Born and raised in Leonville amongst a large family of 7 siblings, Deon developed a love for Louisiana’s outdoors at an early age, spending most of his adolescent years chasing small game and catfishing along the banks of Bayou Teche in St. Landry Parish. Upon experiencing his first deer hunt as a teenager within the confines of the Atchafalaya Basin, Deon’s life was changed forever. Deer hunting soon became an obsession for him and, having little money at his early age, was forced to begin hunting Louisiana’s public lands. With no mentor to show him the ropes of scouting, locating, and killing deer in their undisturbed environment, Deon quickly learned from his own mistakes. Tackling the challenge of bow hunting exponentially shortened his learning curve. He developed keen insights into reading deer sign, understood the necessities of staying mobile, and gained an inept ability to interpret maps of areas he had never set foot on in order to locate the best hunting spots. As vast as Deon’s knowledge is pertaining to deer hunting, he constantly seeks to better himself by adhering to the humble mentality of telling himself how much more information exists to be learned. Like many of us, he’s reminded of this every time he comes home empty handed.

Deon’s repertoire of Louisiana’s public lands consists of Red River/Three Rivers, Sherburne, Thistlethwaite, Indian Bayou, West Bay, Big Lake, Jackson Bienville, & Dewey Wills WMAs, Tensas NWR, Catahoula & Red Dirt Preserves, and numerous sections of the immense Kisatchie National Forest. However, out of all of these areas, he’s found himself devoting most of his time to the hills of Kisatchie’s Red Dirt Preserve in the early parts of the season, moving down to the Indian Bayou tract during January and February.

Have a question for Deon? Contact him here