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We decided to give it a go in a true desert unit this fall. Never had hunted it before but a couple buddies have seen a fair amount of deer in January during OTC. We arrived Thursday evening with only two days to hunt and as we picked a camp spot the landscape blew me away…how do these things survive and thrive out here. Looked like the surface of the moon with the surface mostly volcanic rock, scattered creosote bushes, and the occasional palo verde washes sprinkled around. 4 of my buddies generously offered to help on Friday and as we all picked high spots to glass from the reports started coming in of bucks. Multiple bucks and some good ones were located in various locations. Max and I spent most of the day on stalk after stalk trying to close the gap to under 600 yards with not much available to hide our approach. We had a few opportunities on small bucks we passed on and a couple close calls on bigger ones but nothing just right. We totaled 19 bucks seen that day. Saturday morning we were down to Max and I and 2 buddies so we all went to the spot that the most deer were seen Friday. Almost immediately we found a group of 3 bucks at 1000 yards. We had some topography to work with this time and we closed the gap to 340 yards and Max anchored the biggest one. It was a fun hunt that I think with a few extra days could produce something pretty special! This was his best desert buck to date and another awesome father son hunt in the books! Now time to get packed for Colorado 4th season Deer 🤙🏻

Nash is carrying a horseshoe that’s never seen daylight. After having a desert sheep tag last year he drew an antelope tag this year. Scouting was tougher than we expected. Not a ton of goats in the unit and we went out plenty of times and never saw a single lope. It was still fun. During my archery bull hunt we slipped out one midday to look around. We bumped I to a dude who told us where he had seen a few. We ended up finding a few right there. Lots of people shared ideas with us and local friends even went out and glassed a few times for us. It was fun to have a hunt where people were really open and wanted Nash to be successful. Nash had practice opening day, this kid is ridiculously committed to wrestling, so we headed up midday. By that night we had a decent buck spotted but we just couldn’t cut the distance down. These antelope were super spooky and would run for miles at the site of a truck. We pulled out after dark and nearly stepped on a baby prairie rattler walking back. The next AM we slipped right into where we saw him at dark and waited for it to get light. The group was right where we left them, except the big buck. He was somehow 1-1/2 miles away. We ended up walking a 7-1/2 mile loop and lost track of him somewhere in the rollers. Unreal. We tried a new spot real quick before running to town for lunch and had a super close encounter with a bit g cutter buck before he got a wild hair and ran into Colorado. For the evening we hit up one of the spots we had seen a decent buck scouting. Didn’t take long for me to find some a mile or two out. We went to loop around on them and bumped into a different buck before we got there. A little sneaking and Nash had a 325 yd shot with only the top 4” of his back exposed. Thats all he needed. After the shot I said you dumped him, and Nash say “Actually?!?!” Apparently he flinched so hard his eyes were closed when the gun went off. Thank goodness for that 2-1/2 lb trigger! Nash asked if he could do all the quartering himself and did a fine job. I’d say these boys have almost outgrown their old man. The buck wasn’t real big and Nash didn’t care. He has two from Wyoming that are curled and heavier. This time he said he wanted a tall one. This one is almost 16”, so I guess that qualifies. We had time the next morning to go scout for his sister’s cow hunt. They were going good and we saw a good bull to round out the trip. Then he took it home and did his own euro.

I hope you were able to see the aurora earlier this week. This is what my camera caught here in Flagstaff just before 10pm.

Was able to connect on a decent little 3x3 175 yards with my CVA Optima this year. Of course after the shot a much larger buck ran out from behind cover, still happy with this guy.

I've shared my family story of Veterans Day before on here. I won't go into the details again, but its searchable if you want to read about it. You can also look up "Task Force Black Vietnam November 11, 1967" or look up "Vietnman Soldiers' Story: The Invisible Enemy" documentary. My dad was interviewed for part of that. We all grew up fighing the war he brought home. Thank you to all the vets on here and out there. To you combat vets on here: I see you. I'll sit with you in the dark. Don't hesitate to reach out. Please.

