lamrith

I have had a few people message about the suppressor. I greatly appreciate the concern and looking out,but they are perfectly legal to hunt with in AZ.: http://www.deeranddeerhunting.com/articles/deer-hunting-gear/suppressors-approved-for-legal-arizona-hunters My suppressor was legally produced after following all NFA laws and gaining a Form 1 tax stamp prior to making it. Anyone that is interested in learning about how to do this legally, just let me know.

Sorry Wildwoody!

Not sure if you are trolling or just not aware of the laws regarding suppressors?? It is perfectly legal to make a suppressor when you follow the correct procedure and file per NFA. As mentioned in post #7 of this thread it is a Form 1 suppressor, hence I filed for and have an approved form 1 tax stamp. Sorry if I have a sense of satisfaction that I made the ammunition and the suppressor I used on the hunt and that I made them to tight enough tolerances that they shoot sub MOA, not many Form 1 suppressors can do that.

Day 2 Evening hunt continued I settle the gun back on where the buck had been and I see nothing, my heart started to sink. dang, I missed him, you had ONE job and you muffed it! I hear Ben say "NICE SHOT! You drilled him, Dropped him like a rock!" I keep looking and start to see a small bush moving where the buck had been, I tell Ben he might still be there, so I rack another round and stay on the movement. After less than a minute the movement stops and the shakes begin. I had my very 1st deer down, my second game animal ever, with what ended up being a 450yrd shot using a round that I had made thru a suppressor I had made (After obtaining a Form 1 Tax Stamp thru the ATF) . I give Ben a big handshake and hug and we are both all smiles. I was trying to show Ben the drop calculation on my phone and my hand was shaking so bad we could not read it! We hastily mark the spot we saw him go down. I take a few pictures of the area he was in for visual confirmation and we pack up and haul to the truck, it is 5pm as we leave the spot I took the shot from. The guys by our parked truck are there glassing the far slope and ask if that shot they heard was us we say "yup, shot a little forky." They congratulate us as we throw gear into the truck and head out, the light is fading FAST. We get down below and visually see the approximate area and realize it is close to the road! I strip my pack of all my gear, down to all but my "kill kit" and bust out into the hills. 100yrds of zigzagging later we have him. Unfortunately, in his thrashing he had rolled into a cactus and had quills all over his head which stabbed Ben when he grabbed an ear to turn him around. He also flopped and had bled all over himself. I did not take pictures, he was just a total mess and hunters have enough issues without showing pictures of bloody harvest animals, and he was just a dinky fork on one side, spike on the other. A quick gut and we each take a pair of legs and pick him up as we walk back toward the road. Did I tell you these are small buggers, maybe 100# tops before gutting? We literally could carry him with one hand each. Back tracking a little we realize that we are actually only 50yrds from the road. The pair of hunters from up top had called it an evening as well and came down to see what we had gotten. More congratulations and we all got on our way and lifted him into the truck. We sat around at the truck waiting for the other pair to arrive back from their deeper hunt and were treated to a beautiful sunset. It is dark as they walk up. We put on our poker faces and engage in the normal post hunt chit chat, did you see anything, what area did you settle in, did you hear any shots? They mentioned hearing a shot that sounded odd and they could not place the location at the time. About that time one of them went to throw their backpack in the bed of the truck and it made no sound as it landed on the deer, they look in the bed shocked and we all had a good laugh recounting the hunt. Once back at camp the real fun begins. One of the other members starts walking thru breaking down the deer since it was my 1st. We skin back a side, he outlines muscle groups and cut points, tendons to cut that release joints and in short order the shoulder and rear qtr are off. Backstraps next and then he worked on some rib and neck meat. These are so tiny with so little meat we grabbed every little scrap possible. We flipped the deer over and I worked on the opposite side. We left the qtrs Bone in for now and got them on ice. Tenderloins came out last when they were easier to get to. Happiness is the end of a hunt with bloody boots and a single spent case. To be continued…

