World record sitka blacktail

A Son's Promise and a World Record Sitka Blacktail











December 2020



Story by
Allen Bolen


State:
Alaska


Species:
Deer - Sitka Blacktail




Early in my bowhunting journey, I read a lot about hunting Alaska Sitka blacktail deer. Bowhunters like Chuck Adams and Jack Frost seemed obsessed with these little island deer and wrote amazing stories about their DIY adventures in Alaska. Their stories sparked my need for adventure. When I decided it was finally time to work on harvesting a blacktail, I knew I wanted to have an adventure like Chuck and Jack and go self-guided into remote Alaska. I also wanted to arrow a really big one like they had both done. The ultimate goal, I concluded, would be a Pope & Young Booner. This is what I call animals that qualify for both all-time record books.

My schedule cleared up in 2018, and my 16-year-old son, Jake, and I planned a two-week backpacking adventure to bowhunt blacktails in the early season alpine. We were dropped by a floatplane by a remote lake on July 30th. As luck would have it on opening day, Jake arrowed a gorgeous 5x5 non-typical. It was his first animal to qualify for the Pope and Young record book.



Kodiak Island is a hunter’s paradise, attracting beginners to veterans seeking a trophy animal. Count legendary bowhunter Chuck Adams as one who makes frequent visits to the Emerald Isle. 



His latest voyage to The Rock was one for the record books. The Wyoming-based hunter recently picked up his sixth bowhunting world record, bagging his prize on Aug. 12 on Kodiak Island.



The velvet Sitka blacktail deer he harvested scored 109-7/8. The Pope and Young Club verified the deer as the largest bow-killed velvet typical Sitka blacktail deer in North America, surpassing the previous record of 108-1/8⅛, which was harvested in 2020.



Pope and Young is the leading authority of North America bow hunting and conservation organizations. Representatives of Pope and Young confirmed the score in Rock Springs, Wyoming. According to wideopenspaces.com, the deer is one of the most symmetrical Sitka blacktails ever harvested.  



“I have been blessed to hunt Kodiak Island for 17 years. It is one of my favorite hunts to do,” Adams said in a Pope and Young press release. “Amazingly, as luck would have it, this buck was the very first buck I saw on this trip. There was never a doubt tha

CHUCK ADAMS BREAKS TWO WORLD RECORDS


Chuck Adams Taking Over the Sitka Blacktail Velvet Categories


By Dylan Ray - July 21, 2023



July 25
th
, 2023 – The Pope and Young Club, America’s leading bowhunting conservation organization, is excited to announce that Chuck Adams has set two new world records, both in the Sitka Blacktail velvet category. Pope and Young announced thirteen new world records at their 33
rd
 Biennial Convention in April of this year. 

Chuck Adams broke the record with a Typical Sitka Blacktail Velvet 5x5 buck he shot in 2021 scoring an incredible 109 7/8”. The buck was shot on Kodiak Island, Alaska on August 12, 2021, and with the score being verified by a special panel of measurers, it is now recognized as the new world record. 
“Amazingly, the very first deer I saw on my 2021 Alaskan bow hunt was a giant 5x5,” stated Chuck Adams. “I had been hiking for an hour and spotted big antlers above a ridge.  I told myself it might be the largest Sitka rack I had ever seen.  After a long crawl, I shot the buck from 36 yards.  This is the best scoring typical blacktail I have ever taken during 18 trips to Kodiak, and a Pope and Young World Record!”

Chuck also



Well-known bowhunter Chuck Adams shot the “buck of a lifetime” on Kodiak Island this year, which was good for a new Pope and Young Club world record. Adams shot the largest velvet Sitka blacktail deer ever to be taken with a bow, a record which was verified by the bowhunting organization Pope and Young earlier this month.



Adams, who has been bowhunting for decades, said he knew immediately that this deer, which he shot in August, was special. “There was never a doubt that this was a buck of a lifetime,” he said. What was even more incredible is that the first deer he saw on the trip “was this monster.” “It was astounding,” said Adams.



This is the second Sitka blacktail deer record that Adams has broken; the last time was in 1986 during one of his first hunts on Kodiak. This year “I got lucky again and found a giant deer.” Adams snuck up on the deer and shot it from about 36 yards away. According to a Pope and Young press release, Adams’s deer scored 109 7/8” which breaks the previous record of 109 1/8” set in 2020.



According to Adams, over time hunters begin to develop a feel for which animals may break records, which is based on antler size. Deer are scored according