Leaderboard

I just got done saying what I thought of trail cams, but I've used them. I just thought that this forum would want some pictures to look at since the success photos are slow. These buck pictures were all taken in the summer of 2014 on the Kaibab.

So, I didn't post my sons success last year but figured now would be a good time. He's the only one that seems to be putting meat in the freezer these days. Last year with 2 points, he was lucky enough to draw an antelope tag in 30A. My wife who had 16 points was ready to kick him out of the house at that point. It took us til the last day of the hunt for him to be successful with that hunt at 200 yards away. Then the following month he took his first cow on opening day with about 30 minutes of hunting light left in the day. This years elk hunt I could see the change in him and how much he matured with this hunt over last year. We only had 2 hours in our hunting schedule left, but he was successful again. Him and I never hunted a day in our lives until I met my wife and father-in-law 8 years ago who hunted all the time. They are very big into giving thanks and respecting the animals when they're harvested which is awesome and has taught me and my son a lot. Last week when my son took his second elk of his hunting career we were walking up to her and I said make sure you give thanks. He says, "I already did before I took the shot". Made me proud. Any way, just thought I'd share the pics.

In 2013 I remember watching a TV show about Antelope hunting in Wyoming. I vividly remember wanting to go Antelope hunting really badly, but didn’t know how or when I could afford that type of out of state hunt. After a little research I discovered I could buy preference points without having to buy an out of state license. That’s when I recognized I could afford to start accumulating points until I could afford to go out of state and draw a good tag. Fast forward to the spring of 2018 when I finally decided to cash in my 5 points for what Eastman’s calls a “Blue Chip” Unit. Upon receiving the notification I had drawn the tag I immediately called a friend (Cliffton)in Utah to assist me with the hunt. We had talked about hunting together in Wyoming for years. This would finally be the year we could hunt together. For this hunt I was planning on taking my bow, my Ruger Precision and Custom long range Savage Striker pistol. I had spent numerous trips to the range with all three and was very prepared to take whatever type of shot that presented itself. Approximately 3 weeks prior to leaving for my hunt I was having lunch with my boss. While at lunch I reminded him I would be leaving for vacation in 3 weeks. After further discussion we realized one of my key staff members would be gone at the same time. With another key staff member already out on Military leave we both could not be gone at the same time. Knowing my hunt would not be end for several more weeks I decided to cancel the original week of vacation and extend it two weeks later. This extension would cause me to spend additional driving time. The extension would also cut a few days off of my hunting. Upon arriving in Wyoming I would only have 3 days to hunt before having to return home. I would now leave for a family vacation to San Diego & Disney Land on Friday October 28th. We spent 5 amazing days in California with the family! The only issue now is we would be driving home on Tuesday October 2nd. The minute we arrived home I had to immediately leave for Wyoming! We left Disney Land at 7am. We arrived in Phoenix at 2pm and I left for Wyoming within 15 minutes. I knew I wouldn’t make it to Wyoming, but I wanted to make it as far as possible. The plan was to meet Clifton in Salt Lake City the next day and leave for Wyoming ASAP! After a long day of driving I made it to Beaver Utah by 1 am. After a short 5 hour nap I continued my drive to my Clifton’s house. Upon arrival at his house Clifton informed me we would not be able to leave until he and his wife finished laying sod in their front yard. He told me to take a nap inside his house and we would leave as soon as he was finished. Of course I couldn’t let him work without my help so after a few hours of laying sod for the first time we were finally on the last leg to Wyoming. We arrived to Wyoming around 9pm that night. We had a fantastic steak and then an even better night’s rest. With excitement in the air it was difficult to get to sleep, but with 2 days of driving behind me I settled in for a short, but well needed rest. The next day was a beautiful sunny, blue sky Wyoming morning. We had a quick breakfast, filled up the truck and headed into the vast Wyoming prairie to start the hunt. If you have never been to Wyoming I can assure you that filling a buck and 2 doe tags was not going to be a problem. The real challenge would be to find a quality buck that was worthy of waiting 5 years. My buddy had hunted this unit on several different occasions so we had a good idea where to go and what size goat we would peruse. Within 30 seconds of leaving town we started seeing Bucks in my unit. That started the very long day of looking over 200 plus bucks. I know some of you might feel 200 is an exaggeration, but let me assure you, it’s not! We actually counted! I’ve never seen so many Antelope bucks in my life! It was crazy! The day ended with us seeing several great bucks, but nothing worth ending my hunt so soon. I stated earlier that I had planned on taking my bow on this hunt. Unfortunately with having to leave my house so soon after arriving home from Disney Land I forgot my bow. This turned out to be a HUGE mistake. Throughout this hunt we saw numerous Pope & Young Bucks either right next to the road or within a short easy stock. If I could do anything over on this hunt I would have brought my bow and shot my buck and both does with my bow. The second day started much the same as the first day. We immediately started seeing bucks. On this day we looked at the opposite side of the unit to hopefully find a great buck. After looking over 100 bucks by noon we still hadn’t seen anything worth taking. We did see several great Muley Bucks lounging in private alfalfa fields. I’ve never seen such huge bucks with zero fear of humans. It was incredible to see. Nearing the end of the day we located a monster shooter buck in a valley without roads. This buck was definitely over 80 inches and was Amazing! The problem is the buck was on a nearby reservation. The buck was close to public land so we decided to come back to him in the morning to hopefully find him on public. With about 30 minutes left of shooting light we located another great buck. This buck had really tall horns, but was weak on the prongs. He was also on public land and was only 300 yards off the road. We spent a few minutes carefully looking over this buck with the spotting scope, but had a very hard time judging him. The real problem with this buck is we kept thinking about the monster buck from 30 minutes earlier. If we hadn’t seen the monster buck we would have 100% shot this buck. We decided to pass and