I will jump ahead a few hours in the story... Day 2 Evening hunt We decide to break out of the usual spots and head up the road into steeper areas. One is a place we had glassed the does from the evening before the hunt. We drop the other two hunters off at the head of that road with the plan for them push up that road and sit in a deeper draw. Ben and I head up around the corner to see what else is around and end up on a sub-peak with a small camp-spot and a couple hunters in shade waiting out the heat to glass for the evening. 15min of small talk and we ask were they planned to hunt so we can stay out of their way. They are glassing the far distant side of the area. We part ways and cross hill around the ridge we are on to get to the other side of it looking in the general direction that our partners were heading. We find a nice shaded spot with decent view of the closest draw and settle in. This draw is steep and rocky and screams mountain lion to me with rock outcroppings, small caves and crevasses all over it. After about 2hrs nothing at all is moving other than the bugs buzzing in our ears and it is getting tiresome. I finally get to the point I consider bouncing to a new spot while there is still some twilight left and I ask what are we doing here this is a dead spot. We have a small snack and decide to start checking out far out ridges (800-1500yrds out) just in case there is something we can chase the next day since this draw is a dead-end. After 30min or so I start glassing up into trees in our draw again, we are here and hunting this draw after all, got to give it an honest attempt. Bored and honestly a bit bummed that we sat in a dead draw I sit back out of the glass and scan around with naked eye. I glance below us and see movement. DEER! I get behind my 12x56 Vortex Vulture Binos and swing that way to see one tail vanish into shadows. I swing a touch right to the second deer and see forks. I turn to Ben and say "BUCK" at the same time yanking my binos off the tripod and putting my rifle v-block on in their place and grabbing my rangefinder. I knew it was going to be a longer shot and the SIG Kilo2000 rangefinder confirms, 375yrds AMR (More on this later). Hhrmm, farther than the drop table I have printed in my scope lens cap. Ben is asking location and I verbally guide him in to where they are located as I pull out my phone and punch the range info into strelok+. It spits out I need to correct up 1.9MIL. I quickly decide not to alter turrets, I have a Mil/Mil scope with markers every 1MIL out to 5MIL on the Reticle, at the range calculated the 1.9MIL is only 1.35" low versus 2.0Mil. I pick up my rifle and verify the turrets are still at 0 and had not been bumped during our hikes. As I was entering the info into strelok and verifying my turrets, Ben has the deer in his binos. I hear Ben say "He's gone, just went into trees." I keep getting ready and get the tripod reset to the lower height needed for the gun and make sure it is stable. I zoom in to max power on my 4-14x scope as I know I will need to see the deer at this distance. As I finally get behind the gun Ben says "he is back out, in the shadows top left of the clearing, the doe is back also in the same clearing." The Doe helps me verify the correct clearing and then I see the buck. Man, these are tiny deer! I settle in and get my offhand set under the rear of the stock and locked into my shoulder. I anchor my cheek into cheek rest but the scope is bouncing all over like MC Hammer on crack. It has been 1 1/2 min since I 1st saw the buck and my adrenalin is spiking hard. I try to steady the gun and cannot. The good news is that he is stationary, and the doe is feeding calmly, so I take a risk and sit up away from the gun. I take a couple big deep breaths with my eyes closed. r-e-l-a-x. Eyes closed I get behind the scope again and open my eyes then find buck in the same place, only this time with a steadier sight picture. I ask Ben, "You on him?" "YUP." "ok taking shot” I start to squeeze the 3.5# trigger and the shot surprises me, just as it should, I hear the PPFFFFSHHHT of the round leaving the suppressor. (Over lunch I had thought about the issue with carrying the rifle with suppressor and decided to put it back in my bag, the benefit for shooter and spotter is just too great to ignore and worth the extra weight in the pack. Once we got settled in to glass I pulled it out and installed it back on my rifle.) The gun jumps off target, then I hear the crack as the supersonic 165grn Sierra Gameking bullet goes down range @2650fps. You jokers did not think I was going to go straight thru and tell you the outcome after that lead up did you? 😈🤣 I mentioned coming back to AMR as I did not want to break from the action at the time. AMR stands for Angle Modified Range, that is the term SIG uses for the distance a shooter uses to dial in or sight in on a target from angle (uphill or downhill) to compensate for gravity due to the shot angle. I mention this because my rangefinder was automatically calculating the angle and telling me the desired yardage for drop calculation, not the actual distance to target. I did not get a hard angle number when I took the shot, but a few days later when in the area took a rough reading and got between 30 and 38* angle for the shot. Running the calculations that puts the shot at 430 to 475yrds from muzzle to deer. I mention this for two reasons, one so other people are aware off it, lets be honest 99% of us shoot at a range when practicing. All flat shots and most probably have no idea that vertical angle changes point of impact, taking your shooting out of the range into real world changes things. Hopefully this helps some other shooter or hunter having the knowledge ahead of time so that they are prepared ahead of time and do not miss that trophy buck, or worse, wound it. The second reason is that this ended up being the farthest distance I had ever taken a shot at any target. If I had realized the actual distance I might not have taken the shot, and definitely been more nervous. To be continued...

