Surprised fisherman turns to see deer on his boat at tournament, WV photos show
A fishing tournament took an odd turn in West Virginia when an angler turned to see a deer standing on his boat, photos show.
It happened Saturday, Sept. 27, on East Lynn Lake, during B.A.S.S. Nation of West Virginia’s qualifying tournament for the state championship.
“One of our anglers had a once in a lifetime experience,” the tournament reported in a Facebook post. “This small buck must have wanted to go for a boat ride and hopped onto the back of his boat!”
Steve Jackson of Huntington was the angler, and he estimated the buck at about 210 pounds.
“He stayed for about 10 min up until he wanted to ‘play’ (by) pushing on me with his horns. Then I had to ‘(coerce)’ him off the boat,” Jackson wrote on Facebook.
The deer exited by jumping out, he said.
As for why it risked climbing aboard, Jackson says he “petted” the deer 30 minutes earlier on the bank. It apparently started tracking him on the water.
“I pulled up in a shallow spot so I could retie some different lures and he came down to me again so I petted him some more then he walked towards the back of the boat and I went back to retying and he just jumped on board,” Jackson wrote.
There are reports the deer tried the same thing with some other anglers, he says.
News of the odd scene had 22,000 reactions and comments on Facebook as of Sept. 29, including jokes about a man who went fishing and “caught a deer.”
Jackson says he only caught two fish during the tournament, but he got one heck of a story.
This story was originally published September 29, 2025 at 7:34 AM.