DNS

You were right on. I couldn't believe the first guess was within 1/8". I guess I need to bring you along when judging bucks. Everyone that guessed was very close.

I thought it would take me years to draw it, but I was prepared to try until I died. Pulled it on the second year so you never know. I'm the guy who has to wait 10 years between elk tags not the guy who draws 3 years in a row. To me it was better than a strip tag since I know the unit.

When I first looked at this buck I thought 185"-190" gross. My dad thought it would gross closer to 200". When I taped it out the main beams were longer than I thought since they curve way around and it's inside spread was wider. He is very symmetrical. The biggest deduction (besides the extras) was the right G2 at 16 1/8" and the left G2 is 14 2/8". Everything else is very close. He carries his mass very well. The largest mass measurement was 5" even on the right H1 and the smallest was 4 2/8" on his left H3. The total green gross score that I came up with is 196 5/8. He has 6 4/8" deductions with the cheaters so I came up with 190 1/8" measured as a typical. Would have loved to touch the magic 200" mark, but I couldn't be happier with this buck. Even my wife telling me that she bought new furniture while I was hunting couldn't remove the perma-grin off my face. All I could think about was how nice the buck would look nice right above the new couches. Dropping him off at the taxi tomorrow morning. Already can't wait to see how he will turn out.

Here are a few more pictures that I took during the hunt. I didn't get many pictures of the larger deer we saw because I was busy looking at them through my scope and they tend not to hang around long. I saw a big 4X3 that I wished I had a picture of. He was a good one. I saw his does a few times later, but he wasn't there. I wondered if one of the other hunters found him. If so they got a nice buck. Here is a Ram from day 1 peeking over the ridge while we were glassing the other side. 3X3 from Day 4 3X3 from Day 5

I just got lucky drawing this tag. We always put in for an easy draw 2nd choice so we go every year. I moved to NM for a couple of years and hunted over there and haven't gotten my loyalty point back so I just had the hunter ed point. Usually my dad and brother put in with me, but this year they decided to put in for a different hunt 1st choice. I got tag #24 so if we all would have put in together I wouldn't have got it. When I saw that I drew this hunt I looked at the website 50 times to make sure it was real.

I found that wide buck bedded @ 75 yards and looked him over good with a round chambered. I saw that he had back forks, but couldn't see front forks so i moved slowly toward him trying to get him to stand. I got to within 50 yrds of him before he stood up and i confirmed he didnt have front forks on either side. I thought I might regret not taking him, but it worked out.

Great Buck and awesome job on the cat.

I've been a long time lurker of the site and finally decided to join to show some pictures of the buck my son killed yesterday afternoon on opening day of his mule deer hunt. He had basketball practice before school so we didn't get over to the unit until around noon. We got up in an area that I hunted last year. It's a tough place to get into, but I got a decent buck out of there last year and saw another good one. We worked through some thick draws and did some glassing off of the points, but couldn't find anything so we decided that we would head into another area north of where we were that I've wanted to check out. We decided to to walk back up a thick draw that we couldn't glass into on the way down. There was sign everywhere so we knew there were deer in there somewhere. We had almost made it back to where we originally started and I saw a thick area that we couldn't see into and I threw a small rock into it. Out jumped this good buck less that 50 yards from us. He was a smart old buck and took off in a direction that he just didn't have a shot. He was running as fast as possible and we were trying to move to the point of the ridge so we could see in all directions. We needed to move about 100 yards to see because it was so thick below us. We got there and I looked over to the right and saw the buck two ridges over and still moving fast. I told Derrik to set up and see if he could get a shot as the buck got to the top of the 3rd ridge over. The buck got up to the 3rd ridge and I was standing to my son's left looking through my binoculars. As the buck came through a shooting window he fired and it sounded like a solid hit. I was looking through my binoculars and didn't see the buck come all the way through the window, but couldn't see the ground because of some bushes. I moved over to my right to look in the direction that he shot from and I could see the buck's feet kicking around. I just looked over and said "I can't believe you just shot that buck". It was almost 400 yards away and moving. He had 3-5 seconds from when the buck came into his view to decide if he should shoot, how much to lead and how high to hold. He hit it right in the neck and the buck dropped in his tracks. He has put in his time at the range so I wasn't completely surprised, but still it was an awesome shot. This is his 4th buck and best to date. It has an inside spread of 24 1/4" with a huge body. He also has a small cheater point below is left eye guard that Derrik calls his drop tine. The buck he killed ended up being the other good buck that I saw last year. He told me last night that he wants to kill a coues next year. My dad and brother also had tags in the same unit and both killed on the first day. This is a tough unit and I don't think we have ever filled all of our tags on the first day. I didn't have a tag for this hunt because I was one of the lucky few to draw the December rifle mule deer hunt in unit 27. Hopefully more pictures to follow in about a month. Sorry about the blood, I'm not much of a picture editor.

Sent you a PM. My dad, brother, and son killed in 28 on Friday

Wow. Nice wide buck

Thanks for all of the comments. My son has really enjoyed reading them.

Thanks for the comments. After spending years trying to teach him things that I have learned and teach him things that my dad taught me. Just standing there next to him when it all came together was as good as it gets.