WAYNE COUNTY, W.Va. — An angler fishing in a BassNation bass fishing tournament over the weekend caught more than he bargained for. Steve Jackson of Barboursville, W.Va. was fishing East Lynn Lake trying to qualify for a spot in the tournament trail’s state tournament when he suddenly had an unexpected visitor on board.
“I was up in the back of Lick Creek and he just came off the hill and was looking at me from the bank. I started talking to him like you would a dog,” Jackson told MetroNews.
But it wasn’t a dog, it was a six-point whitetail buck. Once Jackson spoke, the deer became more and more curious and eventually made his way down to the water’s edge where Jackson was fishing.
“I moved my boat over too him and he started letting me pet on him,” he said.
Jackson now knew the deer had been somebody’s pet and had no fear of humans. He chalked the experience up to something interesting and unusual which would make for a good story. But, he was trying to qualify for the state tournament, so he figured he would keep on fishing and hunt deer, literally, another day. He had no idea what was a good story, would soon be an unbelievable story.
The deer kept following him down the bank of the Lick Creek arm. Jackson had fished about 200 yards and stopped to tie on a new bait. As he did, his boat drifted close to the shoreline. He had kept an eye on the buck who kept on walking with him. Evidently the buck had ideas of his own.
“He wanted me to pet on him again, so I obliged and then he started to walk down the edge of my boat and checked it out and all of a sudden, he jumped on board,” said Jackson.
By now Jackson was stunned and not sure what to think. Two other anglers 50 yards away had noticed the encounter and were capturing the incident on video.
“I think he was probably wanting snacks or something and I wasn’t going to give him anything. Then he started butting me with his head and I wasn’t having that. He had those antlers and I didn’t want to get knocked in the water or get my rods broken,” he said.
Jackson trolled his boat a few feet backward to the bank where the deer had jumped on and said it took more than a little gentle nudging to get him to leave the deck.
While certainly an amazing story, it was the opening day of archery hunting season and Jackson knew such a lack of fear was going to probably be the undoing of this buck.
“Somebody will probably kill him if they don’t realize how tame he is. Then some might just kill him anyway, but I wouldn’t do that, that wouldn’t be fair,” he said.
The encounter highlights the reason feeding wildlife and taming them is a dangerous exercise which could result in somebody getting hurt and almost for certain the demise of the animal.
“Especially with the rut coming up, somebody’s going to get hurt. If people go out there and feeding from the launch ramp, that deer is still a wild animal,” Jackson said.