For anyone, a 12-point, 210-pound buck would make for a fine hunting day. For Herb Lounder of Hancock, it meant quite a bit more.

In July 1978, a motorcycle accident left Lounder paralyzed at the age of 22. A lifelong hunter and angler, Lounder returned to the outdoors four years later, unable to stay away, even though he was unable to hunt and fish with the freedom he had before.

“For a few years I didn’t do much of anything,” said Lounder, now 44. “One of those situations I really didn’t handle that well. I still haven’t. I’m doing a lot better with it than I use to.”

Lounder began deer hunting again in 1982 and said he has improved in the past 10 years. He also returned to fishing using a kayak, although his disability impairs him in the activity, he said.

He embraced these outdoors activities nonetheless, his brother, Manley “Squeak” Lounder, said.

“He’s always been a sportsman,” Manley Lounder said. “He never gives up. [His disability] took getting used to. But he target shoots. He went to college, started his own business, his tax business. He is a go-getter.”

Herb Lounder hunts on a friend’s 486-acres. With his truck rigged to compensate for his disability, Lounder said he is able to drive himself in and often hunts alone. He is allowed legally to hunt from the window of his truck because of his disability.

Two weeks ago, he was hunting with his brother when he saw the massive buck.

“The deer went up over a back hill. I wished I had a movie camera. It came up over the hill, looked straight in the air with its gigantic antlers on its back,” Herb Lounder said. “When he saw me, he turned his head and started running hard, right broadside about 80 yards off. It came down over in a clear cut and run probably about 40 yards. It went behind an old pile of slash and came out the other side. It began to cross the road when I fired.”

Manley Lounder said the first shot in the neck dropped the buck where it was but its movement indicated it was still alive. From his truck, about 80 yards back, Herb Lounder shot the animal again, his brother said.

“I went off the road into the woods,” said Manley Lounder. “It jumped in front of me and went toward him. He shoots from his truck because with his wheelchair, he can’t get up in a tree stand. When he shot it, he let me know he got it. He was really enthused. I didn’t realize how big it was.”

Herb Lounder, who owns Lounder Business Services in Ellsworth, has bagged two deer in the past six years. The last, which he tagged four years ago, was an 8-point, 175-pound buck.

The one tagged at Willey’s Sports Shop in Ellsworth on Nov. 8 far surpassed his expectations.

Lounder said part of his prize must have been luck, and part must have been the healthy population of bucks in Maine this season.

At Willey’s Sports Store, there have been 21 deer over 200 pounds weighed at the tagging station through Tuesday, a figure that is way up from past years.

Don Moaratty, a salesman at the store, said that on a normal year the store sees half that number.

“The other day we had a deer come in with such a rack, it looked like a moose,” Moaratty said. “That’s something else that’s odd about this year. It seems most of the bucks have really great racks. They may be 6 or 8 points, but they’ll have nice broad antlers.”