deserthntr

i should add 41 of the brass are currently loaded. 35 with berger bullets, 6 with accubonds, 51 grs of powder, cci BR2 primers

Great bulls Houston! You can always find and produce some monsters

Houston usually does more than he takes credit for! Congrats Tory on a great bull!

Well I figured I better type this up now since i have some time. My dad finally got another archery bull tag with 13 pts... we were beyond excited to see his results say drawn. Neither of us got a chance to get up and scout due to work, and i was busy chasin bears but we knew we would have no trouble since it would be during the rut. We got up to camp late Thursday night and listened to some bugles and got a game plan ready for the morning. My uncle showed up shortly after, and was glad to have him since he didnt have hardly any hunting experience and had never been up to listen to elk rut. Opening morning came and we were on bugles, trying to pull the elk off the rez, my dad had given my uncle a hoochie mama so he would feel more apart of the hunt, i had the bulls screaming at my calls and one sounded like he was gonna come off the rez, then my uncle started pushing on that hoochie mama and all the elk went quiet. We moved on and heard a bugle, so we set up and i jumped a few yards back to call. The bull didnt sound to hot and wasnt answering my calls very often, but one of the cows started calling so i did my best to piss her off and bring her in thinking the bull would follow. I called those cows in to less than 10 ft of my dad but the bull stayed out of sight. The cows left and so did the bull and he quit bugling ending the morning hunt. I told my dad we needed to get off the rez line because when we heard a bull we couldnt go straight at him, he agreed and we moved spots for the evening hunt. As we were working our way up a hill we jumped a group of elk, but never laid eyes on them, the bull bugled as he followed the cows out of there and sounded like a small bull anyways. we got to the top of the hill and sat down to listen, shortly after we heard a bull screaming and quickly worked our way to set up on him, the bull was a 250 class 6 pt and across a canyon and hammering my calls but sounded like he wasnt coming any closer so we started to move up and get closer when my dad spotted him running down the other side of the canyon to get to us, i called the bull from 400 yds to 100, and had him coming on a string when the wind swirled and he boogered out of there. it had gotten dark on us so we headed back to camp with a plan set for the morning. we got in early and head 5 bulls screaming, we set up on one but he wasnt having any of my calls, so we set up on another bull and the same thing, so we moved on to another bull and had the wind perfect. I brought the bull to about 80 yds but he stayed in thick cover out of sight for about 5 minutes screaming at us but then he moved on. we bird dogged him up and over a ridge when he quit bugling, so we sat for a minute listening for a bugle, it was about 730 am, and i spotted a spike about 80 yds away, and some other elk that we couldnt tell if they were bulls and cows. i only had time to jump about 10 yds back for fear of being spotted and started calling, the spike beelined to us with a small 5 pt in tow trying to beat this spike to the montana decoy, the spike got about 20 yds from my dad and saw something he didnt like. My dad had stated he was gonna shoot the first branch antler bull i called in for him so he could get back to work. the 5 pt stopped behind thick brush about 40 yds away and my dad had no shot (thankfully) the spike spooked a little scaring of the 5 pt but i couldnt get him to stop before he was out of sight. i continued calling as all of a sudden the canyon lit up with bulls screaming. the 5 pt came back in but stayed 60 yds out behing brush presenting no shot. another spike and 2 pt came in to about 20 yds, but it wasnt enough to lure the 5 pt out. those bulls moved off and we started after the other bugles. we had only moved about 100 yds when we spotted some cows working a ridgeline, and i told my uncle to just sit down as me and my dad worked closer since he was having trouble working the rangefinder. my dad and i moved to about 60 yds from the cows and knew their bull was gonna follow them. soon the bull came into sight and i saw it was a decent 6 pt, i started ranging the cows and was getting 55-60 yds, i was shaking like a leaf and quickly told my dad not to look at the antlers and shoot this bull. I asked him where he wanted me to stop him and he said right in front of that black pine tree, the bull came out and i mewed at him, he stopped and turned and screamed at us! i whispered for my dad to shoot for 55 yds. but some small branches were in the way of the vitals and so my dad held at full draw. the bull took one step and he released. i watched that arrow center punch that bull and immediately cow called trying to calm the bull, he took off out of sight and my dad and i started high fiving and hugging as i told him he smoked the bull and it was a dead bull running. my uncle came over to us and stated he thought the bull had winded us and then saw us high fiving and hugging and got all excited. i had to calm my dad and uncle down telling them we needed to wait and give the bull some time before we moved bc we didnt know how far away the bull was. after 10 minutes i couldnt take it any longer and we headed to go find the arrow. the arrow was no where to be found and neither was any blood. i started to get worried and second guess if i had really seen that arrow smoke that bull. we waited another hour and started tracking the bull. i finally found blood after 50 yds but it was only the size of a pea. not looking good. we did our best to follow blood and tracks never finding anything bigger than a nickel to follow. i was following what i thought was the bulls tracks when my dad and uncle said they had found more blood. but still minimal amounts. i walked over to them and could see an elk body about 120 yds away but couldnt see its head. i motioned i see an elk and my dad gives me a yeah whatever look. i finally get him to take me serious and we start moving towards it ranging the whole way incase we needed to put another arrow in him. we couldnt see the antlers as we were getting closer and started to think is this someone elses elk?? we get about 20 yds away and can make out the antlers in the tall grass and realize he is down for good! the hooping and hollering began! and so did the work... big thanks to my cousin houston (WHTMTNMAN) for coming up and saving us from a very long initial pack out since he was able to get about 1/2 from us with his truck on a road we werent sure if we could get to! it was one of the funnest hunts id been on in a while, and even topped getting 3 young girls get their first deer last year and finally the pics! he is no monster but a good bull in our books!

