Best friends score big buck double

Josh Villanova

Tim Warren (left) and Dustin Rimmer display a pair of Orange County bucks they arrowed less than three miles apart on Monday.

Dustin Rimmer and Tim Warren of northern Orange County spend most of their hunting time together. And no two Tar Heel bow hunters could have had a better afternoon Monday(Sept. 13) – or any other day this season. That’s because the pair arrowed a pair of trophy bucks within 45 minutes of each other three miles apart that afternoon.

Rimmer’s buck, which sported a 5x5 mainframe rack, has been green-scored at 164 3/8 inches while Warren’s 10-pointer has been unofficially scored at 156 1/8 inches.

Rimmer said his monster had special meaning.

“It was the second deer I’ve gotten with my bow,” Rimmer said.

Warren, on the other hand, has plenty of experience with killing trophies.

“My buck was the 16th buck I’ve taken over 130 inches,” Warren said.

The pair had scouted and put up trail cameras three months before the season began to capture images of both bucks, and they saw the deer in separate agricultural fields in Orange County.

Warren, 27, shot his buck at 6:40 p.m.

“I was hunting a stand on a power line (cut through) near a cutover,” he said. “I’d seen the deer Sunday (when bow hunting was legal for the first time on Sunday in North Carolina) but he winded me and walked off.”

Using a Parker Hornet 2-Plus bow with Easton arrows and 100-grain Rage two-bladed mechanical broadheads, he put an arrow into the deer’s shoulder at 38 yards.

“He ran through the cutover into a broomsedge field and went over at 75 or 80 yards,” Warren said. “I didn’t see him but left and got Dustin’s cousin, Brandon Rimmer, and we gave the buck an hour, then came back and found him about 7:45, about 15 minutes after Brian had shot his buck.”

Rimmer saw almost a dozen deer from 3:30 p.m. until 7:30 p.m., including a pair of nice 8-pointers, before the big 10-pointer walked to a corn pile sweetened with Swamp Donkey acorn blocks.

He arrowed the deer at 30 yards just before dark with his SSR High Country compound bow with Gold Tip arrows and 100-grain Muzzy broadheads.

The double caps off a longtime hunting partnership, Warren said.

“We do everything together — duck hunt, rabbit hunt, deer hunt — but this was one of the best days we’ve ever had,” he explained.

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