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Hey guys, got this guy last Sunday on day 10 of a tough hunt. The rut was sporadic at best with some days having almost no bugles during daylight hours. I've been getting caught up at work so haven't done a full write-up, this guy came in screaming with about 10 cows at 7:15 am when it had been quiet all morning. I had to wait at full draw for what seemed like ever for his cows to clear out from between us, but managed to make a heart shot. He only went about 30-40 yards before tipping over. I'm super exited. He's my biggest bull to date, and broke my drought. It's been a few years since I've put anything bigger than an turkey or javi on the ground.

So I cashed in on some points and decided to go to Colorado for a Mule Deer muzzy hunt. I tried my hand on the Elk hunt there a couple years ago but a early season snow storm threw me off and I left empty handed. One thing I decided this time I was going to buy a lighter rifle and to bring a pair of llamas. This past year, a friend and I pulled the trigger on some llamas, but I will have to write up a new thread on those. Fast forward to the hunt, I showed up a day later than I wanted, due to life issues. I rolled into camp at mid night and as I proceeded to park, my alarm on my truck goes off, declaring my presence to everyone in camp. I thought, great, an awesome way to start a hunt. Over the first 2 days I spent my time just day hiking and hunting with the llamas trying to adjust to the thinner air. Which i didn't do very well. The first couple days I didn't see much, other than spectacular views, does, fork bucks and tons of hunters. I was going to adjust my plan to take the llamas in deep, and spend a few days doing that. But one of the guys in camp convinced me to try another area first, but due to the access in getting there I wouldn't be able to take the llamas. At this point I was happy with a decent 3pt. The next morning we were in our glassing spot. As the sun came up, this new area proved to be better than anywhere I had been the previous days of the hunt. We located a few bucks that peaked my interest and began to see which one would give us the best play. I about had my mind set on a buck we called the miner, until he walked over a ridge and out of our lives. Soon after, one of my buddies, who seemed to be struggling behind the glass, calls out a doe on a ridge across from us that we had all seen. Shrugging it off we laughed and said, yeah we've all seen that doe. But as we all look were he is describing we see 2 awesome bucks, in the chutes below her. We waited till they both bedded. Which happened to be in one of the gnarliest places I've ever seen. But off I went. I had to decend 2k ft and then climb 3k ft to get above the bucks. Then come down 500ish ft to get into a shooting position. I was stoked. It took me almost 2 hours to get into position but I finally made it. I settled in and could see this buck was an awesome 3x4. At least 30" wide. I was positioned directly above him at 42 yards on a cliff over hang. I couldn't see the other buck, but I knew this was the one I wanted. I ranged him several times, and I knew couldn't miss at 42 yards. I kept calm but was excited. I leaned over to make the shot, I am in and squeezed, POP, the muzzy misfired. The buck looks at me and I slowly lower out of sight. I think ok, he's not leaving. I add a new primer to the rifle, wait for the buck to look away, hang over the ledge again, aim, fire, POP, another misfire..... the buck looks up again then away. At the point I can't believe this is happening. I decide to lay on my back, pull the breech and kick the load. I have never been under such reloading stress. I grab some grass and clean the breech hole. Reassemble the rifle and reload. I reprime a 3rd time, take aim, squeeze, POP, again no ignition. This time the buck gives me a hard look. He must have stared at me for 15 minutes. Now I'm panicked. I'm only carrying 5 primers, and I'm down to 2. Reprime one more time, not knowing what to do. Aim, POP! Again! At this point he knows something is up. In a panic I decided to kick the load again and add a new one. Its at this point I finally remembered that I could add powder in front of the primer in the breech hole to get a stronger ignition. As I hurried to reload and set my primer, the second buck i had forgotten about stands up, and we are both terrified, staring each other eye to eye about 20 yards apart. Now I know I'm in trouble, he then breaks running down the chute towards the other buck. I pop up to see if I still have a shot. And there they are, both standing there broadside, I take aim, squeeze, BOOM! Clean miss.... both bucks run off and out of sight. I couldn't believe it. When I got back to the truck I restocked, this time with stronger 209 primers. And shot a practice shot, dead center. That night at camp I was disappointed, but I had no one to blame but myself for missing a great shot opportunity. But we decided to head back to the same spot the next morning to see if we could turn up another buck. The next morning we hadn't been glassing 30 seconds, when my buddy says, "Got him!" Sure enough, there he was, the wide buck on the same ridge, 300 of yards from where I missed him. Today other hunters were around, so we made no delay and went after him. We figured he would bed in the same spot again, so we were gonna get close and just wait till he bedded. As we watched from a closer location, we watched as a trail hiker passed under the buck and the buck was having none of it. He bolted over the ridge and gone. We decided to climb up a separate ridge and get eyes on him again. We did a huge circle, another 3k ft climb, but it paid off. We saw him walk back over the ridge toward the chute were he was bedded the day before. This time we were already positioned above him. So we gave him some time and made our move. Once we got above the chute I began to climb down, I looked back at my buddy and told him to stand by here as I stalked lower. The wind was constantly shifting and we weren't 100% sure he was in the same bed. I crept down the side of the chute periodically looking down to see if the buck was in there. It wasn't until I got to where I missed the day before that I finally found him in the same bed as yesterday. This time facing away from me and dead asleep. This time I took my pack, rested my gun against it, peered over the edge. I ranged him 41 yards this time. I said a little prayer and took aim. Due to the swirling wind, I knew I didn't have much time to shoot. The angle was an almost straight down shot. I aimed in on his spin in-between his shoulder blades. Slowly squeezed, BOOM! Perfect shot. The bullet broke his back and straight into the boiler room. He death rolled into and down the chute, stopping inches from the edge and 1,000 ft drop. I was beyond excited and in disbelief. I turned around to yell at my buddy to start the climb down, but to my surprise he was already there. He said he got selfish and had to watch it go down. We slid down to the buck, broke him down and made our way out. 6 primers fired at a single buck. Later looking back, I practiced using blackhorn 209 with Triple 7 primers. In practice the gun went bang everytime. But at higher elevation I figure the lack of oxygen was reducing the flash of my primer. When I switched to shot shell primers it went off everytime. Inside spread was 30 7/8 and outside was 33 7/8. Gross 170.

