Jeremy Critchfield and Ben Gardner
Posted By
Chad Lathrop
at
10/21/2009 12:00:00 AM
Jeremy Critchfield was born and raised in Armstrong County, PA where he grew up hunting just about every type of game available with his grandfather Warren. Warren also got him keenly interested in preparing, and eating, all the game they managed to bag.
Jeremy got into bowhunting in high school, and with some advice from a friend's dad, managed to arrow a couple of bucks using a Hoyt Rocket and an old wooden climber. Then came culinary school and lots of work. Along with that came lots of moving to acquire more culinary experience... and not so much hunting. For 15 years, Jeremy lived and worked all over the country at world class resorts as a professional chef.
But for the past 6 seasons he has lived, worked and hunted in Fayette County, PA. Since he's been back in PA, he's redoubled his efforts and love for bowhunting. He hunts Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Ohio every chance he gets. He arrowed a good 8 point in 2004 but none since. Instead, each season he has let smaller deer walk to grow older and larger, while always holding out for a "good" deer. Although, each season he has managed to arrow a couple of doe for the freezer. And it's a good thing he's a chef, because he's eaten more than his share of "buck tag soup"! Passing all these deer has shaped Jeremy's hunting philosophy and now his passion is finding a mature deer, patterning it and hunting it exclusively.
Ben Gardner grew up in
Ben’s summers consist of a lot of scouting using trail cams, watching fields til dark, and sitting on the back porch at his buddy’s house watching the deer in the food plots. The rest of his time is spent doing what he loves, hunting. He plans to spend a lot of time 25 ft off the ground getting a lot of good hunt footage with his partner Jeremy Critchfield for everybody to watch on Midwest Whitetail this year.
Jeremy and Ben's Hit List
“MOOSE”: He is a 3 or 4 year old really symmetrical 10 point with a character enhancing big chunk out of his right ear. He’s the biggest deer on the 200 acre block that Jeremy is hunting, hence the name. It took all of June and July to get this guy on film and now Jeremy thinks he has his core area locked down. We look forward to following his hunt for Moose this fall!
“THE GREAT 8” This buck is a 4 or 5 year old on state forest ground that abuts private ground that Jeremy hunts. This pic was taken in mid-July so there was plenty more growing to do. His patterns were like clockwork at this camera site, but then he disappeared. Jeremy is sure he’s still around, just moving with the surrounding alfalfa fields’ harvest. With good mass and tine length, and what looks like a small drop tine, this one is high on the list!
“ROCKS 9” Here is a 3 year old West Virginia deer that gets his name from the natural funnel in a ridge edge of huge boulders he uses most evenings to access an alfalfa field. If Jeremy is lucky enough to fill his PA tag, he’s headed south of the border in search of this guy!
