On October 12th, 2014, Joe Franz harvested the largest whitetail buck ever taken on film. Soon after, the monster buck named “Palmer” went viral on Facebook, and landed on all sorts of hunting magazine covers and internet articles. The buck was truly a phenomenal whitetail. The palmation was freakish and ultimately helped draw in an enormous gross non-typical score of 261 inches.
You can read the full story of the Joe Franz’s hunt here.
Nearly a year had passed and the 2015 hunting season was about to begin in Iowa when an anonymous tip was sent to the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, claiming Franz had an open mineral site near the hunting blind from which he shot the massive buck. Joe was charged with illegally baiting by the Iowa DNR.
Now, 5 months later, after a drawn out legal battle, Joe Franz has been cleared of all baiting charges. The mount of the buck is set to be returned to Franz, along with his crossbow and muzzleloader, all of which have been in possession of the Iowa DNR. Despite regaining what was rightfully his, Franz allegedly had to sell the farm in order to pay for the trial.
Read the full saga of the Franz buck here at Outdoor Overload.
