bullwidgeon

Anything with 9 inch G2's, over 4 inch H measurments, and beams pushing or maybe over 18 should be shot first and scored later. Go ahead and ground check that one . Bret M.

He will push BC book typical (110) and should make state book (107) I would think. Hopefully you guys get him before the cats do. Bret M.

AZGFD.com hunt information on the unit has all the mile markers for the turnoffs on the Sassabe road. They also have a bunch of good areas to scout on there. Bret M.

Post the bear pics or send them to me. The bears are definately out and about big time. While helping an elk hunter in 27 on Saturday I glassed up 3 bears in the oaks before 8:00 AM. I might go back and try to poke a hole in one of the acorn eaters in a week or two. Bret M.

All those John Wayne elkhunters in that unit are constantly camping in the best rut meadows in the unit . Look out in the flats where elk do not belong and in the nasty breaks going down to them. Those ones usually go out there that way when the pressure builds, good luck. I found no carps worth tipping over in NM. I did find a bajillion elk and some nice bulls and a big old pumpkin headed lion. Bret M.

did they have .270 holes in them ? Nice bulls but they do not belong there or down at Ft. Thomas or Eden on the river either. Bret M.

Allthough nothing like what I am sure some of you guys with good tags will bring in. It was definately a bull that needed shooting with the tag I had. We had 4 tags and shot two bulls. We hunted hard till the day before the season ended and never even saw another bull over 300 inches. The hunt was tough and I just plain old lucked into this one as he was bugling his head off and chasing cows around in the canyon behind the hill I climbed up on at first light to glass from on day 3. Finally around 7:30 AM he chased his cows out below me in a stalkable postition and I went down and shot him after following them through the cedars and playing tag with them for a half mile or so. I was relieved because on day 2 I walked over 10 miles and glassed literally a ton of country that used to hold lots of elk, but no more, I didn't even cut any real fresh sign out there. We killed this bull out of the same cow herd that we killed another 325 or so bull out of on opening day. I guess sometimes it pays to check back up on cows when the rut starts. Mr. Quimby shoot me an email at mattausb@wellsfargo.com and I can point you guys to where 7 bulls were runnning around Saturday afternoon. They were not awful far from where the last one you killed was at. I am not sure if your buddy will be too picky or not but the pickings out there are getting slim and one was a neat 5 x clubby looking droptine non-typical bull he might be happy with. The others were spikaroonies up to spindly raghorn looking 5x5's. As far as this one looking like a big unit 1 bull, I don't know about that, maybe with an Archery or November tag but man there are some whoppers running around unit 1 this year. I would think the guys with unit 1 Early Rifle Bull tags should be holding out a little this year . Heck, Lorace came over when we were skinning this one in the yard and told me that 10 of the 14 that came down through the neighborhood the other day and ate all the pear and apple trees were bigger than this one . Bret M.

You get one inside spread credit in the score total. You measure the other spreads that you mentioned and put them on the sheet in the "do not add this to the total score" aisle but thats just for grins and giggles and does not go into the total score of the deer. That buck might go 90 something gross. I don't know what he would net. Bret M.

If he scraped his velvet he could have gone up higher and be in the thicker stuff up top. He will probably be back down low again chasing does in December though I bet. Thats all I can think of as to where those great big toads go in that country. I looked and looked and looked for that gorilla for a few years ago both in August bear hunting and during November and December and we only saw him those 2 times chasing does. There is alot of thick slopes in that country that deer can stay in and never leave if they don't want too, I think some of the older ones do that. The camera on the spring might provide some good info on him that proves he is still around or maybe traveling only at night. Good luck, you guys are due for a big one this year. Bret M.

Enough with the collared peccary jabs, codger . I found no sheds, but my uncle found a nice big fat forky carp horn while I was wandering in the lifeless zone on Saturday. And yes the guy who's garden I flopped it in was angry when I backed over his tomatoes and chili's while trying to get my bull out . Bret M.

That bull definately scores 10 out of 10! Good job man!! Bret M.

.300 Weatherby/4.5-14x42 Burris scope with a Ballistic Plex reticle. I had the power set to 14x for that shot. I was shooting off my tripod with my shoulder/back braced up against my backpack that was braced up against a juniper stump. You can not have any movement in the rifle at all at long range, you need as much a benchrest like atmosphere as possible for those ultra long shots. Alot of long distance guys like bipods and prone postition. I do not like prone and never feel comfortable shooting that way, and I am not carrying around a bipod on my rifle when I have a tripod with me all the time that works the same but if anything is more stable. If you are going to shoot at game off a tripod practice in field conditions shooting targets off one before you try it. When I go to practice shoot I always shoot at least 1 or 2 groups off my tripod like I would in the field, and sometimes only shoot off my tripod. It helps when setting up for what may be an important shot in the future. I assume the same goes for the guys who rock the bipod/prone method too. Bret M.

