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Was lucky enough to have drawn a tag this year with a couple good friends. We knew this deer was in the area. Opening morning a friend got on him, but couldn’t seal the deal and tagged out on another nice buck. That afternoon, @buglethemin and I headed where we thought we could glass him up. Sure enough, some does busted and while trying to find what spooked the does we picked him up at 1100 yards. It was after 5pm and losing daylight so we decided to try and make a play. We were able to loop around and get to 410 yards. 140gr accubond out of 280ai did the trick. Great healthy deer, nice big body. Just over 15” inside spread. Couldn’t be happier. IMG_0213.mov

https://www.southwestgameprocessingaz.com/

Traditional Gov't hand outs and open check book vs fiscal planning, stand on your feet and top down economics (jobs are created by those that actually produce something)...? Is that what you are getting at?

We really should be doing more elk scouting but.. Weather was killer for fishing. Salmon was dying down. Not so for trout.

Well my youngest boy shot his first Coues deer in 2017, 250 yd shot in unit 33. He was pretty stocked because it was the biggest out of my other two children at that age…so there was some trash talking going on. Since then he’s been drawn for deer and cow elk but unfortunately has never filled his tag, he was getting pretty down on his luck. Well he got drawn for the early general hunt in 33 unit again and was looking forward to filling his tag. Being that Redington is so close to home we were going to do day trips because of the extreme heat this weekend, regardless we were both ready. We got up at 3:30AM on Friday and got to our parking spot at 5:15 and made it to our glassing spot right at 6:00. I told him to glass this hillside where I saw 3 bucks about a month earlier coming down into a draw. I told him I’m focusing on this other area where I’ve seen an absolute bruiser. Well at 6:30AM I see 2 does, I turn to my left and proceed to tell him but as you would know it, he was asleep…go figure. I then turn to the hill he was looking at and instantly see antlers, I said…I’ve got a buck get up. This was at 6:40AM. He shoots straight up and asks how far, he was bedded at 343yds. I have him get behind the 15’s so he can see what landmarks to focus on when he’s behind the rifle. We both back up about 5 yds on more level ground so he can lay prone. He gets the deer in the scope, I dial it to 350 yds and tell him just breathe easy and squeeze the trigger. As I’m looking through my binos all I hear is heaving breathing, I told him to relax the deer isn’t going anywhere. All of sudden he cracks off the first round and I wasn’t ready, I go back to the binos and see nothing, he says he missed but the deer moved to right about 20’. I’m frantically looking to see where it’s at and I hear another crack, I asked where is it, and then a third shot rang out….he then yelled I got it. At that time I do see the deer tumble. It wasn’t dead so he let one more fly and put it down, right at 6:50AM. As I’m patting him on his back he says “ dad my eye really hurts”, I have him look up at me and he has a really nice egg of a welt just above his eye on his forehead. No signs of blood, so I start to giggle and remind him of what I told him not to do with his eye. For the next 1/2 hour all I hear is, dad this hurts and of course I told him remember what I told you. We cross the canyon and locate his buck, I don’t know who was more excited him or me, but I could definitely tell he’s in hog heaven because he just stood there admiring the antlers. We gutted it and started the haul out, we got back to the truck at 9:45AM completely exhausted due to the heat. Pics of him and his 1st deer-2017 Pics of him and his 2nd deer-2024

The list is finally up on the fish and game site.

As I patiently wait for my December rifle hunt to be here , I figured we’d have a little fun guessing the score of my last rifle buck I was blessed to have taken . I’m getting him officially scored in a few days to see if he can be entered into Boone and Crockett , then will be sending him off to Clay to have shoulder mount done. I know a bunch of you guys are pretty good at guessing score on these little majestic creatures from god off of photos So let’s see who’s the closest to the exact measurement. To help you with a guess , his inside spread is 16 inches !!

CZ upland ultra light. 12 gauge, 28 inch barrel, 3 inch chamber. Very nice shotgun for bird hunting. It's really light and easy to carry around. Purchased it for my son, but he cannot seem to hit birds with it and likes his browning pump better. Includes 5 chokes. $650

I call those victory steaks. Nice job, hope to hear a story of you didn't already post one.

