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Halftime update, there is a lot to cover. Long story short we’ve had a little adversity but the boys and I are here and we are still getting after it. Fingers crossed.

Congrats to Clay Kelly & Destry Guilliam (GUILLIAMS GUIDE SERVICE) & To Mr. John Tanner guided by his son Thad Tanner... on some good ole bucks!!!!!!!!!!

Blue jeans, work boots, packing out whole. This reminds me of some great hunts I’ve been on. Nice work and great buck. It doesn’t take $800 in clothing and a $3k rifle to get the job done.

"I just want to fill my tag, put tasty meat in the freezer for us, and get out of this stupid heat." That's what Jacob said to me when he decided to go after a smaller deer than planned on the opening day of his deer hunt Friday. We both love chasing Coues whitetail in SE Arizona, but hunting in 87 degrees in November is horrible, especially when shade is limited. Shortly after a post-lunch nap in a small piece of shade, I glassed up a group of deer going to water across the valley. I got Jacob's attention and let him know there was a fork and a goofy-looking spike in the group of 5-6 deer. That's when he said the above quote, referring to the fork. They came down to 350 yds, but circled back up to 400 yds. Jacob got lined up, adjusted his scope accordingly, and missed slightly right. It happens. We attributed it to buck fever/operator error. The bucks kept walking uphill away from us and bedded behind two rocks just under 500 yds from us. We kept an eye on them and our friend joined us to glass, bringing much-appreciated ice-cold drinks. We watched the bucks fidget and twitch for a couple of hours and then realized the one rock was actually the spike's body behind some grass. Jacob asked, Carl encouraged, and I gave Jacob the thumbs up for a 500-yd shot. He's put the time in behind his rifle and I know how comfortable he is. He took the shot, and missed wide right again. The fork eventually stood up and walked to the left of the spike, standing perfectly broadside. That's when we found out his scope got bumped off somewhere between his last practice session and his hunt. He shot at the fork at 5:05pm and dropped the bedded spike cleanly. We celebrated and laughed at what just happened. Somedays, I'll take luck over skill, although I know Jacob has the skill. He's a way better shooter than I am. We hustled across the valley, tagged Jacob's deer, took a few quick pics, field dressed the deer, and hiked back to camp by headlamp. As I was carrying all of the meat, I realized I was glad he harvested the smaller buck. My pack was somewhere between 60-70lbs, including meat and all my gear. Then Jacob cooked us Coues tacos for dinner! Friendships were solidified, and the love of chasing Coues whitetail in SE Arizona grew stronger. What an adventure. Now to give the new grinder its first workout and work on a scope before Jacob's next hunt. It turns out that, between his last practice session and his hunt, two ring scews had come almost a full turn loose. It made me realize just how lucky we were and it taught me a valuable lesson about checking all aspects of all gear much more regularly. \

If the deer is dead, did the bullet fail? I prefer rapid expansion on deer.

Tomorrow we ride . . . I won't be posting any field updates on this one. I want to leave the phone put away and soak up the time with my dad and two boys. We have the whole hunt available. Hopefully when we get back we have plenty to share. I am a giddy like a kid at Christmas right now.

I don’t have patience for 15s and I don’t like to look for stuff bedded either. 10s big field of view, spot movement. That’s how I do deer anyway

power lines.... oops. My bad. You said "legal".

Come out opening weekend or before. I’m trying to get everyone so we can kill a giant and have a kill pic like a football team photo.

I’ve only had all pass through shots and devastating destruction with that bullet.