I had my offset for with and without can documented and with me. (Can changes POI .5MIL right)

Day 2 Morning hunt The 1st day of hunting had taught me one thing. Hiking with a medium weight rifle (Savage Hog hunter in 308) with heavy glass (PA 4-14x44 FFP Mildot) and a heavy suppressor (Form1 10" 30cal) really sucks. The extra weight on the barrel makes the gun not want to stay tucked in behind your shoulder and has it rotating the butt of the stock forward, plus the extra 10" ontop of the 20" barrel gets it caught on everything. I pulled the suppressor off completely and left it in camp. The gun carried much better, and helped get thru some tight spots on the walk in. For the second morning we decided to head to "The basin" for the 1st time since scouting it. But this time we eased our way in and to a spot that provided shots all under 300yrds to the slope we had seen deer on during scouting. I caught movement on the way in but lost that deer as we kept working to our glassing spot. We got setup in a good spot and started glassing. We had does on the left slope that we watched for a while, then noticed movement on the main slope. Two more does up and feeding, then a couple more. Despite all our prayers and begging, none of them sprouted antlers. Overall, we saw 9 does in 2hrs of glassing, all up feeding and milling around without a care in the world, but not a single buck. We are in deer which is good, but the girls are off limits. The Girls are in town partying, where are the boys!? The day is calm and warm, and not much else is moving around, we see no other hunters in the area and hear no shots. We hike out quietly around 11 and back to camp for lunch. The last member of the hunting group was there in camp waiting when we get to camp. To be continued...

Day 1 Evening For the evening hunt we headed to "The coral", it is a spot that the group hunts all the time and last time I was there 3yrs ago we pulled a spike out on opening night and could have had 2 spikes that night (I decided to pass on that second spike and we never saw another deer for the entire hunt, DOH! It is a decision I have regretted since I made it). We got into our glassing spots around 3, and all was quiet. Around 4pm we catch movement and see a couple does working on the left side of the draw. One is nervous and watching to the right all the time frozen, ears forward, twitching, then she would relax and eat, then head pops up and twitching again. We pan over constantly and try to find what is bothering her but no luck, so we stay on her for a very long time. We keep checking to the right and light is fading when Ben suddenly see's movement and a bunch of does on the right side of the draw in the direction the doe had been looking. I could not find them so go over to Ben and he shows me where they are. I go back to my glass and sit down. When I look through my binos to get ready to shift them to the does I am looking right at a spike buck sneaking along in a shaded area! Adrenalin dumps and I turn to Ben and say BUCK! He tells me to get my gun up and ready and before I stop to think and fix the buck's actual location on the hillside I pulled my binos down and put my rifle rest on the tripod. DOH. I literally had no idea where my glass had been pointed at as I had just sat down and gotten behind them to start looking for the does. I start looking by naked eye to find deer and then scanning each thru my scope and see a couple of the does but cannot pick out the spike. Ben comes over to ask where I had seen the buck and I tell him I was not sure. Light is fading super-fast and he goes back over to his binos to try and spot him, two of the does catch him moving and all heck breaks loose. We are suddenly looking at a hillside of fluffy white tails busting up and over the saddle. We count over 9 in total which is many more than we had seen prior to the mayhem. It is so dark at this point I cannot make anything out in my scope. We pack up while a single straggler deer snorts at us. We head down the hill with headlamps as it is now pitch black. Day one ends busted and frustrated with a missed chance at a buck at less than 140yrds. At this point other than vehicles passing camp in the morning we have seen no other hunters on the ground or up on hillsides glassing. To be continued...