After his first deer hunt last year (unsuccessful) I put my grandson in for the youth hunt. He drew a cow tag in 4A. We scouted a couple of times and he was excited to see them up close. We got there on Wed before the hunt and drove some roads and saw elk. Thursday am I woke him up and there were elk 75 yds. from camp- he was shocked. That evening drove around and saw more elk. Friday- opening morning we left camp and were into elk but too far away for a shot. We tried following them but couldn't catch up with their quick walk. That evening hunt we didn't see anything. Saturday - AM hunt was uneventful but we did help another group with some tracking but trail was lost. PM hunt driving to where we were going to sit a herd ran across the road about 200 yds ahead of us and dropped into a steep draw area. I told him that's where we were going to sit for the evening as I figured they would come back up there to graze and hit water. After sitting there we heard some cow yelps and moved 250 yds towards the sound. after a few minutes I spotted a cow starting thru a small clearing. It went thru too quickly. The next one by was a spike. Another cow stepped into the clearing and stopped - he was steady and drawn as I waited for the shot- didn't happen. I think we had a slight case of buck fever- that was all we saw of that small group. A few minutes later we heard bugling and cows where we were initially and headed back over there. The herd was moving back across the road where they had first crossed and dropped into another draw. I told him we probably wouldn't catch up but he was insistent to follow. We ended up a ways from the road and they had stopped in another meadow area. We slow footed towards them and ended up about 100 yds from the herd. We waited for a cow to enter a clearing and the rest is history - except for the quartering and pack out. Congrats Mason Burns

First off thanks to the good Lord for the time I got to spend with my boy, it was a heck of a time with plenty of ups and downs. Can't say enough how cool it is to watch your kids slowly become young men. Second thanks to @M@tt for coming down to help the first couple days. Great guy for sure. And of course @zackcarp for squeezing room in the walk in to hang the kids buck. This hunt started with high expectations, Kiki said he wants to hunt muley's, and so we did. Started off in an area I thought was a slam dunk. As usual (for me anyway) hunting mule deer made me humble. Spent the first couple days glassing up only forkies and does. Moved the camper closer to home, glassed up more forkies and does. Luck turned Sunday morning when we spotted a couple decent coues bucks and we went for it. As they do like ghosts they disappeared while on the stalk. Thought for sure they were heading for thick cover but in retrospect that phrase got me.. "coues are always where you last saw them". Looked up to see them high tailing it away from us. Next morning got off to a 15 minute late start, my fault but it could a made the difference. Got to the glassing point and immediately picked up a herd of muley's. Saw one that I knew right away was a stud. Bailed off the hill to give chase. No biggun where I thought he should be though. Had a doe and a spike walk right in front of us and that was it. I decided to pull out to not ruin a future chance. Came back that evening and no deer to be seen. Talked momma into coming the next morning, promised her we were close to sealing the deal. The next morning she was not as gung-ho when 330 rolled around, but she still came. Got breakfast at Denny's (part of the deal we made) and off we went. Got to the spot early and started glassing in the dark. No deer... Kept glassing... No deer.... Kept glassing... A couple does.... Oof. I told Caliche even if it's trash deer we should probably go for it since momma don't come out often. He agreed. Well once the sun was up I spotted one lone coues over a mile away verified he was a decent buck based on overall frame but we kept glassing for a closer opportunity. Suddenly like clockwork several white rump patches started appearing very close to the coues buck. We all converse quick and decide there is a chance the big one is nearby and if not we still got the coues. Bailed again off the hill, while in route momma said the big one is out there. We got to where I felt comfortable stalking and started to glass and could not find any muley but the WT buck was right in front of us under 200. The wind also started to shift. Momma said where the big muley was but due to the wind shift and not knowing the location of the rest of the muley herd we quickly decided let's kill this coues buck. Texted momma we are on the WT and getting ready to shoot. Well momma was so mesmerized by the muley she didn't keep eyes on the buck we were actually shooting and she didn't realize what I meant by WT. So we set up for the shot in a quick and quiet rush, Caliche looks at me and says "dude, this is so exciting!" and a minute later bang! I see the buck in my binos fly backwards and drop. Clearly we are full of adrenaline and I tell him he dropped, I texted momma "he dropped him". She responds I'm still looking at him??? I'm like no babe he shot the whitetail buck! So we rack another round and creep in just in case. we were in tall grass and sure enough the hit was a spine shot. Saw him up flailing and told him put one through his neck high and he did but for good measure had him put another in his head. Hence the bulging eyes. Once we really stopped and got to look him over I was pretty stoked at the buck he just killed. I assured him this buck was an old stud. Pretty gnarly horns and big body. Rack had some serious character and we had no regrets shooting this guy over the big muley. Called momma for the pickup while I showed Kiki how to quickly gut a deer. We earned ourselves some deer dragging sweat and met momma for some more pics. As per usual my new hunting partner Bucky the Boston terrier was there for the entire hunt, although not on the stalk he still put on the 12+ miles with us for the rest of it. Can't say as a dad how proud I am of Caliche.. out of all of my kids he's the one that seems to be bitten by the hunting bug the most. He was all in and fully immersed in this hunt. Even being the first one to pick up deer behind the glass a few times. This kid has grit and he sure makes me proud. He even caped his buck himself and measured him. He did dam good too on both fronts. Buck grossed 94" and netted like 88 and change. Can't wait to do it again. Got another youth tag this Friday and can't wait. It's my youngest boy Enoch. I don't think he's gonna embrace the suck though so probably forkies are on the menu, but if he's happy I'm happy. Thanks for reading. Ps. Not gonna lie, we had a hard time not laughing while taking the first few pics. Them crazy Steve Buscemi eyes