The benchrest guys shoot 1000 yard tournaments all the time so it is possible. I am sure they use .308's just because they are either brainwashed my our military (God bless them, but alot of these guys will argue up and down with you that Steiner binos are the best binos ever made, there is no better pack than the crappy old Vietnam era ALICE packs, and there are no other bolt action guns than Remingtons) or are big sissies and do not like recoil. If they were not such big sissies or brainwashed and knew how much .300 Weatherby's and even RUMS or STW's devastate things at long range they could probably shoot 2000 or even 3000 yard tounaments . Heck, Lark regularly dumps spike mulie bucks on the run at 1000 yards and he uses a puny .270 Winchester . The longest shot I ever took and made was on a broadside bull elk at 639 yards. The first bullet chingered it but it took off in that wounded stagger/trot that bulls sometimes do after being hit. It made it 50 yards or so while I launched 3 more slugs at it and missed all of them, and then it bedded up and died. I wouldn't have taken the shot if I hadn't shot 20 long range (400-600 yard) feral goats and countless coyotes, rocks, targets and rabbits that Summer and Spring with that gun/scope/load set up. It also took me a long time to set up for the shot. It seemed like almost 10 minutes to make sure I had my breathing, rest and target positioned exactly where I felt comfortable enough to shoot. I know all this now because my uncle videod it all. The three misses on the run were all very close, 2 of them missing by inches rather than feet and the only reason I kept shooting at it on the run is because I knew I had a bullet in it from shot #1 and was trying to anchor him. Anyways, I haven't been shooting as much with that setup this year as I did that year and would be awful hesitant to take a shot over 450 this year. In the end it's all about practice and knowing your capabilities and your equipments capabilities. Bret M.

You can spend any amount on a camera from $100- $472,000,000, and you might be able to get one even cheaper if you win an auction on Ebay for an older/used camera. From experience you should get something bigger than 2.1 Megapixels, I wish I did. If I had to do it all over again I wouldn't look at anything less than 4.0 MP. Zoom does not matter too much if you mostly plan to shoot through binos or snap close up photos but more optical zoom is better in some situations and digital zoom is worthless. There are a ton of websights out there dedicated to digital photograpy and cameras and Consumer Reports always runs stories about new cameras. With a little research you should be able to figure out what would suit your needs best. It is pretty neat, I am happy I got into it. I have some neat pictures and wish I would have started sooner, there are lots of things I glassed up in the past and never took pictures of that I wish I had pictures of now. Bret M.

I have a little 2.1 MP Nikon digital, it does OK through binos and spotting scopes. You just have to make sure you are not shaking too much and the glass is rock solid when taking the pics. They turn out blurry with only a teeny amount of movement. I just hold it up to the lens and have the camera autofocus till I can see what I want on the viewfinder and then snap the pic. Bret M.

They glass for bears, like all regular Arizona guys should. Apparently according to liscense plates, hound hunting is for New Mexicans . Bret M.

That lower bear looks worse off than Lark on a bad day! Good job! Bret M.

Yesterday... Bret M.

Yes, Friday afternoon in the oaks in 27, I put a stalk on him and he disapeared like they usually do in the oaks, he was probably there but it was thick and got dark on me quick once I got down in the bottom where he was at. Then Saturday I spent all morning stalking, videoing and subsequentially packing out an antelope buck with my uncle in unit 1. Saturday afternoon I saw no bears but lots of sign. All day Sunday I chased goats with my buddies again. There were alot of goofballs archery hunting the all but imaginary mule deer herd in the North end of unit 27. The bear I saw was way off in the bottom of a roadless hole, I think the people presence probably pushed him there. He was a nice one, I wish he would have poked his head out once I got down there. Bret M.

Too many pine trees there in that country. Look lower . Nice pics, you guys are going to do awesome over there even if you hunt those unglassable thickets!! You could send the boys on down ahead of you making deer drives . Take lots of pictures. Bret M.

Some dude from the Whitetail Club a few years ago had a sight under WWW.DESERTDEER.COM or NET or something of that sort. Anyways, he had a bunch of pictures of Volk and Duperret's bucks on there and a few he and his brother killed. I think most of those bucks were/are unit 33 bucks. The domain name is no longer valid or I do not remember it properly. Either way, I haven't been to the Whitetail Club dinner in a year or two so I do not know what is going on with that dude or his websight. Bret M.

I have been. Seen alot of weener bucks and new fawns and finally after four days found two good ones. Neither posed for pictures but I got pretty good video of the second biggest one. The biggest one was just moving too fast and wouldn't stay in the open long enough. Anyways here are some pictures of ones that posed and a turtle I managed to almost run over in the road. Some of the pics are blurry because my autofocus was picking up swaying ocotillo limbs and not the deer. A little 2x1 that thought my truck looked cool. I am not sure he has ever seen a truck before, anyways he didn't act like it. I think he is a passer till about 5 PM on the last day . 2 little bucks that posed out of a group of 7. None of which were exceptional. The camera wanted to take pictures of the ocotillo rather than the deer. Sometimes it acts like it has a mind of it's own. A doe being trailed by a fawn. The fawn is the little red thing behind the deer with it's front half in the cholla. This little thing could not have been more than a day or two old. It kept falling down while trying to follow momma. The tortuga who was almost flattened by a tire. The fawn crop is exceptional this year. I saw several whitetail twins and a big mulie doe with triplets. Next year there should be spikaroonies running every place . Bret M.

I was looking for bears the other day and on the way in decided to glass around the edge of the burn for a little bit to see what was going on with it and there are deer everywhere on the edge of it. As soon as all this rain greens it up the deer will be right back in the middle of it. By the edge of the burn, I mean 90% of the deer I glassed up were withing 100 yards of burned stuff. Do not over look the fringes of the burn this year. Good luck guys Bret M.

Nah, Not this year. I will be in unit 1 carrying around an antelope decoy while my uncle tries to stick one with an arrow. I was just bumping around the Superstitions and going to try to kill one opening day before I go up North that weekend. Looks like it is all for naught, every acorn in the Superstitions is brown and falling from the tree at the slightest breeze. Then in September I got a NM carp tag and a elk tag like last year. My bear prospects for this year look bleak. Who can complain when there are elk and floppy eared carp to be shot at... You guys knock em dead over in 27 though... Bret M.

Nope, it's been tough. I have been out looking for 3 afternoons over the last three weeks and found 0 bears. Bret M.