Wes's 2nd muley

[DEF110]

After five days of hunting, we had seen 40 to 100 deer per day and turning down spikes and forked horns in the four days prior. I had to talk Wes out of shooting a spike in the morning. After a morning of not seeing more bucks I was questioning myself for talking him out of it, but he had to do better than his 2x3 from last year. The evening hunt started out with three doe bedded at 4:30pm. So we take a road that we had seen deer on and a good place to glass from. I went to the end of the road and turned around to head back to the top of the hill to glass. Wes said lets walk down to the end of the ridge and glass, I said ok. After a 200 yard walk I see a glint under a tree two ridges over. I put the 15x56 up and say I have a deer bedded, set up the tripod and say it’s a buck and a good one. We set up with Wes’s 243 on a bipod and after the range finder batteries being dead; I had to estimate the distance to be around 300 yards “BOY WAS I WRONG”. I told Wes that’s a long shot and with no way to get closer to lay prone and over my pack. I told Wes to put it at the top of his back and just squeeze the trigger, it hit four to five feet under the bedded buck. The buck jumped up, turned and started up the ridge to the left away from us. I tell him to put it two foot over this time and it hit at the bucks feet. After a short stroke of the bolt and a click of the firing pin and a little meltdown Wes gets the third shot off and it hits just in front of the buck. Wes did not take his pack on our hike as it was just to the end of the ridge his extra bullets in the pack. I told Wes this is his last chance and he had to make it count. Wes hit with this one and the buck humped up and walked into a group of trees and did not come out. Wes had to run back to the ranger to get his pack. He wanted to head over and get his buck. I said let’s give it some time. After waiting 15 minutes we started our hike thru two canyons taking about 30 minutes to get over to the ridge the buck was on. Getting to the bottom of the ridge Wes wanted to run strait to the buck. I said no let’s take our time and make sure. We went up to the side and the spot that the buck was hit at. The buck gets back up and after telling Wes not to shoot thru the trees, Wes runs 20 yards in front of me sets up in the bipod with me still looking for the buck, I hear boom and all I see is the buck turn upside down. What some awesome shooting from this 13 year old. He took all my inputs and made the adjustments. Not knowing the true distance I had to wait to get home to upload the information from the GPS to MapQuest. The distance was 450 to 500 yards.

[tjwking]

Great shooting. Congratulations on a great looking buck.

[CRAZYBUCK]

WOW way to shoot very nice buck

[Apatkelley]

Great buck, way to hang in there.

[John O]

That is a real beauty!!! Way to go Wes.

[couespatrol]

Awsome buck! Congrats to both.

[stanley]

Outstanding!! Good for Wes!!!!!!!!!

Thanks for sharing!

 

S.

 

[Millhouse]

Congrats! Heck of a buck! Good to hear you saw so many deer. Which unit were you in?

[khaller]

nice muly! great job!

[CouesBuckhunter]

congrats

[loco4coues]

great job on a great buck and thanks for sharing.

[Pine Donkey]

This is a great deer. No better time that in your youth to begin making payments to the taxidermist. Congratulations

[Coach]

Man - that is an AWESOME looking buck! Congrats Wes, and good shooting! Way to hold out for a biggun too!

[bow.hunter8971]

good shooting nice buck congrats.

[lucky2hunt]

OH.........MY...........GOODNESS!!!!!!!! Awesome, absolutely Awesome! Good Job