Westcoastgunner
02-07-2015, 03:07 PM
I've been on these forums for almost 3 years now, read many stories, and finally I can offer a story of my own.
I've only been hunting for two years, my first year was tag soup so I was determined to make things happen this year.
It was last week of October and I had already put one deer in the freezer (my first deer ever, wont waste your time on the story of that runt).
Still on a high from my first deer, my old man and I decided to head out to fill another tag. So we drove to an area in 8-23 that he had hunted a few years prior where to this day I believe he shot a B&C Record Breaker but never got it scored(he's not into the whole scoring bit). We arrived late in the evening, it had rained most of the way up in the valleys, finally reaching the logging road and climbing switch backs we hit snow and my truck would go no further with a trailer and two quads on it. By the time we set up the wall tent and got everything unpacked, it was 1AM and there were going to be only a few hours of sleep before it was time to get up.
Day 1: Needless to say it was rough getting up after being up till 1, but we got underway. We got on our quads and pushed through the foot of snow further up the mountain to where he had got his buck. The amount of fresh track were incredible, they went in every which direction, how we didn't run into a single deer was beyond me. We decided to leave the quads and make our way through the trees, hopefully hot on the trail of a buck. The deeper we went into the trees the deeper the snow got as it dumped from the sky. Visibility was pour we couldn't see more then 50 yards ahead of ourselves. We pushed till just past noon and retired for the day seeing the weather showed no signs of letting up.
Day 2: The next morning went pretty well the same as the first, but the amount of fresh tracks were very limited. Upon further investigation 4 sets of wolf tracks had moved into the top of the mountain where we were hunting. Maybe they had pushed the deer out over night or who knows what but it did not seem promising. That afternoon we decided to put the footwork on hold and just bomb around on the quads back into the valley and take a small bypass road over the mountain range to another valley. We made our way to the other side of the mountain range where we decided to split up and explore new cuts or areas for the coming morning. A few hours had past, as I made my way from cut to cut exploring and looking for fresh sign. This side of the range had a lot of new growth due to logging but as I made my way down the road and around a corner the growth immediately changed (I always struggle to explain how it changed, its one of those you had to be there to understand it). I entered this area of old growth timber, something out of a painting, a feeling of surreal came over me. Fascinated by my surroundings, I came around a corner and was absolutely caught of guard for what was standing in the middle of the road staring at me. Sure enough I've got my gun across my back and not ready at all, meanwhile there stood this large bodied deer with antlers(no idea on the count at the point, as I'm panicking). As I finally get my rifle over my head, a few trots and he's no longer on the road. With my rifle in my lap I slowly cruise up the road to where he had been standing, to my disbelief there he was standing 30 yards off the road and just watching me. I jump of the quad almost forgetting to set the brake. I load, raise, breath, squeeze, bang. He's been hit, he runs about 40 yards, I can hear him the whole way struggling to breath, then crash, he's down! Before I get to him, he is done, and there laid my first 4x4 mule deer. I thought I had buck fever after my first deer... Well it didn't compare to what I felt that moment. Not even 5 minutes later I hear a quad in the distance, its my old man. He couldn't believe it, he was proud.
http://i1316.photobucket.com/albums/t607/westcoastgunner89/dadmikebuck_zpsqftiy2bw.jpg (http://s1316.photobucket.com/user/westcoastgunner89/media/dadmikebuck_zpsqftiy2bw.jpg.html)
http://i1316.photobucket.com/albums/t607/westcoastgunner89/mikesbuck_zpseyv05mcg.jpg (http://s1316.photobucket.com/user/westcoastgunner89/media/mikesbuck_zpseyv05mcg.jpg.html)
http://i1316.photobucket.com/albums/t607/westcoastgunner89/skinnedout2014_zpszfago0l8.jpg (http://s1316.photobucket.com/user/westcoastgunner89/media/skinnedout2014_zpszfago0l8.jpg.html)
I've only been hunting for two years, my first year was tag soup so I was determined to make things happen this year.
It was last week of October and I had already put one deer in the freezer (my first deer ever, wont waste your time on the story of that runt).
Still on a high from my first deer, my old man and I decided to head out to fill another tag. So we drove to an area in 8-23 that he had hunted a few years prior where to this day I believe he shot a B&C Record Breaker but never got it scored(he's not into the whole scoring bit). We arrived late in the evening, it had rained most of the way up in the valleys, finally reaching the logging road and climbing switch backs we hit snow and my truck would go no further with a trailer and two quads on it. By the time we set up the wall tent and got everything unpacked, it was 1AM and there were going to be only a few hours of sleep before it was time to get up.
Day 1: Needless to say it was rough getting up after being up till 1, but we got underway. We got on our quads and pushed through the foot of snow further up the mountain to where he had got his buck. The amount of fresh track were incredible, they went in every which direction, how we didn't run into a single deer was beyond me. We decided to leave the quads and make our way through the trees, hopefully hot on the trail of a buck. The deeper we went into the trees the deeper the snow got as it dumped from the sky. Visibility was pour we couldn't see more then 50 yards ahead of ourselves. We pushed till just past noon and retired for the day seeing the weather showed no signs of letting up.
Day 2: The next morning went pretty well the same as the first, but the amount of fresh tracks were very limited. Upon further investigation 4 sets of wolf tracks had moved into the top of the mountain where we were hunting. Maybe they had pushed the deer out over night or who knows what but it did not seem promising. That afternoon we decided to put the footwork on hold and just bomb around on the quads back into the valley and take a small bypass road over the mountain range to another valley. We made our way to the other side of the mountain range where we decided to split up and explore new cuts or areas for the coming morning. A few hours had past, as I made my way from cut to cut exploring and looking for fresh sign. This side of the range had a lot of new growth due to logging but as I made my way down the road and around a corner the growth immediately changed (I always struggle to explain how it changed, its one of those you had to be there to understand it). I entered this area of old growth timber, something out of a painting, a feeling of surreal came over me. Fascinated by my surroundings, I came around a corner and was absolutely caught of guard for what was standing in the middle of the road staring at me. Sure enough I've got my gun across my back and not ready at all, meanwhile there stood this large bodied deer with antlers(no idea on the count at the point, as I'm panicking). As I finally get my rifle over my head, a few trots and he's no longer on the road. With my rifle in my lap I slowly cruise up the road to where he had been standing, to my disbelief there he was standing 30 yards off the road and just watching me. I jump of the quad almost forgetting to set the brake. I load, raise, breath, squeeze, bang. He's been hit, he runs about 40 yards, I can hear him the whole way struggling to breath, then crash, he's down! Before I get to him, he is done, and there laid my first 4x4 mule deer. I thought I had buck fever after my first deer... Well it didn't compare to what I felt that moment. Not even 5 minutes later I hear a quad in the distance, its my old man. He couldn't believe it, he was proud.
http://i1316.photobucket.com/albums/t607/westcoastgunner89/dadmikebuck_zpsqftiy2bw.jpg (http://s1316.photobucket.com/user/westcoastgunner89/media/dadmikebuck_zpsqftiy2bw.jpg.html)
http://i1316.photobucket.com/albums/t607/westcoastgunner89/mikesbuck_zpseyv05mcg.jpg (http://s1316.photobucket.com/user/westcoastgunner89/media/mikesbuck_zpseyv05mcg.jpg.html)
http://i1316.photobucket.com/albums/t607/westcoastgunner89/skinnedout2014_zpszfago0l8.jpg (http://s1316.photobucket.com/user/westcoastgunner89/media/skinnedout2014_zpszfago0l8.jpg.html)