started driving back to the hotel. Of course we were both uneasy with our decision and began seriously second guessing our decision. This ultimately led me to turn around and attempt to harvest this buck. We arrived a few minutes to late and just in time to watch the buck walk onto private land. This turned out to be the only mistake I had made on this trip. With only 1 more day to hunt I should have shot this buck! The drive back to the hotel that night had a strange somber feeling to it. With only the following day left to hunt we were both a little uneasy about what we would find the next day. Harvesting a buck in this unit or any unit in Wyoming is not hard. What we were finding out is harvesting a Boone and Crocket style Buck was becoming almost impossible! While eating an amazing Prime Rib steak I recognized that I had made a huge mistake and should have shot the tall buck! Unfortunately I let “score” get in the way of “fun”. We ended the night with a solid plan to go after the Reservation buck first thing in the morning and then go after the tall buck if that didn’t work. At first light we were both staring at the Reservation buck. He was chasing does about 200 yards on the wrong side of the fence. We felt he might cross onto public, but with only 10 hours left to hunt we decided to find the tall buck. About 30 minutes later we located the tall buck, but he was still on private land, but was slowly making his way to public land. We decided to look into some other area’s for an hour and come back to see if he had made his way onto public land. We drove away and found numerous more bucks. As it had been the previous 2 days all the bucks were nice, but not worth tagging. It was now noon and my heart was beginning to feel that all too familiar feeling of Dred and regret! We returned an hour later to find the tall buck. Thankfully we found him quickly and on public land. The problem was he was steadily walking towards private land. We quickly attempted to get close, but as it was the previous night he made it onto private land before we could make a move. At this time I was heartbroken! With only 6 hours left to hunt I knew my chances of getting this buck or any nice buck was seriously slim! We decided to look at some completely different country for the next few hours. This ended up being another huge mistake, because this was the only country we didn’t see any antelope in. It was beautiful country, just void of any living creatures. We returned to are of the tall buck at 2pm. Surprisingly we located him bedded about 100 yards onto public land. We quickly made plans and began our stalk. The stalk was going perfectly, until a doe popped up in the general area the buck was bedded. The doe ran off, but we never saw the buck go with her. We continued and got within 100 yards of the last location of the bedded buck. Unfortunately after a few minutes we realized the buck was gone. We never saw him leave and we could only surmise he was bedded close to the doe and she took him with her. It was now 3:30 on my last day to hunt. My buddy could easily tell I was beyond stressed out! I couldn’t believe I had come to Wyoming and would not get a quality buck! I knew I could kill a smaller buck just about anywhere in the unit, but that’s not what I wanted. I wanted a mature buck! At this time I had already made up my mind that I was not going to shoot any buck just to fill a tag. If it wasn’t mature and had the look I wanted I wasn’t going to tag out. Shortly after this realization I suddenly remembered the two bucks in the valley without any roads. The area was only a few minutes away so we decided to try and locate them. Within a few minutes we were fortunate to locate the bucks within 100 yards of where we found them a few days earlier. The bucks were only 650 yards away. I could have easily taken a shot with my Ruger Precision 6.5 creedmoor, but I decided I wanted to end the day and hunt with a challenge. Therefore I decided to take my long range pistol on the stalk. I was very comfortable taking a shot at 400 yards. Thankfully the terrain had enough small draws that enabled us to stay out of view for most of the hunt. We had a plan to get to a particular hill that would hopefully get us within 300 yards. Well, our plan worked a little too well. Upon popping our heads up out of the draw I immediately located the bucks and they immediately located me. That’s because were where within 150 yards. We spent the next 30 seconds attempting to the video camera working and getting me set up for the shot. This proved very difficult to do quietly and ultimately didn’t work. The bucks slightly spooked and ran out to 230 yards. At this time my Clifton told me to forget about the video and shoot when I was ready. I had a pretty solid rest, but not great. I took the shot as soon as the buck stopped. Once I recovered from the initial recoil of the gun I was able to see dirt fly about 3 feet in front of the buck. Clifton immediately said those dreaded words “You Missed”. I was not shocked, because my rest was not really solid. I was hugely dissatisfied with myself and wished I hadn’t taken the shot. The rest of the Antelope ran out to 300 yards and looked back at us for about 30 seconds. I could have taken another shot, but without seeing the second buck in the group I wanted to make sure I missed before attempting another shot. We gathered out gear and hiked up to the area the buck was standing. While hiking up I was filled with emotions. I was sad, mad and disappointed in myself! I was shocked I had just missed my last opportunity at a buck an hour before dark on my last day to hunt! While walking up I tried to keep it together, but with only an hour left to hunt I knew the hunt was over! I walked 5 more steps and I caught a glimpse of something white in the grass ahead of me. That’s when all my sadness and disappointment turned to hopefulness and excitement. Another 5 steps and I could see those beautiful black horns lying on the ground. To say I was excited and elated would be a huge understatement! I had just filled my tag with a really nice Antelope Buck with a pistol. The feeling was Awesome! After taking about 100 pictures we cut up the buck and began the mile hike back to the truck. We headed back to town for dinner and ice and began the long drive back to Salt Lake City. The rest of the trip ended much like the beginning of the trip. A lot of driving! We arrived in Salt Lake about 11pm that night. I continued my drive for another few hours until I reached Beaver again. I awoke the next day to rain and snow. The rain and snow continued throughout the rest of my drive home. At one point I was in a mini blizzard just north of Kanab. The rain continued all the way through phoenix. This trip taught me one very important lesson. There is nothing wrong with working hard to find a huge animal, but the search for a monster did take away a little of the fun. Ultimately I made a few mistakes on this hunt, but the knowledge and lessons learned were invaluable! Thank you very much to all those who assisted me on this adventure!!!!

