Finally ended my free range bison quest!!!

[yotebuster]

I was lucky enough to draw a Wyoming bull bison tag last spring.  I’ve put in for WY, AZ, and UT for a decade or so and pulled a AZ tag a few years back and was unsuccessful after sitting in a blind for 158 hours.  I was really hoping for another chance as I really couldn’t bring myself to shoot a fenced one on a ranch or reservation (I’m 1hr from the Ft peck rez which has bison hunts but they are fenced).  
The season runs aug 15-dec31 and then they reopen it from jan1-31 if they haven’t had any buffalo migrate down from the park.  They shut the hunt down as soon as they start feeding the elk in Jackson Hole which has traditionally been mid jan.  I decided to go as late as I thought was comfortable without getting shut out.  Turned out it was still early.  These hunts used to be easy, the buffalo would show up in nov or dec and they’d be near 100% success.  The last 5 years or so the buffalo just don’t come down.  The snow was deep when we got there, so much so we needed horses just to get through it at all.  The buffalo unfortunately still hadn’t come down.  There was a rumor of one bull on the elk refuge, there were about 15 more on the park about 5 miles off and the rest were all way way off in the park and likely won’t be here before they close the season. 
Well my luck finally turned on wild bison.  We picked up tracks in the river bottom first am and caught up to the lone old bull on horseback.   I was able to get into about 125 yards.  I tucked a 175 swift a frame  into his heart with my 7mm STW, then another.  He spun around and started heading out.  Couldn’t believe it.  I put the next two into his low shoulder to break him, which sort of worked.  I had time to reload and put two more in the base of his skull before he finally tipped.  All shots where lethal.   Can’t believe how tough they are!!!   

We got him gutted and were able to get horses and a sled to him.  They’ve got draft horses here to drag them out, I really didn’t think it was possible but they got him drug about a mile to the nearest retrieval road and loaded whole!!!   He weighed 958# carcass weight!   That puts him at about 1600-1700# on the hoof.  Should make Boone and Crockett and we are gonna have a few years of great eating!!  

 

Super stoked to have finally ended this quest.  We were able to get done early enough to get in a little skiing and are having him butchered and frozen right away so we can haul him home ready to go in the freezer (freezers!).  
 

Edit: Sorry about the sideway pics.  They all looked the same on my phone.  

[WHT_MTNMAN]

Nice job on an awesome bull.

[azbirdhunter88]

That’s a lot of meat 

[bonecollector]

Congrats on filling your bison tag.

[Heat]

Nice bull man!  Be careful though, like sheep these bison get in your blood.  I can't wait to go help somebody on another bison hunt.

[eddielasvegas]

Congrats and what a magnificent bull you harvested.

A bison is next after an elk.

 FIFY.

 

Eddie

[mattys281]

Nice work yotebuster.  Congrats!

[yotebuster]

Recovered two of the 175 aframes when skinning.  They look just like their website says they should!!  Pretty impressed!!  I killed my muskox this year and a few other critters with 175 partitions with plans of using them for this hunt but they shed a ton of weight (40-50% loss) so I ordered some aframes just for buffalo as my rifle hates copper bullets.  Reallly happy with them.  Will weigh them when I get home.  

[CatfishKev]

Way to go man! That thing is ginormous!  Hope you got a lot of wall space for that beast.

[wildwoody]

Awesome, very tasty 

[218buck]

Great trophy what a huge animal

[NewlyMinted]

Congratulations!! What a beast!

[biglakejake]

wow.  just a magazine cover bull.  just WOW! huge.  congrats and enjoy.  

why the STW?  first thing i would have done with that hot little tag in hand was reach out for a 416 rigby.  prob settle for a 416 rem mag both with 400 gr swift or woodleighs'.  7mm?  just a great animal sir!

lee

[weldor]

Outstanding!

[AZbowhntr]

Wow, that is awesome! Congrats