A New King in Ontario: The Buck That Could Rewrite Ontario’s Big Game Records!

In November 2021, a hunter from Ontario named Dearl Hill killed a typical whitetail deer that is expected to become the new No. 1 typical whitetail ever taken by a hunter in the province. The record has not yet been confirmed by the Foundation for the Recognition of Ontario’s Wildlife (FROW), according to Ontario Out of Doors. The group, which maintains the Big Game Records of Ontario book, will have the antlers panel-scored before it can become official. However, the panel-scoring is considered to be little more than a formality at this point. Hill’s buck is already listed in the Boone & Crockett book as the top hunter-killed typical whitetail ever taken in Ontario, with a final score of 190 4/8 inches. This score is only surpassed by a 194 2/8-inch whitetail that was picked up by an official with the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources in 2009.

According to the B&C’s score chart, Hill’s buck has a total of 14 points and a gross score of 204 4/8 inches. Not much is known about Hill’s hunt for the monster whitetail, and he did not respond to immediate requests for comment. However, photos on Hill’s Facebook profile show him with the buck in a bean field on Nov. 7, 2021. Hill, who resides in Sarnia, mentioned in a comment that he killed the deer near Brigden, which is located approximately 10 miles east of the U.S. border and the town of St. Clair, Michigan. One of Hill’s friends wrote in a follow-up comment that “He was the king of the Oil Springs area,” and “You took his crown!”

Ontario Out of Doors reports that Hill kept the buck’s head in a freezer for six months until it could be checked out by a Boone & Crockett scorer sometime in April 2022. According to the publication, the scorer recorded a total of 194 3/8 inches of antler. This doesn’t match with the Club’s score sheet, which shows a final score of 190 4/8 inches. However, even this lower number will be enough to surpass the current No. 1 whitetail in FROW’s big game records book’s Typical Firearms category: a 190 1/8-inch whitetail taken in 2009 by hunter Harry Brown. An unnamed scorer told OOD in reference to Hill’s buck that “I did not know he would be number one,” but “I did know he was the biggest typical I have ever seen.”