Gduncan

My 2018 Hunting included several firsts for me. I got my first bow and started archery shooting for the first time in September 2017 and my wife got her first bow in October. Feeling like we were shooting well enough to attempt hunting we got OTC Deer tags and on some vacation time the last two weeks of January 2018 picked an area we had seen deer in before while driving through. Since our ability to hike any real distance is limited and so far our stalking abilities suck, we found a water hole to sit to hopefully ambush a buck that might come in within our bow range. We saw quite a few deer come in, some does within 10-11 yrds from us! We both had shot opportunities at nice bucks but our inexperience along with Healthy doses of Buck Fever prevented us from connecting with only clean misses. We practiced all year and went back out to this spot on December 16. We got in and set up under a big oak about 7:15 and waited and watched, my wife just over an arms length to my right. About an hour later I saw a deer moving through the brush and trees about 70 yrds away. When it dropped into the bowl of the water hole at about 40 yrds I thought it was a doe due to limited visibility and not wanting to move enough to use my binos and spook it out in case a buck was following her in. When it went to the right past a big Juniper tree enough my wife saw it was a buck and tried to whisper "Shooter" which of course I couldn't hear but the buck did and stopped and looked straight at her. After a few moments it looked away and continued to the small water puddle back to our left. When it cleared the Juniper tree to my side I realized it was a buck not a doe. He stopped at the waters edge at 21 yrds and I released an arrow at 8:21 am. The sound of the Swhacker broad head hitting him was louder than I would have thought and seemed like it echoed! He jumped, kicked and took off tail tucked over the earthen dam of the water hole and we listened carefully and in a few moments thought we heard him crash. We forced ourselves to sit for 30 minutes before even going down to look for my arrow that I found covered in blood and buried about 6" in the ground. Following the blood trail about half way to where we found the buck down I saw motion to my left and had to run off what was either a coyote or Mexican gray wolf that looked like he was already scent tracking my buck! We found my Couse buck at about 60 yrds in a drainage double lunged. This is my first ever Deer, a Couse Whitetail and first Archery kill. He's not real big, but real Couse deer aren't big anyway!

Thanks Kev! I would not have believed that I could have done this (getting within 500 yrds of a buck during a hunt season with a tag in my pocket!) 1 1/2 years ago! But got talked into trying archery by a guy I used to work with years ago. I'm glad I did try it! He's glad too as I shared some venison with him! Surprised the heck out of my Dad, I hadn't told him we were into archery until I sent him a picture of me and my buck. I even one upped the old man by one point bigger than the Couse buck he got a couple months before I was born 60 years ago! As to my wife of 36 1/2 years, I can't even think about trying to go hunting without her and not expect to get in hot water! Got ourselves a jeep a few years ago that helps a lot in getting closer to the areas we can't hike to. She is the one that does the hide tanning and did the skull that I have on the wall now.

After numerous short conversations with a young guy through my work (he works for a contractor doing work for my employer) I have agreed to try to help him on his first game hunt and he has chosen the spring hunt for Javelina. At 19 yrs old I guess he doesn't qualify for any of the typical "Youth Hunts". I am not what you would call an experienced hunter. I did help my wife get her first game animal, a Javelina and then was finally able to get my first one the following year. Haven't seen any sign of Javelina in that area since seeing lots of Mountain Lion tracks. We are going to do the Online Hunter Education Course primarily since he hasn't been around anyone that hunts to make sure all bases are covered to get him started. So, I'm looking for any advise and/or help from this point to offer him as good of an experience as possible. We both live in/near Tucson and once we figure out where to put in for tags and determine if day trips or setting up a hunt camp is appropriate, as we will most likely be weekend hunting only due to work. Thanks in advance for any thoughts, advice or help!

Wow, Thanks for all the support and suggestions!

Between my wife and I, four different bows using the QAD Ultra rest Hunter with noise at shot, inconsistency, with some arrows doing a visible wild bronco ride to the target area. All installed at archery pro shops, including one shop also setting the center shot way off on the Mathews I had. I ended up plugging the QAD CD into the computer and reviewing the installation instructions several times. Then went through step by step and remounted the rest and timing cord length and served in position and nock height according to QAD's instructions. Every one of our bows suddenly got dramatically quieter and more consistent shots. We did discover the QAD rest that replaced a whisker biscuit on my wife's first bow came up with a glitch during drop and would bounce. Replaced it with a new QAD rest and used cheap lipstick on the launcher to verify clearance of the fletching and all is well now with that bow. I went with a QAD HDX with the lock down function that stops any launcher bounce on my Evolve 35 and it's still doing great at 1,000 arrows shot so far with it.