Went out on opening day Friday to look for a bruiser out in Redington to my secret spot 😆. Turned up 16 does and 1 decent 2x, it was 600 yds out, complete opposite direction of truck. He will live another day!!! Saturday had family obligations so I got some good rest for Sunday. Headed out this morning to the front side of Mt Lemmon to my other secret spot😅. The hill was straight up and full of shin daggers…..I absolute hate those things!!!! Found multiple doe right from the get go. Started glassing across this canyon and found 5 bucks right away. Ranged them at just under 800 yds. Where I was positioned on the down slope of this hill I couldn’t use my bipod, so I hurried down hill to a more level spot and a flat rock. They were milling around and ranged them again at 750 yds. As I extend my bipod and position the rifle I keep looking through the big binos and I thought let’s try and see my rifle is up for the challenge. I’ve shot rocks out to 800, but never a deer. 1st shot was just above the deer, I see dirt/dust fly. Reload and send another one. Same spot, more dust. I back the clicks down 2 and send the 3rd round….. bam deer down. As I get some landmarks as to where the deer fell I start walking. 8:10 was shot, I didn’t find the deer till 9:23. The mountain was so steep and so thick of vegetation I couldn’t find the rock formation it fell by. Finally found it…..wheeew. Took some pics and started the long drag out, dropped it off at the butcher and now back at home relaxing. Looking forward to my daughters WT hunt Nov 7.

Next up Rob and I took some of our family to NM for Oryx. my son and son in law had a great time shooting their first Oryx. Rob’s brothers shot some also I didn’t get pictures of them all

My younger son drew the general rifle hunt tag this year as his 1st deer tag. 2 weeks ago my older son was on the youth hunters in the same unit and the big storms really put a damper on that hunt. The weather for this hunt was much better thankfully. Friday morning was a dud, but Friday evening we sat a blind that we setup a few ago. About 445pm 6 deer walked in. 2 spikes and 4 doe. We were teying to get him settled and setup for a shot on a spike and they were moving and feeding. Either stopping in front of other deer, behind other deer, or at bad angles. After about 5-10 min something kinda spooked then and they went into cover and fed away. Bummer. About 530pm a few doe popped out of another area farther away, then came the 2 spikes. It was the same group. We started positioning on them and from the right 4 more deer fed in, this group had a Forkhorn in the mix, so we started to target him. Again. He wouldn't stop moving or stopped in bad positions. Eventually it got to dark and we had to let them go. Saturday was uneventful other than bumping some does here and there. Sunday morning went like Friday morning. Not alot. Sunday afternoon we set the blind again and the 4 does and 2 spikes fed back in around 5pm. We were able to get my son lined up on a shot at about 200yards. He sent a round and you could tell the buck was hurt bad, but he walked about 30yrds and lied down. We gave him some time, but he was still head up so I had my son send another round. He was hit again, walked about 10yrds and lied down again. After awhile we went over and he expired. It wasn't as clean as you pray for, but it was done. He was a pretty happy camper and I was a happy dad. We quarter him out and got him out of there after dark. You always want a trophy, but this will be his first of hopefully many. So this is trophy #1 with room to grow.

Ya I will say that, the water was crazy. I have for sure never seen as much water as we did this year. Every single tank was loaded. A couple of springs that were dry 2 years in a row were flowing again. Tons of logging going on across the state as well so hopefully they are doing it right and not going too far. Some of the cuts we ran across seemed a little excessive. We got hooked up by one crew, helped them out with a floor jack and they filled my truck with juniper and oak.

I don’t think you can make an educated guess on the buck population in central and southern AZ after a couple general season hunts. Especially when you consider it rained 2” 2 weeks before the hunts. Had a super moon on one of the hunts. 2 drought years and tons of tags every year, they probably didn’t increase this year. there’s hardly a quail out there. If you got a lot of quail where you’re at this year, you’re the anomaly.

Action screw torque is crucial in tupperware stocks. https://www.accurateshooter.com/technical-articles/savage-action-screw-torque-tuning/ I have only bedded one polymer 10 stock and it did help, but it was relatively stout to begin with. If yours is one of the really flimsy stocks, with the bedding effort involved, I'd consider an upgrade. That said, bedding can't hurt and could make good practice for a future bedding job on a better stock.