I'm not as active as I used to be on CWT. But I still linger and have always had a tremendous amount of respect for what Amanda built from the beginning. So if I can contribute to her and the rest of you Coues deer fanatics I will! I finally caught up with this buck after he eluded me last year. He's an old buck (and I'm not very smart) so I honestly couldn't be happier. It's always special when you can follow an animal this long. And for those who've done it, it can be very bitter/sweet also. I especially feel that way as I feel like I linger closer to my Coues deer hunting days being numbered. Enjoy.

My son and I took off this past weekend for a father-son fly fishing trip to the San Juan while my wife and daughter were on a girls trip. I haven't been to the San Juan in 11 years and its always been bugging me to go back, especially to get my family really into fly fishing. We've all fly fished a couple of small streams here in AZ and Jacob has landed a YOY rainbow w/par marks, but that's it. We got to Abe's about 1pm Friday afternoon, got checked in, license purchased, and some local fly patterns. I was nervous about Jacob wading since he's the skinny kid who has to dance around in the shower to get wet, but he did great. I had a life jacket for him to wear, but the guys at Abe's put us in a spot where he wouldn't need it. When we got there, I asked a guy if we could squeeze in downstream or if he'd prefer we go somewhere else and he graciously offered Jacob his spot. Its nice to see (especially for Jacob) that kind-hearted people are still out there. We started off close together with him upriver of me and me not fishing until I knew he was ok wading, getting his casting game on, and knowing what to look for when a trout takes his fly. He was amazed at all the big trout swimming within a foot of him and he fell into a groove. After an hour or so, the river started clearing, so we moved up to the next good looking spot. I re-rigged his set up, removing the weights so the emergers acted like true emergers and, after 20 about 20 minutes, I hear "I got one!" I coached Jacob on how to use the rod and we were able to net his first real trout on a fly rod. It was a fat 15" bow and I could tell by the look in his eyes that he was completely addicted to flyfishing. That was the only fish of the day, but we stayed for the hatch. Jacob said "How about we stay for 30 more minutes." when the hatch started. Three takes and three misses later, an hour had gone by and we finally worked our way back to the truck. He made it clear that he LOVED dry fly fishing! As we were walking back, I turned around to snap a sunset pic, and I saw a 10-year old boy walking with the swagger of a seasoned fly fisherman. Jacob's first real trout: 15" fat bow Kid with swagger (can't get it oriented right) We got up early Saturday morning, had breakfast, and were on the river by 8:25. It didn't take long for Jacob to hook into another bow, then another, and then he had some real fun. He hooked a 15" fat brown and figured out why I've always said I'll take a 15" brown over an 18"-20" bow any time. I managed to finally get on the board with a smaller bow, but I was finally on the board and giving Jacob some competition. We took a quick lunch break and short nap back at the truck and then decided it was time to get back to our spot, hoping someone hadn't come in. During our lunch break, I reemphasized his casting technique to work on because I spent a big part of the morning undoing wind knots and/or changing leaders because the knots were so bad. That worked and his casting came back solid. I noticed several fish rolling subsurface, so I took my weights off and, after missing a few takes, I ended up landing a 15" fatty bow, too. Jacob and I both played that game off and on, after I set him up with the same flies I was using and removing his weights. We stayed until the hatch went off and I managed to land two bows on my brand new TFO 4wt. Jacob missed a couple of more takes, but is definitely loving this new addiction. He asked me several times on the drive home when we're coming back to the San Juan. Yesterday, we finally set up or fly-tying bench and organized our kits. He was off school for a fall break day and he ended up tying four flies, following the instruction book. His elk hair caddis (#12) needs work but its a great start. His beetle, wooly bugger, and nymph were all pretty solid. He's loving this whole fly fishing thing and I'm loving having a fly fishing buddy! 15" brown Lunch Break My 15" bow Jacob's fly tying

Awesome story congratulations to the entire family.

Never sell a gun unless you absolutely have to.

Sounds like you made the effort. I have had many a bowl of tag soup. No shame in it as long as you try.