SOLD!

2016 Mathews HTX in Lost Camo XD 70# limbs Draw range 23" to 29" Two Draw modules included, 28.5" with 29" installed, both 85% Torque Less Custom Bow Grip Maybe 200 shots on new ABB Platinum string set installed 4-5-18 QAD Ultrarest Hunter drop away arrow rest 7 pin lighted PSE sight Mathews 6 arrow Quick attach Bow Quiver in matching Lost Camo XD Asking $650 I really like this bow and would not be selling it but it's max draw length is too short for me.

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It is made to fit either way and can be changed easily. I liked it this way as it helped make it less top heavy feeling.

TTT Will be posting this bow on Craigslist this weekend.

This was my second year hunting Javelina. Last year on the morning of the last hunt day my Wife on her first ever hunt got a nice big old male and I got tag soup. Due to multiple things we didn't get to go scouting for this years hunt so we figured we would just start where she got hers last year. So we drive in and park the jeep and hike on to the water hole just as there is enough light to get into position to wait. At about 8:25 I see one javi through some trees at about 80 yrds for a moment before it disappears. At the same time we are hearing vehicles not far away. I turn back to look for the javi again and it's now on my side of the trees and about 10 yrds left of where I'd seen it before. It comes on in to about 75 yrds in the open and turns to give a perfect profile for the shot. It spun around and ran about thirty feet back into the brush and trees and piles up just as the two vehicles drive right up to the outside of the waterhole behind us. I'm amazed that the vehicles coming up so close didn't spook the javi back into the brush before I could get my shot off. It turned out to be a 53 lb female for my first ever Javelina! So now I get to play Sherpa for my Wife to see if we can find one for her before the season runs out.

Thanks everyone! Well we weren't able to find a Javelina for my wife this year, but think we know why. One, the area looked like there had been mud bog parties going on in the area due to the severely pounded out mud holes in the roads and trails and large and small vehicle tracks all over the desert. Two, heard lots of active coyote's in the area. We spotted one female that looked like she laid down and when we approached it turned out to be a den that she had ducked into. Three, Mountain Lion tracks that measure up to be in the 150 lb. size cat! After seeing all of this and very little Javelina sign we feel fortunate to have gotten the I did on opening morning. Four, and of course the biggest reason is our extreme inexperience at hunting. Just reading and going out and trying to apply what we have read. But we are having fun learning as we go while enjoying Arizona outdoors! So, until next season!

My wife and I are confirmed for unit 29 wt in November! This will be her first ever deer hunt! But she needs a better guide than me since I have yet to get any game in AZ. Hoping to find a bigger buck than the Coues my dad got back in the late 50's!

Wife and I were up on the rim the last weekend of June enjoying the cooler temps and the dry green scenery (compared to the even dryer triple digit heat in Tucson..) and found this tree. We started to debate if it was from bear or mountain lion until we got close and could smell the cat piss all around it. I'm 6' tall and while the majority of the claw marks are 5.5' and below, there is a couple scratches at and above my eye level. Is this a male lion territory marking? We did find some very fresh lion tracks in the softer dirt on the FS roads in the area. Just crawling along in the jeep with the windows down now and then we could smell what we thought was cat box but never could find them. The wind was blowing pretty good so we may have just not hiked down into the canyon far enough to locate the cat box. The next day in an area about a mile away we found some smaller lion tracks with some even smaller, we figured these were a female with kittens?

Even though my wife had a lion tag in her pocket we hadn't planned to actually hunt this trip as it was an anniversary weekend outing. We only had 9mm hand guns with us, no rifles and forgot to pack the e-caller... We do plan to go back as soon as we can plan/afford to go up there again with the appropriate gear to see what we can find hiking farther into the canyon the cat box smell was coming from. Thanks for the comments!

Cards got hit for deer tags for both my wife and I today! My second AZ tag as an adult and my wife's first ever deer tag! Hopefully, the newbies that we are, we will be able to figure this out and at least one of us get one on the ground this fall!

