Coach

I'm backpacking into that area at the end of October for a ML coues hunt. Shoot me a PM. The access is limited, but available, you just have to be ready to do a backpack trip. It's only a few miles into Skeleton canyon but when you get back in there, you know you're in the "wild west". There's not a lot of water, plenty of illegals and even the hardened "mules". I did it a couple years back solo and by the second night I decided I would take the first 3x I saw just because I was so on-edge the whole time I was there. I just wanted to come home to my family, but not burn my tag. Shot a decent 3x4, knowing there were much bigger bucks in there. I can tell you this, when you get back in that area, all alone, with no cell coverage, a hunt takes on a whole different perspective. The country is pretty open and when you've got a bivy pack and a full moon, you feel very isolated. I was 15 yards or so from a major trail and had coatis in my camp all night. I literally slept with a 9MM Beretta in my hand all night wishing it was a pump 12 guage. My "camp" was a lightly sheltered draw several miles from the closest road. One-two-three days draw on forever out there if you are alone and it can get flat-out creepy. That said, I wouldn't trade that experience for anything. There might be no better coues hunting anywhere. If you can handle the danger, the isolation, the lack of water and communication with the "outside world", it's an amazing place to hunt. Luckily, this time I am going in with a good friend who knows the area and has hunted it multiple times and taken a couple bucks over 100 inches and has seen some well over the 'twenties' even some 130+ class bucks. I think it will be a lot different this time, not being completely alone. Just having that second person along makes it so different in your whole mental attitude. Here's hoping this time I won't settle for a 90's buck when there are so many in there in the upper teens and beyond. I hope you find one like that too. For sure, send a PM, there is public land that leads to where you are tyring to get. I'll show you the maps to get in there.

Just the three. I've got quite a few pics of that group and she's got just the two cubs. The other bear in the area is clearly hers from last year - cinnamon body with a black head. On Thursday when I pulled the card and replaced it with a new one there was no salt left at all, so today my oldest son, Matt and I refreshed it with 80 lbs of salt and 40 lbs of corn. The new addition in the past 2 days is a group of turkey (8, young birds from this Spring). Still had some elk, but they were discouraged by the lack of salt and resorted to licking my camera. The young boar was also there 1/2 hour before we replenished the salt and corn. I tried out my new backpack (Lowe Alpine Saracen) carrying 2 40 pound bags of salt, and it was great - looking forward to my NM coues backpack trip. Got a new bull in there, but he's just a 5x5. Hopefully the big boys will be coming in this week. I've heard that the bigger bulls are starting to show up in 3C, so I'm thinking they won't be far behind here. I did hear my first bugles on Thursday night so it's definitely starting.

How many seatbelts in the back? Any idea how many hours are on it?

Looking for hillsides full of prickly pears is where you start, but you have to find the dense drainages that lead into those areas. Bears love thick stuff, so look at your area from their perspective. They want to warm up in the sun-lit hills and gourge on whatever is around, but they need a place they can bound into if confronted. They like deep, oak covered, steep stuff. They'll venture out for food but always want to have that "safe place" to retreat into.

I hunted antelope in NM a couple weeks back and, all I can say for a guy who never had an antelope tag in his pocket, it was incredible. It's an all-day, every-day kind of hunt. Many good stalks, many good opportunities that seem impossible...Just getting out there and trying to get close to big goats several times a day is what bowhunting is all about.

With the rampant theft of trail cameras, I think the only way to truly "secure" a camera is to bolt it to a tree. Maybe it's against regulations, but anything I leave in the woods worth over $100 is going to require a chainsaw and a grinder with a cutting wheel to extract. If you steal my camera, you're going to work at least half as hard as I did to keep it from getting stolen.

Nice job Clay! Congratultions!

Wow...I'm almost speachless...those are some freaking amazing bucks! I hope your dad gets to arrow any one of those awesome bucks. Keep it up, keep his spirits up, hunt hard and show us one of those big boys on the ground. Best of luck to you.

Wow, this is giong to be strange...The FS has opened a number of roads, along with logging permits, but areas South of 260 will remain largely accessible, even on roads not marked for general travel or firewood cutting for big game tag holders. Meanwhile, most of the area is closed off to the public unless marked by a "ground-level" white arrow, and access is limited to retrieval of game, unless any danger of soil damage is predicted. As a guy with a tag in hand, I've seen the maps, I've heard the rhetoric. Overall, I'm glad so much of the unit will be open to huting, even more than I expected open to vehicular traffic. It's going to be very confusing in there when it comes to who can drive where, and what they can do while there, etc. Overall, I'm really happy about the latest turn of events, because anyone with a unit 1 elk tag has access to pretty much the whole unit, minus 3-4 totally closed out areas.