So I gathered up some buddies and we jumped on the Wyoming bandwagon this year! 5 tags between 4 guys-- we filled 4 in 24 hours and then I opted out of filling my doe tag because I wasn't going to be able to get the meat home. Originally I was supposed to drive up from Texas (12+ hours), link up with our Denver dude and then get the NC boys who were flying in. Unfortunately for me I couldn't break of the 5-6 days I had hoped from work. So I had Fri afternoon to Sunday afternoon and I booked a hasty ticket and as a group we split a rental car (truck- more on that later). Here's how things went down: Thursday had some things come up at work that resulted in a much later than preferred ride to the airport to fly from Dallas to Denver. Still made the flight, guns arrived with no issues and had plenty of time to go pick up the rental car and drive to my buddy's house in Denver to spend the night before driving up to WY on Friday. Until I got to the Budget rental car center at DIA... 60+ people at 11pm and only 3 folks checking cars out. So when I got to the window at 2am... they no longer had full size trucks... but they did have a 2018 Tacoma TRD so I snagged it, which ended up being a great vehicle on and off road. Get to Dave's at 3am and we drink beers and BS until who knows when. He has to work Friday and I have to get the other two from the airport. Friday: I pick up our NC boys from the airport and we head north towards the promised land of WY!! Except it is raining, foggy and generally crap weather, not the 50-60 degrees and sun that were forecast. But we make it into our hunting unit and head towards a chunk of public land to check our zero since we all were now 6,000+ ft above where we confirmed our data. Upon arriving at said chunk of land... there is a chunky pronghorn buck standing off the road about 500 yards and he dips over a rise. I had compared my actual data from Texas (hot, low altitude) to the WY forecasted data (cold, high altitude) and the ballistic calc had told me there wasn't going much difference (less than 1/4 moa out to 600y). Since this was for sure a shooter buck and I had a short hunt we bailed out and made the stalk. I got up to the rise and over the top, bedded down, was the buck and a group of does. I ranged at 289 yards, my rifle is zero'd at 250. I keep inching up to get my bipod up and rear rest set. The does saw me and they slowly stood and began to walk down and away from me. The buck stood, slightly quartered too and looking at the does that were now trotting. I held just a hair high and into the cross wind. The 7RUM barked and the 145gr LRX buried itself just in front of his shoulder and exited just behind his offside shoulder. He ran maybe 25 yards and expired!! We were on the board having been in the state of Wyoming for about an hour! We got him gutted and back to the truck and proceeded to get the other two rifles double checked for zero and then we headed off to some other spots we had google earth'd. At last light Dave texted and said he was headed up from Denver. We checked a last spot and found a nice herd on the border of public/private. We marked them and headed back towards camp... until we saw a really great buck dip into a small draw off the road. We bailed out again and began a several hundred yard stalk up to the draw. As the terrain thinned out we knew he was going to be just beneath us. Boom- horns! There he was- the next man up got settled as we saw the buck turn broadside and trot off. We heard him alarm wheeze or whistle (whatever you want to call it) and we knew the gig was up. He made a brief stop and got flattened by my friend, shooting a family heirloom .270. We admired his buck which, to us uninitiated pronghorn hunters seemed to be a good bit larger than the ones we had seen and definitely bigger than my buck. Well, he just got scored and before drying he netted 80 6/8"!!! Saturday picked up where Friday left off- We got on several bucks early but couldn't get good stalks set up. Finally, I glassed up a super tall buck who was narrow and unmistakeable. After a great (and long stalk) Dave connected on this superb goat. The length on this goat was awesome and he grossed out in the mid 70s! We were feeling good about ourselves but we knew we needed another buck. We were having a great time but we all wanted the guys who had traveled across country to fill their tags!! I headed out with my buddy while Dave skinned his buck. We found a great wide, forward leaning buck but he spooked across onto private before we could make a play. Then- as we drove over a crest, tucked behind a hillside, almost invisible from the road was a buck bedded with does. Knowing that this had been a recipe for success so far we stopped. Checked our topo and made a plan. I got to crawl in with my buddy as he navigated to this unseen herd. I expected us to pop up about 300 yards off... but he got to within 80 yards before cresting the hill!! The antelope were now milling around feeding and headed off to our right. At 156 yards my buddy got the shot profile he was looking for and absolutely stoned the buck. Making us 4/4 in less than 24 hours of hunting!! Just an amazing trip overall and something that I think we see ourselves doing again the future!!