My wife scored her first Javelina today in 37A. She picked up one of the leftover tags after I was drawn for mine so we could go figure out how to hunt them together (I have never hunted them before either). We have been scouting all over 37A since the first of January seeing good sign in several areas but never seeing any pigs, one area only lots of other hunters. On Monday having no success so far we tried a different area only to walk up within 40 yards of a herd of at least 7 or 8 pigs that took off before we could do anything. But we knew then where we would be hunting the rest of the week! Today we made our way in before daylight and sat on a water hole to wait them out. We where there long enough for the birds to quit alerting anytime we moved at all. I was watching one trail and Angel was watching another one coming in from another direction. The one I was watching had enough Javelina traffic to work the trail to powder dust. A little after 8 am I saw one javelina in the brush and got ready for them to come up the trail to the water where one or both of us would have shot opportunity. But after almost 15 mins of them not appearing I hear a splash of water to my right past my wife and looked to see her with gun drawn and down on the scope. I looked toward the water and saw two pigs on the far side of the water just before she shot. I started in with a call but they only continued to run the other way. So I get up and go over to where she was sitting and she's shaking from the adrenaline rush and saying that it had to be a good hit because there was nothing but hair in the scope! Her shot was no more that 25 yrds at a third pig that I hadn't seen. Two adults and a youth with the one she shot at being the smaller of the two adults because it was drinking and didn't notice her very very slow movements to get her rifle up. The youth was apparently the one that spotted her and startled and made the spash that I heard. So after a few minutes to let the adrenaline slow a bit we started looking for blood trail. It was probably a good 30 yrds up over the dam before finding the first sign of blood and heading into some of the thickest brambles I think I may have ever seen. So we hiked back to the jeep and lightned our loads and went back to continue tracking. Another hunter stopped while we were still at the jeep and offered to help track the pig since he'd been hunting the area for archery and knew the area pretty well. We didn't get a last name but Rick with the white dodge pickup Thank You!!! My wife was starting to cuss the people that left there shotgun shells all over since the red ones she'd see in the grass was confusing the attempt to find blood. We ended up on our hands and knees crawling to get through the brush and thorns. Angel was in front of me and when she spotted her pig and I had to slow her down a bit and give her my 9mm just in case before approaching the last bit. Good thing he was dead because if we had needed to run we couldn't have hardly moved let alone run in the thicket. Rick had found a small wash just a few yards to the east and that made getting him back out to the jeep much easier than trying to drag him back out the way we had tracked him in. It took us about an hour from the time he was shot until we had him back to the jeep. All 56 lbs of him!

Looking for suggestions of taxidermists in the Tucson area? Considering ideas for my wife's Javelina. Just looking to do a simple head mount or skull depending on pricing. Thanks, Greg

Just finished cutting up and packaging the last of Angel's Javelina that I cooked on the smoker today over Mesquite lump charcoal! We Like!!! Nothing like the stories a lot of people have told us. Here are the shoulders and hind quarters coated in dry rub seasoning and ready to go in the smoker. And then a finished hind quarter with a nice smoke ring on it!

I forgot to mention in the story that except for the things that required some extra hands and/or strength, by her choice, she field dressed and butchered it all herself! She cooked some of it up tonight for dinner and if the rest of it tastes this good we will be back out there for more next year! Thanks to all from both of us for the encouragement and compliments! Greg & Angel

She's still wearing that big smile tonight! Yes, it is one of the infamous Mini 14's! And can't talk her out of it!

Wife and I both have our first ever Javelina tags and will be headed out in 37A in the morning to see if we can find them piggies! She's got her 223 and I'm taking my 7mm08 w/ Barnes 120 gr TTSX and my 9mm.

I haven't deer hunted in over 35 years and picked up a Marlin X7 in 7mm-08 on sale last winter and ended up drawing a nov 8 whitetail tag in 36A. Last AZ hunt was in 1969 in unit 29 with my dad who took a nice muley. Otherwise only a handful of deer hunts in Oklahoma. Wife and I started hunting for access two weekends ago, picked an area and started scouting it last Sunday. We spotted three does that two of them stood for 3~4 minutes looking at us at 85 yards. I read that glassing is key for Coues and have a pair of Nikon 10x42's that will have to do for this season. A new Nikon 4-12x40 BDC should be arriving tomorrow and get sighted in on Saturday and then target practicing every weekend that I can until my hunt. The ammo I have on hand is Barnes 120g TTSX, If I can shoot well enough, will this work with the longer distances of 300-500 yards that I'm reading is common when hunting Coues? Or should I be looking for a heavier grain bullet?

Yes, I was on the west and north west side due south of the end of sierrita mtn rd.

For me this year 36A was non producing. Opening day of my hunt Friday Nov. 8th was very quiet, only heard two shots all day. Around 9:30 am I saw 6 or 7 Mule deer does on the move headed south through the area I was in and that was it. Couldn't make it back out on Saturday due to other obligations but was sitting on top of a much higher peak before daylight on Sunday morning. Constantly glassing as the day progressed I still saw no deer though did hear a number of shots toward the central mountain area. Watched at least 10 other hunters scouring the foothills and valley areas around me and thought if there were any deer in the area they would have moved with that much activity, but nothing. So I guess until next season I'll be looking for "tag soup" recipes!