At the risk of being called a narcissist, I'll fill in some blanks. From the late 50s on into the 70s, varmint calling & hunting became really popular. A lot of clubs cropped up in CA, TX and even CO. Bill won four world championship calling events and probably would have won more had he not died when he did. Sam was an expert caller, as well and excelled at the hunting end. He often used a 20 ga. shotgun that he called "Singin' Sally." Tallon had been a guide at the Grand Canyon, worked in the I&E dept. at the AGFD for a time and eventually became a freelance, prolific photographer with photos in about every major outdoor magazine and most notably as a regular contributor to AZ Highways. If I had to label him in regards to myself, I'd call him a "life changer." He was also my link to Bob Hirsch, Bill Sizer, Steve Galiziola & Wes Keyes -- all folks he knew from when he had worked at the AGFD and later introduced me to them. I first met Jim one afternoon in either 1967 or '68 when I was hanging out at Bellows Sporting Goods on Camelback & 27th Ave. Ed Bellows, the owner, introduced us, and somehow the topic of why Jim's wife's car wouldn't start came up. At the time he lived just east of 35th Ave., north of what was then Grand Canyon College. So I offered to go and take a look at the car, an early 1960s era VW bug. It was a simple fix: no spark because the points weren't opening. As of way of thanks, Jim invited my wife and I to dinner the next night. It was the start of a friendship that would last until his death in 2010 at 85 yrs. old. During the 1980s, we usually met for coffee every morning at the Smitty's at 35th Ave. & Bethany. That ended when Jim moved to Ahwatukee. I was doing a lot of hunting back then, so when we'd be together, I often related some hunt or another and sometime showed him a crummy snapshot taken with one of the cheapie cameras avialble then. To this day, I remember what he told me after a few months; he said, "You need to buy a decent camera and start putting your experiences down on paper." I took that suggestion to heart; a few days later I went downtown to the Jewel Box and bought a used Minolta SRT101 camera with a normal 55mm lens for $75, and within a year or so, my photo gear expanded greatly. As for putting stuff on paper, that was easy since my college majors were biology and journalism. And I even owned a manual typewriter -- the "computer" of old. Although he was a bit older than me, Jim sort of took me 'under his wing,' especially with the photography aspects. And after a few months I was writing regularly for 'Outdoor Arizona,' which was published by the same company as 'Phoenix' magazine. The editor of both was the late Manya Winsted, who eventually went on to 'Phoenix Home & Garden.' Thus, my outdoor writing career began, and when I finally had enough stuff published, Jim had me join the Outdoor Writers Association of America (OWAA). After we bought our resort at Vallecito Lake in CO in 1976, Jim visited twice -- once to use my entire family for a photo shoot in the Valley of the Gods (Utah) for a Winnebago motor home brochure and another time to pick me up for my first visit to Yellwostone NP during the elk rut, which would be only one of many in the years that followed. This was also the time I made what I decided was the worst trade of my life. In the early 1970s I managed the Pennys sporting goods dept. at Tower Plaza shopping center. While there I bough a beautiful Charles Daley O/U 20 ga. The wood was spectacular. I swapped it with Tallon for a motor driven Minolta camera body that was all manual. For wildlife photos, it was a royal pain, compared to the other auto everything bodies I had in my arsenal. I found out through her FB page that the Daley was passed on to Jim's daughter, Rachel, who was born the year after I first met him and eventually became a NP park ranger at Petrified Forest NP. She's now well into her 50s and is still using the gun to hunt. It was on the YNP trip in 1976 that I first met Jim Zumbo. Tallon and I were sitting in a pullout in his van watching a herd of elk when Zumbo and his friend, Gabby Barrus, pulled in behind us. Zumbo had recognized the van and walked up to Tallon's window. He had met Tallon at an OWAA conference. By the time they were done talking, Zumbo had invited us to dinner in the trailer they had parked in one of the campgrounds. I wouldn't see Zumbo again until 1980 when I attended my first OWAA conference, which was one of many. I became quite active in that organization, serving three years on the board along with Zumbo, and several years on both the ethics and membership committees, the latter for vetting applicants' credentials. In the meantime, Zumbo and I became good friends. By 1984, I was selling enough articles and photos to quit my sales rep job and go fulltime freelance. I never looked back. Eventually I had stints as the AZ state editor of Outdoor Life for 7 years and as a contributing editor of Arizona Hunter & Angler for 10+ years. In addition to features and the Last Shot column for AH&A, I also wrote the 'Lake of the Month' feature under my "pen name," Lou Migali -- my late grandfather who was a mentor of sorts, too. In 2005, at the SHOT show in LV and the SCI show in Reno by tele-conference call, 200+ of our peers elected Zumbo, me and seven other writers as the steering committe to form a new writers' organization. We all travelled to the White Oak Plantation in AL to do the task, which became the Professional Outdoot Media Assoc. (POMA) The steering committee served as the first board of directors. In the photo below, two of the nine are missing: Laurie Lee Dovey & Jim Casada. As I wrote earlier, meeting Jim Tallon that fateful afternoon was life-changing. 😉 Now, I'm tired of trying to remember stuff for now. When I get my mind back together, I'll provide some back story about Sam. Stay tuned.

He's been eating frybread.

It only takes one sheep to go from zero to hero. You guys are going to be fine!

You need to check out Mormon lake.

Have your favorite girl pee on it

Obviously the elk died...how many shots did it take? Shot placement? Hit any bones?

Solid buck. Congrats

Congress

If buying online, ammoseek.com is a good resource to see what’s in stock and pricing at a glance.

updated 5 for 5 this past weekend

Just took inventory. All 6 are loaded with FMJ. 5/6 are windowed mags. I'm feeling generous. $480

Uggh team hunting no thanks. Bwahaha I hope you guys get on them. As we get nearer my wife has always wanted to go on a sheep hunt. When do we need to RSVP

You never know who’s gonna show up exactly, but I think possibly, *hopefully*, the first weekend I’ll have a crew so big that even jimmy John will be jealous. But I think we need all the help we can get.

It was two years ago that I drew my 15 C south tag for bighorn. The anticipation leading up to the hunt had left me basically worthless at work by this time two years ago. I would spend all my time looking at google earth, thinking about how I would concentrate in one area, putting all of my eggs in one basket. The anticipation of the hunt was 1/2 the excitement, and the hunt itself was everything I had hoped it would be. To all of you that drew a bighorn tag this year, I envy you, knowing what level of excitement you must be experiencing right now is something that will be hard to relive. Good luck and enjoy your hunt. P.s. I ended up taking the ram I had dreamed about.