Benbrown

Heard that the draw is complete and that results should be posted this coming Wednesday.

Who made the barrel and what twist? Thanks!

Is this Kimber of Oregon manufactured? Thanks!

Check your PMs

PM Sent.

I drew my second choice: first hunt in 26. The western boundary of this unit is a few hundred yards east of my house. Get to sleep in my own bed and eat my wife's cooking! At my age, that sounds pretty darned good!

Exactly!

Hope that he likes winter!

Sounds like the plot to C J Box's mystery novel, "Back of Beyond", from about six or seven years ago...

A friend went turkey hunting in one of the big canyons on the west side of the San Mateos here in New Mexico. There was still a lot of snow up high and he needed to cross one ridge to get into the roadless canyon that he wanted to hunt. As the got up to the snowmelt line, he was startled to see the tail assembly of a Beech Bonanza sticking out of a snow bank. Figuring that it was a known wreck, he clambered over the fuselage to take a look and was startled to see the body of the deceased pilot still inside. Turned out the plane had vanished from radar late in the previous fall and no one had known where to look for it until my friend stumbled across it. Things are sometimes not as obvious as they seem...

They are very common here in the Boot Heel of New Mexico. A fair number of them live on our little acreage here on the outskirts of Animas. We have lots of harvester ants around and they are a staple food of horned lizards.

Not as die-hard as I used to be when licenses were cheap, tags were easier to draw and the mountains weren't so steep and rocky. Probably a 5. However, each year I spend 11-12 days on my five-day Colorado elk hunt. Didn't draw anything here in New Mexico this year, but I bought an OTC bear tag and will start doing some serious scouting when I get back from Colorado. Probably will spend more days scouting and hunting for bear than do when I have a deer tag, as I know my deer hunting spots pretty well. I will spend the week after Christmas with two of my grandchildren from Texas, up in the Gila, trying to fill their Youth Encouragement cow elk tags. Next year, we'll just have to see what tags I draw and how much time the Good Lord and my wife will let me spend afield.

Nice looking animal you have there--what breed?

Sorry, I did not see this until today. Hopes this helps. All of the whitetails in 27 are south of NM Highway 9. The closer you are to the Mexican border, the denser the populations become, but that is all relative as there are plenty everywhere in the mountains south of Hwy 9. The problem with the northern part is that virtually all of the public land is landlocked by private land. That puts most of the hunting pressure on the Peloncillo Unit of the Coronado National Forest. The only public land access to the Forest is via the Geronimo Trail and via a very convoluted access route at the end of County Road 1 at Cloverdale. However, it can be accessed through the Sycamore Canyon Ranch on the Arizona side. With the rancher's permission, you can take a two-track to within half a mile of the New Mexico state line and hike in from there to camp and/or hunt. The best hunting there is to the south all the way to Bunk Robinson Peak. On the New Mexico side, most people camp at Blair Well or Black Dam. If you take the forest road south from that area, it dead-ends about five or six miles north of border at a stock tank. You can park there and hike west and south into some pretty good Coues habitat. It's a ways over to Bunk Robinson, but you can hunt all the way. If you have a good GPS with an app that shows public and private land, you can hike north from Blair Well and work your way around the private land at Whitmire Draw and get to the head of Skeleton Canyon which always has whitetails, as well as mule deer. Not many people bother to do this, but almost everyone that has gone in that way at my suggestion has killed deer. That's a good start, Get a Coronado NF map and take a look at it. If you have more questions, don't hesitate to PM me. Ben

Flying a wildlife census down on the ranch. The radio said, "Land Immediately", so we flew back to the strip and did so. After we listened to the radio in the truck for a few minutes, my pilot got back in his plane. I asked him where he was going, and he said. "home". I said, "What about the 'all aircraft' warning. He said, "They just said for all aircraft to land--they didn't say anything about taking off." And he proceeded to take off and fly over to his ranch which was only about ten minutes away.