Leaderboard

Got to help my nephew on his 33 youth hunt. These hunts are the best!

As a Gambels quail freak, I'll not be completely satisfied without a wet winter plus a nice kicker storm sometime in mid-late Spring (Call me greedy for wanting a double hatch!). But as an AZ native and general fan of rain, I say heck yes to every single drop! 👍

Oh boy, let it rain.. Greener then crap all the way to Phoenix and all around payson. The hood elk are fat.

Everything pictured is free to any youth hunters in need of this stuff. Kuiu bino chest pouch size L and XL, Leupold bino harness, Harris bipod, Limbsaver butt stock, sling, gloves, hats, small day pack, bird bags, Highgear Summit watch. Buck, Smith and Wesson, and small 2 blade pocket knives with parents consent. I’m in NW Tucson for P/U. 520-444-767one.

Good luck to all the lucky tag holders! Be safe and post those trophies!!

I'll take this...

I might have to go. Haven't been since most of you were born and only went a few times but I picked it up after a few hours.

Love that for you guys. I was lucky to have a dad and mom took me to do it and got me passes. It wasn’t cheap then, but my broke butt just can’t justify it anymore

Not me, I still got my ski’s but no boots. Haven’t been in 20 years. Used to live for it.

Gonna be so wet elk won’t be able to lift their heads in July.

I wonder how Sunrise is doing. I can remember back in the day skiing there on Thanksgiving.

Glass is still glass so no case and no caps is exposing glass and a possible issue. With that said I'd suggest the GPO Passion ED Binoculars. Great quality, under $500.00 during our current Black Friday / Year End Sale and a lifetime no fault warranty

Licensed and titled Custom built Camo trailer features: 3500 pound torsion axle with spare and led lighting Insulated top with lighting and double rear doors Fold down bunk Open and enclosed storage on the sides 13 gallon water tank with 12V pump Includes popup outhouse, collapsing garbage can, Coleman camp stove Currently set up in shop to show in San Tan Valley. I can text more pictures if needed. Price $1300 for trailer package.

That’s not abnormal, they ski till July there. Snowbowl with 47” on November 22 is crazy

No need to delete, just stop coming if you aren't interested in the forum any longer

Custom Ruger #1 .270. Custom wood, case colored frame, lever, quarter rib, rings. Checkered steel grip cap and butt plate. Accurized and custom trigger. Shoots great - sub 1-inch groups with several factory loads. $3700 for local sale. In Queen Creek area. Was told it would cost $6000+ to do it again. Scope not included. Many more pics available Hate to part with it but divorce requires you to do stupid things...

Your comment on growth is just incorrect and your logic is ignorant to seasonal hydrologic and biotic relationships. I like OPs word-use "primed," a great way for our watersheds to be going into moisture during any month. Very nice is the answer to OPs question!

You’re probably right because I’m a little retarded but that doesnt make any logical sense to me. that an 700lb animal could grow optimal antlers without an optimal body going into the growing season. Rain in June and July don’t make any sense to me either, they’re almost done by then. This isn’t the frozen tundra. stuff will grow, waterholes are all full, there’s more in the forecast for next week. It already can’t be as bad as the last 2 years

Can’t wait til March and April and get enough moisture. Need it all through winter and continue through April.

A few years ago we sold our home and our plan was to wait until prices came down up here on the mountain before we started to build. Well it didn’t happen so we built last year. Anyway during this time we had invested some money into my remodeling my parents “little” house (580 sqft) so they allowed us to live there rent free for the next 3 years. It was the first time I hadn’t had to pay rent or mortgage in our 25 years of marriage. My wife was ok if I invested some of that money saved into my personal and emotional well being. I was able to get CO vouchers the last couple of years. I shot a good buck my first year, but I hadn’t seen anything over 170” to shoot until this year. I’ve always been ok going home empty handed but when this deep forked buck gave me the opportunity I decided to take it. A couple of random bucks screenshots. My first CO buck a few years ago. this years buck.

Nah, this is still money in the bank. They’re gonna be fatter and healthier going into winter. Won’t have to move much all winter. Go into growing season primed. the way it’s shaping up, could be wet all winter

Sitting in my elk camp now around the fire dealing with the last 3 days of being rained on chasing a few bulls around with my bow got me missing the warm southern weather. I started the season off with killing a solid buck on the opening morning. I found this buck on the 2024 late December hunt helping my dad. We opted to not shoot him last year as he had half an antler broken off. I kept tabs on the buck from February on. Opening morning I went to where he had been frequently spotted and never turned him up. About 9:30 with not seeing much I decided to change spots and go look for my backup buck. To my surprise the first buck I found in the new location was the buck I was initially looking for. I had never seen him in this area. After watching him bed I snuck in and shot him at 227 yards. Hit him mid body. Slightly panicked I scrambled to reload the muzzleloader. Shot again in a rush and made a bad follow-up shot knocking a chunk out of the top of his back. He went and laid down and I watched him expire about 5 minutes later. My apologies on sub par pictures as I’m not good at solo photography deal. Went over and quartered the buck packed him out and all was wrapped up before 1:00pm opening day. Following that 2 weeks later I took my Mom on her whitetail hunt who turned 66 on opening day. It was slow. Didn’t see any mature bucks. We hunted 3 more days until one of the bucks I was looking for finally showed up. Nice 100”ish type 3x4. We played cat and mouse with him but he unfortunately disappeared on us. A while later my mom found a nice little 3x3 across the canyon that she said she would be more than happy to take. We snuck in to position and set her up 290 yards from the bedded buck. After 3 1/2 hours the buck finally stood. She heart shot the buck and he dropped where he stood. She was extremely happy as this was the first coues she had taken in the last 10 years. She’s taken a lot of time off hunting to help take care of family and grandchildren so this ment a lot to her. Couldn’t of been more proud of my mom. it was a tough 4 days on her hiking the hills getting after it in the October sun. Currently still a busy season going on as I am on a late archery Bull elk hunt and my 10 and 12 year old kids have rifle bull hunts after thanksgiving. We have one late December whitetail tag left to fill this year and can’t be more excited for it.

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.

Here is my hunt recap. My Dad and I came up Wednesday and went out in the evening to see what we could find. Driving around we saw probably 30-40 deer, mostly does but a couple of very small bucks. Thursday we head out and don’t see much in the morning. Even after the rain we got ~3 weeks ago the area was back to being pretty dry so we head to a water catchment and glass from a high point in the road. We were able to glass up group of about 10-12 does. We go check out another water catchment and discover someone had constructed a blind. Friday morning we setup in some of the clear cut to glass. We see a couple groups of does and one single deer I could not determine if it was a buck or not prior to it going into cover. We move to another area but don’t see anything. For the evening we decided to sit in the blind we found at the second water catchment. After about an hour and a half a couple of does come in to drink. After about an hour my dad decided he has to stretch his legs and walks up the hill away from the catchment. While he is gone a deer comes in and it’s a buck! I text my Dad not to come back so he doesn’t scare it away. Of course there are 2 small trees that he drinks behind leaving no shot. It feels like forever that he is drinking behind the trees and my dad is texting what was going on. As he is leaving he finally presents me a shot at about 70 yards. After a long night of breaking it down and the long drive out we were both exhausted but thrilled that I was actually about to be successful and share the hunt together.

Im in too!