut feeling. It's probably stupid. I should be hunting the grain but here I am. I mean the barometric pressure has went through the roof. Massive cold front come in. It's been super windy all day right before dark at six o'clock. The wind dies down. I mean everything you hope for. We got deer moving right in front of us here. That's awesome. God I don't know why you guys follow me. I'm just big ignorant buffoon but here we go. There's a lot of deer starting to move. Oh there's a buck. It's forks. It's freaking awesome. Oh boy that's a freaking slammer. Dude he is gonna be such a big deer. Oh shoot dude look at him. Awesome. I think he's four. So him at five might be something really good. Oh man what a beauty. He's got big brows too. Oh there's more deer. Check out this food plot. Big old buck in there. Look at this up and comer. Oh there's another deer. Well it's 6 40 and it is prime time boys. First big cold front of 2023. And I am getting nervous. I'm already nervous. It just it feels right. You know it feels like you know everything is perfect. It's just the only thing we got standing in our way is obviously deer that's not consistent at all. You know there's he's not like he shows up to this plot every day. But man the acorns are stacked against us. We got some things stacked against us right now. But it's 6 40 and I'm in Iowa hunting a farm where there is a 200 inch deer living. Like how exciting is that? But we've seen two nice bucks. It's been uh it's been a good sit so far. We haven't seen a ton of deer. Maybe like six or seven. But um the ones we've seen we've seen two nice bucks. You know three and four year olds. So uh it's pretty awesome. Let's see if uh before dark old showtime doesn't show up. There's a big buck. Yeah. Oh it's not him but it's a big deer. He's got a little kicker starting and everything. What a beauty. Good lord he's nice. Look at the frame on him. In like this. I think that's about 40 yards. He's like on a mission. These other bucks have been over here fighting a little bit. Oh. Oh that tickling might help. You know I just don't know if he's rattling in for us. Right? Since it's 6 49 so it's we still got 20 minutes. Get in there big boy. We got another buck. This is a different deer. Let's see what we got here. Oh my god it's him. It's showtime dude. Oh my god he's a monster in person. All right. It's game time baby. That looks black like the video. It's not usable. It's not that dark. I mean we've got 20 minutes before dark. There's no adjustment that you can do. So do 8k 120. Yeah. Run crank the iso. Have you even touched the iso? I will throw that camera in the dumpster. Another big deer that just moved in. It's the big management eight. He's distracted. Screw on that other lens. It's a 2.8. Do you think that that would be better? Can you do it quietly? Head up. We're gonna be in good shape here. He's right here. Same spot. A little bit closer. This is my chance right here. Okay there we go. I expect him to drop a little but he did not drop at all. It zipped through him so fast. Play back the footage and see if I was high enough in this cavity. Oh that's better than I think. The shot wasn't terrible but I definitely was going to need help from the beast product. With the shot being marginal I decided to wait till morning before attempting to track him. So I'm calling in reinforcements and we're gonna get a well-trained tracking dog and hope that they can help me find my buck. Well we got tracker John here with us. He's brought his good trusty dogs and I needed the help so I appreciate you coming in. You're welcome. We're best guy on the planet for tracking deer. That's a lot of pressure. I don't know if there's many other people that's tracked as many as you so it's going to be a team effort to get the recovery now and let's see if we can do it. All right let's go. Okay so I shot him just over here and I marked this spot here. This is kind of the arrow but you guys can see I mean the blades are still really sharp. All right let's see if this still works. Oh yeah well still works after going through deer and going into the dirt. Oh well here's blood. All right guys so right here look at this there's some more right here. Oh wow look at this it's really coming out. That's a lot of blood. Wait wait what'd you say? You found the deer? Are you kidding me? He didn't make it freaking 100 yards. Dude holy cow guys freaking awesome. Look at that boys. I can't believe this. Wow thank you dude so much. I'm calling Sarah. Honey we found him. So super pumped but anyway I gotta roll. Good luck tonight. Punching my Iowa tag. Oh my gosh yes. Oh my gosh. Oh well Tracker John pulled through. It was a very short track job. It was unbelievable. He actually only went less than 100 yards but you know the shot you know in the video you guys saw it too. It looked okay but it didn't look great. Ended up coming out his armpit on the other side so he was quartering away and we got everything and my god what a beast. Giant brows. He's got stickers everywhere. Let's count his points real quick. We got 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, maybe 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20. What a giant but Tracker John why don't you come on in with the the pooch. Yeah look at that. A good testament to the broadhead you know it wasn't a perfect shot but man it killed him fast and at the end of the day I love what you always say it's not what you hit what you cut. Well let's get him up in the food plot and get some good photos. Well we got him out in the food plot that I shot him in and I thought I made a bad shot but you guys can kind of see the shot was actually pretty good and it came out his armpit. He went less than 150 yards but he dive bombed off of a a big huge embankment and we just didn't see him down there. The history of this deer is so cool. So I found this shed last year and this was his rack that I passed him on and you can see we shot him this year at six years old and he is just an absolute tank. He grew a drop tine this year and everything and this is what's so cool about these bucks. I'm in awe right now you know the amount of work that goes into you know being able to harvest these kind of deer year in and year out. It's a lot of effort and I'm so grateful to be able to sit behind this deer and be able to do this and punch my tag here in Iowa and do it with a bow and you know it's one of those things that never gets old.