Day 1 Morning We decided to do a traditional opening day hunt and hunt the draw right outside of camp. We walk up and get to our spots just as the sun crests the mtns. Have I mentioned how cool desert sunrises are? There are some cattle on the right side of the slope we are facing right at 1st light. After 1.5hrs we finally see a pair of does off on the left, then a 3rd joins them after about 20min. They are in the tangles of Ocitillo, just relaxing and oblivious to our presence. After 45min a large solitary javelina shows up. He was a big fatty that could have made great eating, but it was not Javelina season. Around 10am we break from that spot we are in and join back up with the other hunter and make a plan to walk/push to the head of the draw and then rest in shade having a snack. We bust one doe out on the push up the draw, but nothing else. After our snack we push the next canyon over back toward camp. We make the push and saw a whole lot of nothing. The one moment of excitement was a brief drive by from border patrol who got out to get a better look at us and I could hear them say, "It's ok, just hunters." This was a long morning and we are all beat and exhausted when we reach camp for lunch. To be continued...

T-1 day to hunt There is just nothing like sunrise in the desert, the day broke clear and bright, a good omen for the hunt to come. We started off the morning with a quick tour in the ranger (side by side utv). The first spot we sat in to scout is one that looks way out in "The basin", it is an area the group hunts every year and it always has deer in it. We settled in and at around 10am and saw 3 does out feeding. Def a good sign there were deer in the draw, but our spotting location was not a place we could shoot from (1000yrds) and, we saw no bucks. Weather was nice and clear, but "hot" The Desert rat I was hunting with thought it was perfect, but being a WA guy, the 77* and blazing sun was like walking in an oven and I was glad to sit in the shade of the Side by side for the ride out. We left that spot and ran back past camp and up into another spot much farther back. We spent a few hours there and glassed up more does in the afternoon. Great news they are up and they are moving outside of twilight hours, not so much luck that not a single buck was seen. We made our way back to camp and another member of the group had arrived. We spent the remainder of the afternoon setting up camp, then had dinner and relaxed by the campfire talking about the plans for the next morning. To be continued...

I was/am being sarcastic. Just really fired up to get down there and was having a hard time focusing on work to begin with, then saw your pictures. 😍 We have a pretty much set area that my family always hunts, not a ton of deer but one person in the group pulls something out every year it seems. I am flying in from WA.

We are on the other side of Mtns and a little south of there. Good news/bad news. Bad news is one hunter in camp backed out and he was the one that had the pop-up camper, so unexpectedly sleeping in tent for the week. Good news is that means my Step-dad can now haul down a trailer with his SxS on it so we ( I ) can run up top into the steeper and more secluded areas that are less pressured. Road up is too narrow to take a fullsize truck, we did it ONCE 3 years ago and swore never again in a FS vehicle. I am not in the shape I need to be really, but one foot in front of the other I am gonna get to a good glassing spot.