Thanks to all our Vets, past and present

Browning Superposed 12ga modified and Improved 26" recoil pad in very good condition. $1100 Remington 1100 LT 28" 20ga Excellent 2 3/4" shells Ventilated rib hi viz front sight. Very nice $650 Winchester 41 410 full choke 24" barrel $300 Open to offers if it interest anyone. I'm hr SE of Tucson.

First trip of the year was our annual Mexico trip. I’ve been with Rob in old Mexico maybe 12-13 times. As always a great trip with friends. This year was tough in regards to big bucks but we had a great time regardless and still killed some solid bucks. I haven’t killed a buck for a few years now I’m hoping we can manage for older class bucks but who knows, it seems like we never see the same deer anyway.

Joel Etchen Signature special. 12 gauge 32" barrels. Negrini case with all accessories that came with it. Perfect condition, not a mark on it. About 250 rounds through it. $3650. Located in Globe but I go to the valley often. Not Interested in trades.

Got to share youth deer camp with some good friends, with three youth tags in camp. My son had killed a spike last year and was looking for forked or bigger this year. One of the hunters was looking for his first deer and was first up to bat. Opening morning a buddy located a couple small bucks, including a shooter 2x2 with a small forky. They bedded them, and we watched them a few hours, waiting for them to get up and offer a shot. They finally did, and a first deer was harvested! The forky stuck around and even though he was bigger then a spike, my son decided he was too young and let him walk. Day two, another buddy showed us a new area. We worked a ridgeline glassing fingers on the ridges to the east and west. After a mile or so and the 3rd glassing spot, this guy was spotting working up a draw and feeding. We knew he was a shooter in an instant. He wasn’t in a hurry, but sure wasn’t gonna bed for us. He was moving towards a small saddle. He was at 650 yards, and we could maybe shave 200 yards getting to the next ridge but wouldn’t be able to get there before he was over the ridge and gone. It was a now or never type of thing, and the deer was broadside, slightly quartering to. I trust the gun and dope, and my son can shoot. We made sure he had a solid rest, dialed for distance and had him hold for a slight breeze. Kid was cool as a cucumber. At the sound of the shot, the deer hunched and I knew we had a hit, but he ran over the saddle so we couldn’t confirm. It was a long 30 minutes to hike down the one ridge and up the other but we found him about 20 yards from where he was the shot, piled against a tree just over the crest. Entrance was middle on onside shoulder, exit just behind off shoulder. His smile says it all and I couldn’t be prouder! The third hunter is still looking for something special, so send some big buck vibes his way this week!

There was a giant killed today

Neighborhood bull is still with cows

It's funny you say that Chris, I was just thinking to myself man that sounds like a furlough meal but we were never furloughed!

You know a mf’er is serious when he has a peg board of supplies.

Here area couple more photos from that trip. Jordan with the a bull and Josh with a cow from this hunt

Just got back from seven days afield with my boys chasing the Grey Ghost and had the best time. The desert was super green and just beautiful ecerywhere. Saw water in places I have not seen since late 90s. It was interesting to observe different behaviors and patterns as a result of decent rain leading up to this hunt. Noticed less browsing on scrub oak and more heads down grazing. Tanks and seeps used less frequently while water is available elsewhere - yet some come in probably out of habit or convenience. Hiked into higher elevation areas but noticed general deer density and bigger bucks at lower elevation. Bugs... dang, once that fireball came up in the sky we were bombed with a constant cloud of pesty little flies / gnats. Once the sun went down, it was like a switch was thrown and they stopped, then sent in the mosquitos to finish the job. Haha. Wildflowers - everywhere! Never seen these flowers out here before in October. Took lots of scenery pics, might have missed a few ghosts passing by while caught up in the beauty of it all. I did not observe cattle munching on prickly pear pads. They seemed pretty content with the green stuff on the ground. What were your observations afield as result of the rains?

I'm amused you think life is fair. Sovereign nation so they can do what they want, at least they didn't take the ops money.