Andy Bean Sr. of Rumford with Hank, a 206.8-pound, eight-point buck he shot on Nov. 14. Submitted photo
RUMFORD — For Darcy Klein-Bean and her husband, Andy Bean Sr., Nov. 23 marked no ordinary Thanksgiving feast.
That’s because the main course was venison from a 206.8-pound (dressed weight), eight-point buck he shot Nov. 14.
“I’ve hunted a lot,” the 61-year-old said. “As I’ve gotten older, I’ve gotten more serious about it, a little more dedicated to it. And we love venison.”
He had added incentive this year.
“I asked my wife a couple weeks ago, ‘What are we going to do for Thanksgiving?’” he said.
“‘We’re having venison,'” he said she told him. “I said, ‘OK.’ No pressure there, right?”
Bean set off for a hunt on a “very well-established trail” about half- to three-quarters of a mile behind his Rumford Corner home. After hunting from a ladder stand for three to four hours, he got down and followed the trail below it.
Around 1:15 p.m. he used a grunt call twice and about a minute later the buck showed up.
“I saw him and had to wait for his head to get out from behind a couple of trees,” Bean said. “And then right after those trees was an opening. I had my scope on that opening with the crosshairs right about where I thought the front shoulder would emerge. He did and I shot once, and that was the fatal shot.”
Bean said, “Normally, when you shoot a buck, you’re better off after you hit it, if you’re certain you hit it, to sit and wait a few minutes before you actually get up and move. He didn’t know I was there, but when I got up, he realized I was there and he took off. Had I sat tight for a few minutes, I might not have had the issue that I did.”
Bean located the blood trail that was like a half circle until it stopped.
He phoned his nephew, Cory White, and his friend, Parker Salatino, who were hunting on a nearby mountain, for help. They quickly made their way to Bean and continued the search for the blood trail, picked it up and found the deer 45 minutes later not too far from where it was shot, Bean said.
“The amazing thing to me is that the shot got him through his lungs and he still went a hundred yards. I just don’t understand how an animal could do that,” Bean said.
He has submitted documentation for membership in the Biggest Bucks in Maine Club through The Maine Sportsman magazine. Along with receiving his patch, he’ll also be published in an upcoming edition of the magazine.
As far as naming the buck, Bean said, “I watch a lot of hunting shows and a lot of times these hunters will name a buck that they’re pursuing. And when they put the shoulder mount up, they’ll have the name under it. I don’t know why I came up with the name Hank. He was big and it seemed to fit.”
Thanksgiving was “absolutely fantastic,” he said. “Darcy took the neck roast and put it in a crock pot and put the vegetables in with it and slow cooked it three days before Thanksgiving. Then she heated it up again for Thanksgiving, and when we had it, it was just absolutely delicious.”
“This is probably going to be the biggest deer I’ll ever shoot,” he said.
Vance Child of Falls Taxidermy Studio in Dixfield will do the shoulder mount, which will be a fixture in the Bean’s living room “so we can gaze at Big Hank anytime we want to,” he said.
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