With hunting season starting to kickoff I thought I would share a few mounts I recently finished up. Good luck to all! 👍

Well… now I need to glass in the tree tops too! 😂 FullSizeRender.MOV

Moved to Arizona in 1982 from Iowa and fell in love with this great State! I have hunted, fished and explored as much as time allowed and still didn’t put a dent in what Arizona has to offer those who enjoy the outdoors. My wife and I will be moving back to Iowa soon and while I am excited to be close to family, a huge chunk of my heart will remain here. I have conversed with some of you through this forum and met or bought/sold items with others. All great people in my book. Thanks to all for contributing to this site and everything we do as hunters and angler’s to keep Arizona such a great place to enjoy the outdoors. Jim

Some pics i just got from him.

Tag has been sent to Tom (AZ Elk Society). Sounds like he has a veteran in Catalina who will use it. Thanks for the suggestions. Jim

I know this has been covered , but does anyone have recent information on where to donate a Coues tag ? My son’s tag will go unused this year and I prefer to donate it to a nonprofit that assist veterans or youth hunters. The tag is for unit 33 general rifle hunt. Dates are October 14-20. Thanks Jim

I thought it was a job opening! Ok I admited, I'm a pervert! 😝😤

Worst jinx sign ever good luck on your hunt!!!!

Thanks. Yes it’s a home made hip quiver that hangs from my belt. Made from an old 2 piece bow mounted quiver I had laying around. Works great.

You need to determine if you ever plan to get a btx. That is when you will want the 115. It is kind of bulky for a stx. The 115 for sure requires a much stronger tripod and head than most are used to running. At the minimum you need a gitzo gt2542 or a rrs tfc-24l with like an outdoorsman fluid head for a 115 or it will vibrate and negate the benefits of the larger lense.

Yes to sweet little infant baby Jesus

Did you send it to see Jesus?

Maybe I don't understand the humor in criticizing everyone and everything. Rarely a positive comment. But he is active.....

