2010 Archery Buck

[Joe Kauffman]

This year my wife and I drew archery javelina tags in an area where we have had a lot of success in for several years and we've been very anxious to hit the hills together in hopes of getting her first archery big game animal. We spent the first few days of January near Spokane Washington where we enjoyed a great pheasant hunt and I was finally able to hit the hills yesterday morning to try my luck for a few hours. I arrived at our usual location right at daylight and was glassing several ridges & draws where we usually see plenty of game when I spotted two javelina walking the hillside adjacent to me. Unfortunately these two had plans other than feeding and after an hour of tracking them I was only able to get within 125 yards of them before they disappeared into the thick Manzanita that covers most of this area.

 

I decided to make a loop around a nearby mountain before heading back to the truck to check out another spot that had also produced for us in the past when I spotted three grey bodies moving through the brush. A quick look through the binoculars showed me two does and one smaller 2x3 Mule deer feeding their way up a slope about 150 yards in front of me. This guy wasn't quite worth filling my tag for the year so I continued my treck back to the truck and drove a short distance to my other favorite glassing spot in hopes of spotting a few more javelina before the sun got too high in the sky.

 

After about 45 minutes of glassing at the second location I spotted a small buck walking up out of a draw 200 yards to my left. Again I thought about my season ending early and decided just to watch him for a bit. Shortly after he was fully exposed and started onto a grassy flat I saw another buck come out of the same draw....followed by 4 more! A total of 5 bucks were now carelessly feeding and I was frantically glassing from one to another until I reached the largest buck of the bunch in the rear of the herd. Now this was definately an archery buck worth ending my deer season early for!

 

I decided to try and make a stalk to see if I could close the gap to under 50 yards where I knew if I had time for a careful shot I could make a clean hit. My biggest problem was the lack of cover with only a few small Manzanita and sticker brush on the ridge between us. Luckily they were feeding away from me so I would have to take every opportunity I had to move quickly while their heads were tucked down in the grass. I did this walk, crouch & stop tactic for about an hour until they all topped over a ridge and just out of site roughly 100 yards away. I took this opportunity to move up the ridge as quickly and quietly as possible hoping they stopped on top which would hopefully put me under 50 yards of them.

 

Once I reached the crest of the ridge I slowly stood up and saw his rack sticking up above a bush 40 yards in front of me. I crouched back down, came to full draw with my bow and stood to full height. He was quartering away from me looking in the other direction which gave me plenty of time to take my mark and squeeze the arrow off. It found its' mark at the back of his ribcage and I knew I'd made a nice clean shot. He barely made it 75 yards when he toppled over and expired for good.

 

Not exactly the species I was after but a definate trophy and a memorable hunt I will never forget. 2 hours later (and many text messages to my son & wife ) I was back at the truck and heading home. Needless to say my wife is now itching to get back out this weekend for her chance at a javelina and deer before the hunt ends later this month.

 

 

 

 

Joe Kauffman

 

 

 

[bonecollector]

Thats a nice deer and good job on the write up. How did you get the deers head to stay up for you in the pictures.

[jwhernandez]

Thats a nice trophy im still waiting on my first archery deer congrats.

[Coues 'n' Sheep]

Congrats on the buck and Great hunt!

[FlyingW]

Nice buck !!! Congrats

[CouesWhitetail]

Outstanding!! Spot and stalk archery deer is awesome! Thanks for sharing your story and pics. And good luck to your wife in her pursuits this month!

 

Amanda

 

[rclouse79]

Your pictures have been killing me. I have been itching to get out again after getting within 80 yds of a mullie buck last Sunday (not nearly as big as yours). Now I am really dying to get back out. Nice work on the deer.

[Packer]

Nice work! That is why it always pays to have every tag possible in your pocket.

 

Aaron

[Gr8 White Jr]

Awesome! Congrats on a great archery buck and good luck on your wife's hunt!

 

-Tracy

[WadeNAZ]

Thanks for Sharing. I enjoyed the post. I am hoping on getting an archery anything this year as well.

 

Congrats and good luck with the Javelina!

 

 

[pwrguy]

Cool buck. I would be happy to end my years deer hunting with that. Great job on the spot and stalk.

[Chef]

Congratulations.

Nice set up on the pictures too.

[jakehaffey]

nice buck! Congrats!

[Coues Archer]

Wow. Nice buck great job.

[Knifeboy]

Thats awesome! I loved the story. I waited to look at the pictures until after I read the whole story, it made the story even better.

 

That left antler has some really neat curl to it, it almost looks like a Coues.

 

Dont think your done with deer for the year. You can still buy a tag over the counter in Colorado. And you can still put in for a New Mexico Coues!

 

Good luck on the pigs, and a super huge congratulations.