I definitely enjoyed every second of it! I dont get to hunt with my dad as much as we used to, so our hunts together are always a treasure, even if we're just helping someone else out. Hopefully he still has another 15-20 years in him to hunt. It will be a sad day when we can no longer go out together. He taught me most everything I know about hunting, so its always a blast to work together to put an animal on the ground.

couldnt quite tell if it was an exit wound or from an animal. didnt know coons and skunks would eat the nose off! interesting! i would report t if you think someone shot it... looks to fresh to me to have been shot on thursday. unless he was gut shot and they didnt hit any vitals, and lived until a day or so ago.

the way his nose is crushed and the velvet still looking pretty fresh makes it seem like its a lion kill... i would imagine if you found him today and archery deer ending last thursday that he wasnt shot by a bowhunter. but i guess there could be a broadhead hole in him that i cant see. but also looks like a lion or something was eating the guts and could be you scared whatever it was off its kill

Ya shoot me a pm when your ready and ill give you my number! the convenience of an opener is great

sent you a text! garage doors are what i do, so if anyone else needs work done i can hook it up with a cwt discount!

Put up a cam, some of my cams i have sitting on water have zero deer tracks around them even though the ground seems like it would produce tracks, but have multiple bucks showing up hitting the water, and leaving behind zero sign

If money wasnt an issue and you could build any wildcat cartidge you wanted, what would it be? For me i think i would get a 338 tejas... launching a 300 gr bullet around 3000 fps really intrigue's me

Ive been using a digital scale that my dad has for my reloading, but im tired of double weighing charges to make sure that the weight is accurate. The scale seems to un-calibrate itself and sometime reads as much as .5 gr difference with the same exact charge. I dont mind taking a while to weigh charges to make sure they arent even .1 grain off, i just hate having to do something twice or sometimes three times to make sure my charges are all the exact same. Is there an accurate digital scale you guys like?? or should i buy one of the balance beam scales?

look into kuiu packs. i wasnt into packs with an external frame at all, but after getting the kuiu icon i wont go back to anything else! it is the most comfortable pack i own, and i absolutely love the eberlestock i have. i have only put a little over 10 miles in with the kuiu on my back and havent packed anything out with one but so far it is by far the best pack ive ever had... between having badlands and eberlestock before. there are some kuiu's for sale in the classifieds section at a great price.

i watched the video of you shooting your elk at 1300! that was an awesome shot! good info on the 338 tejas... good to know for the day i can afford to build something like that

those rifle's are flat awesome! id love to shoot one, one day. if were gonna dream might as well dream big right?

i have heard 7 LRM tossed around but know nothing about it. what is the case like compared to say a 7 RUM? better barrel life than RUM's?

I just ordered a kuiu icon so i am selling my eberlestock just one and my badlands stealth pack... they are both the older model but i just went through both packs and couldnt find a single rip on any of them. the eberlestock has some slight blood stains on the strap and inside the pack on the mesh but they arent very noticeable as i washed the pack after it got blood on it. The eberlestock has packed out 9 deer, a couple elk, and 6 or so javelina in the 3 years ive had it and still comfortable and in great condition. i dont have pics of the badlands on my computer but can text some if your interested. i only have pictures of me packing out an 11 year old girls first deer of the eberlestock so if you want more pics of the eberlestock i can text or email those over as well. 175 for the eberlestock 50 for the badlands...

btt, dont be afraid to shoot me an offer. worst i can say is no

I would also look at savage actions, there arent nearly as many options for aftermarket parts as a remington, but with that said i shoot a 6.5x284 for my LR gun. It has about 1000 rds down the pipe and i am starting to see my groups open up. I used to get 1/4 moa out of mine but am now shooting about 1/2 moa. Which is still great but seems large since i got used to my 1/4 moa groups. I have a savage 110 action, brux barrel, sss trigger, choate varmint stock, with a viper pst scope. it is a heavy set up but it shoots so sweet i wont change anything to make it lighter until i re-barrel... dont fix it if it aint broke right? I can get consistent first round hits out to 1000, but i have put a lot of time behind the trigger and know my gun. For coues and mulies it is perfect for what you want to do with it. very mild recoil, but like 308 and others have said barrel life is not excellent. When i re-barrel i will stick with a 6.5x284, i had 3 girls kill there first deer with it this year, one being 11 yrs old, so if you have kids it is an excellent caliber for them as well. I dont think you can go wrong with any of the calibers mentioned, but i would listen closely to everthing 308 says, he has a ton of time behind the trigger and alot of research and testing he has personally done with alot of rifles. i learned quite a bit from reading his posts, as well as some of the other guys commenting on your thread. The 6.5 is easy to load for and find a sweet load, but you will need alot of rounds down the pipe if you are new to reloading and shooting LR in general, and the 6.5 may not be the best option until you have things down and get the hang of it all.

if anybody in the valley has some i can meet you to grab them from you and shuttle them up to WHTMTNMAN

ttt... i will be up at the sunrise shoot this weekend and can have the pack up there if you wanna check it out in person

I bought some swaros and ordered the outdoorsmans tripod adapter set up. I have just the adapter and not the stud. Adapter is basically new and doesnt have a single scratch or particle of dirt on it. asking 80 bucks

if you are just looking for a great representative of the species i would leave the spotter at home. unless you are trophy hunting and trying to decide if a buck is 109 or 110 i would personally opt for the set of 10's around my neck and 15's in the pack. with a good set of 15's you can usually get within 5-10 inches of a buck's score no problem. then you dont have as much weight with the 15's in your pack instead of the spotter. i dont own a spotter and dont feel the need for one cause i can judge a buck just fine with my swaro 15's. but thats just my personal preference. i know guys who wouldnt leave home without a spotter

badlands sold

will send some pics in the morning when i get back from doing some scouting