That was awesome.

I used to fish Lee's Ferry a lot. I had the best luck with 3" rebels that look like baby brown trout. Sometimes, you need a weight 2-3 feet up above a swivel to get 'em down to 6-8' feet. If you went more than 3 casts without a fish, your depth was wrong. Good luck and tell us what works.

Nice job! That's a great looking buck - I'd bet my bottom dollar there's a good story to go along with it - eh?

Didn't read it - want to elaborate?

Alright, now we need a picture, because he one in my head is just plain scary.

Holy sweet mother! Nice bucks indeed! My next AZ rifle tag will be 12A W or 13B. I'm not even going to bother putting in for anything else. Building points, and one day I'll hunt those monsters hard-horned. Thanks for the awesome pictures. If that doesn't get your blood pumping I don't know what will.

Nice bear! Congrats.

What size of pack? A day hauler or are you packing in and carrying everything you'll need for several days? I've got an Eberlestock J105 that I use mostly for hauling a a Matrix ground blind around or bags of salt - not a bad pack but I don't use it for hunting. If you're looking for a large, serious pack, I'd recommend the Lowe Alpine Saracen. This pack is used by the Dutch Special Forces and is similar to the Kifaru or Kuiu. It's military grade, which means it's heavy (9 lbs) but extremely durable. This pack will hold a rifle very well and carry anything you can pack in our out.

Great looking bucks there Brian! I can't wait to see the "hero" pics later.

A lot of it has to do with how steeply they increased resident big game tag fees, while at the same time doubled, even tripled the number of tags allotted in most units. Effectively, they started charging way more money for far less desireable hunts. Not that long ago, I could draw 24A December coues every couple of years for something like $27 (I don't remember all the actual tag prices) with around 350 tags total for that hunt. It was a quality hunt, for very little money. There were no October, November or early December tags for coues, if I remember correctly. Now a December tag in 24A is almost impossible to draw (only 45 tags), but for twice the price, I can hunt the same area in October or November with either 500 or 550 other hunters. 1095 tags, nearly triple the number of hunters, same chunk of land, same quantity of deer, just at times when they are harder to find, competition is exacerbated, and I'm supposed to pay twice as much. That's just one example, from one unit, for one species. I'm sure we could walk through them all - all units, all species, being managed by accountants and investors who have no understanding of the product or "commodity" they are attempting to manage - the way they see it through their eyes. At this point, I'm thinking AZGFD doesn't have too many economics majors sitting in on their top-level meetings - or hunters, for that matter. It's ironic that several years back when they started this whole strategy to "increase opportunity" - read literally as "lower value product for a higher price", a whole bunch of us economically illiterate hunters told them it was a monumentally stupid idea - a "lose-lose" proposition. They snubbed their noses at us and pointed to bogus surveys, totally dismissing any input we provided - which of course, they had asked for, but had no intention of acknowledging in any serious way. So now, applications are down which means revenues are down, and they're scratching their collective heads, wondering why. The irony is that this very situation was predicted, and communicated to AZGFD, years ago by the very sportsmen and women that they claim to be representing. They asked for our input, they got it, they ignored it - and now they wonder why support has dropped off.

Personally, I like the Jim White tripod adapter better than any other I've tried. It's light, simple and you can still wear your binocs with it attached (most people don't wear 15s around). Having one adapter that is always attached makes for easy transitions between scanning and slow glassing without having to mess with things. I've got 4 pairs of bino's with this adapter - my Swaro 10x42 SLC, Swaro 15x56, my two sons' Vortex 10x40's and we can all interchange our tripods when need be, or I can go to the big Bogen for any of our glass - it just makes things easy. What is it you're not liking about the JW adapter?

I like the Glen Del bucks the best. Way bigger than a coues, but a very good 3D target. I'm thinking broadheads will eat up just about any 3D target really fast.

Good pix - still doesn't look like they are as far along as they normally are this time of year.

+1 for Diamond Razor Edge. It's extremely adjustable for young archers.

LOL - this thread just keeps getting better by the day! Real hunters dress in loin cloths, and club deer into submission. Any fancy projectiles, and you are a WIMP!

I've heard really good things about the Z7, may as well shoot the Bowtech Destroyer and Hoyt CRX 32/35 too. So many great bows out there - I'm sure you'll find one that just feels right to you.