Sauk Rapids Teen Harvests Rare Nine-Point Piebald Buck During Hunting Season

(KNSI) – A Sauk Rapids teenager bagged a rare whitetail during deer hunting season.

Mason Rudolph shot a nine-point piebald buck on his grandparent’s farm near Fairmont in Martin County. A piebald deer has a genetic mutation that gives it both brown and white hair. The condition is seen in less than one percent of deer. Rudolph told KNSI News his family had spotted the deer on a trail camera over the summer, so they knew there was one around. Around 8:00 on Thursday morning, the 19-year-old spotted the two-tone buck, “I was hunting in a stand on the edge of a creek and along a field in this little ravine. I was up in a stand and saw him coming from behind me, and he went down the hill and came back up the other side, probably 10 yards away. And that’s where I shot him.”

Rudolph says it wasn’t a kill shot and took several hours to track down. Once he caught up to it, Rudolph couldn’t believe what he had harvested, “I was nervous all day finding this guy because this is a once-in-a-lifetime [experience]. I’ll probably never see one again.”

Because of the animal’s rarity, Rudolph plans to get a full-body mount. According to the National Deer Association, about one in every 1,000 births produces a piebald deer.

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