That is pretty unique set of rings, any pictures of them you can share? So I take it she is also a hunter, or does she even know what the rings are made from?

You're not helping me get thru the day Elkhunter1!!!!! twitch, fidget, squirm, clock is ticking, I fly south tomorrow for my 34A hunt that starts friday.

Sorry to hear that. Man you went all over too. Thanks for sharing!

Well 1st off. CONGRATS!! Honestly it sounds like things are looking up for you, even thought life is getting super busy. Having been thru the newborn/young kid cycle I know what you have coming and are planning for. I would def keep your core reloading gear. Maybe in a year you are back in a place to do it again, maybe not. Do you get an ammo allocation to work with your duty pieces? If so then I could maybe see letting the gear go. However the thing about reloading is.. well, it does not change over time, I mean not really at the core of it. sure maybe new powders or bullets come out, but press, dies, brass do not change. As long as stored properly that gear could sit for 10yrs and still be good, and ready when you pull them out. Rather than take a "loss" selling used, and then have to buy it again later on, just hold onto it. Maybe let some of the guns go with matching relaoding items if they have value right now and you are not going to shoot them for the forseable future. Just keep one gun to scratch that itch if you need? You could also use the reloading gear to make ammo for your duty rigs, especially if you are having to pay for the ammo to practice for sure keep the reloading gear. Is your press single stage or progressive? Even 9mm ammo you can save a considerable amount of $/box by reloading. I know many people scoff at it, but a box of 50rnds only costs me $6.10 to reload, versus over 14 to buy from a stock, or maybe 11-12 mail order when I place has a super sale/free shipping. Plus the reloading for service weapon will be more plinking ammo, and that is something that you can do when you have a spare hour here and there as a way to "get away" from the rush and stress or work/family. You can also break down your LR round creation and hunting round creation the same way. Spend a hour sizing a batch. week later trim, etc, etc.. over time you gradually get to point all you are doing is dropping powder and seating bullet. Some guns also just have a specific load they like. If you have a good load developed for one of the ones you have then stick with that gun/bullet and sell the others. then when you feel the itch you have a round/gun ready to go and can switch up practice one day. Long and short I think it makes sense to keep options open, trim back to only one LR rig that you use for LR&hunting but keep the reloading gear to feed it and service guns.

How did you do on your hunt? Did you find your spike or better?

Thanks, I snagged a Johnny Stewart Caller GS-2 so I have 256mb of space for MP#/wav files. Stumbled on this site that has a ton of calls and I will download a bunch. https://averageoutdoorsman.com/wild-game-downloads/ I will make sure to look up the regs on fox's. Just verified zero on rifle and ammo lastnight, so that is set and now I will focus on getting a good mix of calls loaded and practice using the remote with my offhand. Yes, I know those names in WA, not hunted any of them yet, but greenwater is close and I have gone shooting up there.

Good to know, I am just curious is why I am asking. Only military calibers I can think of are 5.56x45 (223) and 7.62x51 (308). Thanks Ernesto!

So just to maybe clarify in case it affects someone interested, no 223 or 308 I take it since they both have a military "equivalent". (not wanting to trigger a discussion on if they are exactly the same or not, so lets not go there for those experts out there.)

Thanks CouesPursuit! I will surely make sure to check wind and get a spot were I am not sitting out in the sun like a beacon. I would not be undertaking predator calling unless I am tagged out on deer is 1st. If I do it would be well away from were the rest of the group is hunting as well.

Anyone have any tips or tricks they are willing to share with a new predator hunter?

Very cool. I wonder what the cat was vocalizing for. Looks a bit skinny.

Good luck on your hunt too, let us know how it goes.

Congrats Duck!! Sounds like a great trip! My Stepdad went up for a deer hunt a week and half ago and they did well on it, though not as well as your crew! Wow, that Yeti is small. any idea how much meat you had or how much those Goats weighed? Same size, bigger, smaller than a Coues?