Twelve-year-old Blake Holbrook sat in the tree, motionless and silent, watching as the eight-point buck stood below. Blake's heart pounded, and he grew hotter as the adrenaline rushed through him.
Boy lets buck go but keeps his integrity
It was the buck of a lifetime.
The buck, however, got to walk away because time and Blake's honesty stood in the way. Refusing to veer from the letter of the law, the first-time deer hunter from St. Cloud figured it was five minutes before the legal shooting time.
"Five minutes on one side or another, a conservation officer might not have a problem with that," said Mark Johnson, executive director of the Minnesota Deer Hunters Association.
"The interesting thing to me ... is that he had the presence of mind and that awe of nature," he said. "He took the opportunity to drink in everything that was going on ... and never once considered pulling the trigger."
The state Department of Natural Resources has chosen Blake as one of two winners of this year's Deer Hunter Ethics Award. The other is Greg Waite of Circle Pines. He helped create the Becklin Homestead Park Wildlife Management Area near Cambridge, which is dedicated for use by hunters with physical disabilities.
In early November, Blake and his father went to their separate deer stands about an hour before sunrise. Blake remembers the first glimmer of morning light. Birds chattered, leaves rustled. And then the buck appeared 15 yards away. An easy shot.
He thought briefly about shooting but knew he would feel guilty. "I just kept hoping he would stay there so I could get a shot," Blake said.
But that didn't happen. With the buck gone, he flipped open his cell phone to call his dad and rushed to tell him what happened. Tim Holbrook wanted to know: "Did you shoot?"
"No, Dad," Holbrook remembers Blake saying. "It was five minutes too early."
"He was just in awe about that deer," the father remembered. "I'm thinking, 'Man, I'm glad I didn't have to make that decision.'"
Mary Lynn Smith • 612-673-4788
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