Wow, some beauties. Even a classic clothes pin!

Those Luger’s are getting harder to find. Looks nice!

Cool thanks guys. I got out there for the last two hours of light yesterday but didn't see a thing. The wind was really blowing so that might have kept them off their feet. Since I've only had a few hours to spend out I've had to stick close to the mouth of the canyon so I think I need to push in a few hundred more yards and see if I can turn a few more deer up. The bucks are probably sitting tight this time of year but with the rut coming up for my next hunt I'm more interested in seeing where the does are hanging out.

They’ll get on their hind legs to eat the flower/fruit off the top. So watch for any ocotillo moving around or against the wind

I've seen a lot of deer bedded in Ocotillo over the years! Probably a good spot, especially if there is water near by.

My first triple archery hunt, in Mexico. Gave 2 to the ranch cowboys and family, kept the biggest for myself.

For those of us that have been alive and hunting deer since 70's know the deer populations really took a nose dive when they banned trapping around 91 or 92. There was once a time when you could go to any unit that holds elk in this state and see way more deer than elk. As a matter of fact it wasn't even close. Those trappers kept the lions and coyotes in serious check. I buy a tag every year and in 40 years I have seen a total of two lions. One in 33 three years ago and one in 6a this past September. Still waiting for my first shot opportunity.

Hi all, just want to say thanks for all the info, the hunt was a success. My son and I went to the north/west part of unit 7w down in the flats and with the help of the new BTX-95 we were able to find some goats, after a 2 mile walk I was able to put a 400 yard shot on him. Dirt nap. I feel very lucky that we found them because most of the goats are still up in the trees. As you can see in the photo pack out was easy.

36a and 36b have great deer numbers!!!

22, 23, and 27 typically have the biggest bucks and you dont have to worry about your camp being raided by drug runners or illegals👍

says the guy posting about bigeye tuna on a coues site for a month

crime doesnt pay.

NoBull350, I'd like to respectfully offer you some advice. I've known your brother through this this forum for quite some time. It is very unlike him to not be the one in here arguing with everyone and defending himself. I'm going to assume he probably received some VERY smart advice (probably from council) to lay low and let things blow over as much as possible. I get that as a brother, you want to stick up for him and the rest of your family, very admirable. But consider what you are accomplishing here. Are you helping or keeping this going? Since you have joined the discussion your family and church have been dragged into the discussion. Clearly you are free to do as you like, but should consider how you could better help your brother and family. It sounds like guilty or innocent, tough times are ahead for Blake. There has to be more constructive ways to love and show him your support.

Same taxidermist mounted this Javelina, taken in Mexico.(the left one.

Guess I'm out of the loop. http://www.coueswhitetail.com/forums/topic/71092-kowa-highlanders-32x82-flourite-with-32-eye-pieces-for-sale-price-drop3750-frim/