I've had my fair share of kills with my compound but figured I would try something new this year and now I'm hooked. 45#pse tigershark Goldtip340 traditional arrows 125 grain montec fixed 3 blade

Grandson Ryan had a 34a youth tag this year. We missed opening morning because of his job. Got to the Gardner canyon area around noon, set up camp and got out for the evening. Saw one doe. Sat morning I glassed up 2 bucks and 3 does. The bigger buck bedded down at 300 yards at 7:30 , while the others went over a ridge. A few minutes later a doe walked by the tree where we saw the buck was bedded. She stared into the tree where he was, and as luck would have it, he got up and followed her up the ridge. When the buck stopped at 350, I told him to hold 2 in. over his back. At the shot, he staggered a few steps, and went down. He was super excited to say the least, but the pack out took most of that away. 4 hours after boning the deer out and packing back to camp, all was good. That deer lived in the steepest , nastiest canyon possible…or so it seemed to this 72 year old, while huffing and puffing him out. Beautiful country though. The grasshoppers down there are HUGE, and they eat meat!

Well my daughter drew her last ever JR deer hunt in 33. Her goal was to fill her tag with any size antlered deer. She and her best friend went out again, hoping to fill their tags just like they did during their recent cow elk hunt. Went out to where I got my deer in Reddington on Friday, just does. Saturday took her to our other go to spot and saw 6 different bucks ( spikes, forks and a really nice 3x) nothing would give us a shot though. Around 4:30 she said let’s start heading back, before we go I told her let’s look at one more canyon. We get set up and start glassing. I look down and just past 3 small hills a solo deer is laying out in the open in the shade. It turns its head and I see a glimpse of bone. I said hey, I got a buck. Her first response “how far”? I ranged it and said 485 yds. Her reply “Can I shoot it”? I said, we didn’t come here for a haircut. She gets set up using her backpack as a rest. I’m behind her with binos and tell her whenever your ready because I got eyes on it. A few seconds go by and lead is sent down range. The bullet clobbers the deer, it jumps up and starts to wobble and shake. It lays down a few feet away, I tell her shoot it again it’s not dead. She puts another one in it and that’s all it took. Two 485 yd shots to fill her tag. Absolutely awesome marksmanship to seal the deal. Due to her birthday, she could only put in 6 times and during her total jr hunts she was able to fill 6 out of six tags, all whitetail. So proud of her.

https://youtu.be/AvUNLRBT5vo Just wanted to share the success of an impressive youth hunter with everyone. Toby made an amazing shot on this buck to make it a VERY efficient and hunt!!! Congrats Toby!!!

Wanted to share my sons first buck he took the opening day in 22 on the jr deer hunt.

After missing at first light on opening day and spending Saturday jockeying with other hunters, my son punched his tag Sunday morning. Second cow tag he’s filled and he turns 12 Wednesday. Aside from the tag being filled, it was a great hunt. He got to see bulls sparring and we were right in a lot of bugling still. He’s able to handle most of the gates finally which was a huge plus for me. I hiked him up and down some steep stuff and into and out of some thick nasty stuff, and he packed out a front quarter even that was probably half his body weight. Beyond proud. Now the processing fun begins. Huge thanks to Dave and all the ADA volunteers for a great camp. You do an amazing job. sorry for the sideways pic

I am so proud of my boys, even my 6 year old. They really put in the work to have an amazing hunt. Their tag was in 5bs/6A we signed up for the youth camp that the Elk Society was putting on there. They really do a great job with all of the youth camps. They teach the kids so much and everyone there is always so happy for the kids and willing to help. We also stayed in one of the bunk houses that they have there and the kids thought that was really cool. We got into them right away my oldest got his down around 10am and my middle son got his around 5:30pm. We hiked altogether about 12 miles. It was a long day but well worth it. They were really rutting hard, a few times we were on a herd the bulls were surrounding the cows so I was nervous for them to shoot, but it all worked out. It was really fun experience it as a family. We live in queen creek and luckily Miller's Southwestern Processing was there. They are nice and very efficient. (It wouldn't let me upload all of the family pictures for some reason)

I posted about my dad in this thread over 7 years ago; he’ll be 80 in April. He called me in the afternoon on March 4th and said “Hey, did you get on your computer and get me in the Utah draw for the Paunsaugunt? I’m due.” “Yeah Dad, I took care of it.” You gotta love it, almost 80 and still dreaming of another go-around after a big mule deer buck!