Just like every major city with high impoverishment and crime rates (Chicago, la, NY, Atlanta, Minneapolis, etc etc) all have voted left for decades and all are living in shat - they just don't get it... You can save some miles and look at this too https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/upshot/2020-election-map.html

It's pretty common knowledge that reservations vote nearly 100% Democrat. Easy to understand when the democrats are the ones giving them all of the social programs and other handouts. You'd think after voting Democrat forever and not being any better off than they were 50 years ago they'd switch it up. Most are happy just existing so they don't care.

God continues to bless me, and today was no different! Unit 34a was scheduled to close today at sundown, so I headed down for the final day in hopes of killing a big ole bruin, but just happy to be outdoors! I had never killed a bear with a rifle (3 with bow and one with handgun) so I decided to take the old 30/30 lever action out for a try. This big ole bruin walked out right before sunset and presented himself at 42 yds. 1 shot from the old lever action and he tumbled into the gulch below, but he wasn't done as he reared up and began to come straight for my tree stand! 2 quick shots put a end to that and then the work begun! this bear stood nearly 4ft high as he walked in, a monster of a bear ( maybe some Mexican Griz DNA in him). I was a little nervous as I walked up to him, because he was so big! The pack out sucked! I hurt everywhere now! We green scored the skull at 20.5" tonight! Amazing day for a last day of the hunt! I think I'm done bear hunting! Too old for this stuff! lol. Truly Blessed!

Venison that was walking around 3 hours prior.

Please do not wait if you have not signed up for an absentee ballot. Today’s the last day to request an absentee ballot. . Please cast your vote early. Only two weeks away to support the things we believe in. It’s not too late, and if you wait life has a way of getting busy on us. Hunting, family commitments, etc. Please vote our kids and grandkids will thank us some day.. Thanks Phil

I'm trying to research all these judges, I'm sure many do and many do not deserve to be retained. They're supposedly nonpartisan with no party affiliation, so far all I have to go on is which governor appointed them. Suggestions?

Good stuff! I like making Asian dishes with quail too. The meat is my favorite from any wild fowl.

Quail piccata

My nephew had the unit two weeks ago. Saw 11 bucks. 9 were branch antlered including 1 behemoth in 2.5 days of hunting.

Use a suppressor stop being a peasant ……..

One and the same.

No it’s a single shot 😂

Yeah I know what I have but thanks