Sikanni Airstrip 2 weeks.

[scoopy]

Got our bison tags for LEH at 7-42D Oct-1-15! Looking at setting up camp on the airstrip at 22km on Sept 28th and then scouting before opening day. Anyone else headed up for this time? Anyone local want to meet up and have a few cold ones in exchange for some tips? We will have Camper and 2 quads and lots of cold beer.

[moosinaround]

Not sure if you been up there before, but the only locals you gonna be visiting have fur, and sharp pointy teeth! Take your sunshine with you, and tires chains to get out! Tale LOTS of gas for ATV's too!! Good luck hunting for the Tatonka! You will be in Beautiful country!! moosin

[wallz]

Lots of good area to cover. Like said, take chains, as the little bit up and down at the creek crossing can get stupid after a small snow fall. Was there 2 years ago. The previous year a few went over the bank coming back out, on the way down from the strip.

Look for the crossing across the sikanni river, and check out the other side as well. Just watch the water level of the river as it can fluctuate, and I don't know what it is.

The far end, to the end of the allowable quad trail, and then walk a few kms further is decent as well.

Really all depends on where they are at the time. We had a hard time, and didn't see any, as they were pushed FAR to the back of the area, and only horse access, as it is a few days travel.

Be prepared for elk, and whitetails in the lower areas.

You can order a detailed map from Frt St Johns, McKellaney I think they are. If you want and haven't been up there before.

It is a hard hunt, if the herd are not close.

[gramps]

I hope the hunt is going well.
Has anyone heard of issues with access to the area?
i heard a rumour that some roads were blocked this week.
We’re heading up there next weekend.

[1prime]

Which roads? There’s only the one road in at 172 mile that I know of. We are heading there on the 14th.. maybe see u there gramps!

[1prime]

Sikanni bridge is supposedly open to 2 lanes again as well, FYI

[Rampager]

We just got back from the Oct 1-15 done D bison hunt and are wondering if anyone had a different result than us.

We started out on the Halfway side sleeping at horse camp before the opener. Explored high and low between the Blueberry Ranch and the end of the zone, including hiking up to the 1800+m peaks behind horse camp and glassed every valley and mountain as far as we could see and saw 0 bison and 0 sign fresher than spring time i.e. crap so dry it was almost dusty.

Then we relocated to Sikkani and repeated the effort with the same result. Again hiking up to the top of the ridges off the valley and glassing everything we could see including spots so far back where even if we saw a bison, we wouldn't shoot it as it would take a week to pack it out. All the other bison hunters we met, including those on foot going back into zone C had the same feedback. And there were lots of other hunters going to every corner of the zone seeing 0 sign.

As a last resort we thought we'd give the infamous Redfern trail a go in the open zone. After a half day of hard travel on quads and making it ~1/3 of the way back we realized we were not prepared to make it to near the end of the trail, supposedly where the bison were, and get one back out, so we turned around. Just too much risk for us novice out-of-town quadders with little old machines. It was a good choice because our quad trailer fell apart a few KM from the trailhead.

We chose to not continue hunting as I can't guarantee there wasn't a bison in our huntable zone but I'm pretty darn sure. One would need to do a serious aerial survey to be sure. Word is the bison were back deep in the valley near the big mountains. If true, all zone D hunters had essentially 0% chance at a successful hunt. Vern at Pink Mtn said "he hasnt seen a bison in a long time". At least when elk or moose hunting you can keep motivated knowing there are bulls out there somewhere, but bison aren't like that. I hope that the situation changes for the tag holders for the later hunts.

We did see two big bull moose that we could have shot on the road before the regs changed this year... Ugh.

Gramps - we did not encounter any road closure issues.

1prime - The Sikkani bridge was still single lane traffic but at worst you are looking at a few minute wait, not a big deal.

Scoopy - I wonder if we chatted on the trail?

[sed8ed]

We are still here, camped at duhu now since it's a little quieter but we were camped near the end of the south sikanni main.

We have changed over to elk hunting since at least those we have seen, just not connected yet... Same as you, we could have dropped a cranker moose in 7-58 before the regs changed this year but oh well. Only thing we have shot so far is a bunch of grouse.
Missed connecting with you I think, we were on foot hiking the river banks on the south side, east of the river crossing or on the red polaris 2-up off the 156 road at the west end.

[RyoTHC]

We are still here, camped at duhu now since it's a little quieter but we were camped near the end of the south sikanni main.

We have changed over to elk hunting since at least those we have seen, just not connected yet... Same as you, we could have dropped a cranker moose in 7-58 before the regs changed this year but oh well. Only thing we have shot so far is a bunch of grouse.
Missed connecting with you I think, we were on foot hiking the river banks on the south side, east of the river crossing or on the red polaris 2-up off the 156 road at the west end.


not the news I was hoping for sir, I was wondering how you two were doing…
hopefully you’re staying until the bitter end and have a shot at finding one if they get moving..

the reports from these hunts seem to get more and more depressing yearly.. clearly they need to adjust the bison zones or quit sending so many people up there to waste all their time and money.

it’s one thing if it’s a tough hunt it’s another if there’s no legal animals in the zone.

[Jrax]

I was way back in redfern earlier in september, i wasnt looking for bison but i didnt see any. Hunted from nevis creek area to redfern lake area and didnt see any bison sign that wasnt very old. We also broke a marlon tub trail, and had a quad break down as well as a swamped quad. There should be pockets of bison somewhere in sikanni area, i think there always is but its a very large area to cover. When the big herds are there, it is very obvious.

[Rampager]

not the news I was hoping for sir, I was wondering how you two were doing…
hopefully you’re staying until the bitter end and have a shot at finding one if they get moving..

the reports from these hunts seem to get more and more depressing yearly.. clearly they need to adjust the bison zones or quit sending so many people up there to waste all their time and money.

it’s one thing if it’s a tough hunt it’s another if there’s no legal animals in the zone.

As much as we tried to not think negatively we had the same thought. The government document from a few years ago describing the change in regs rearranging the zones and adding the open season estimated the zone D population at 400 bison. Obviously this number will change throughout the year based on the herd's location at the time. Other stats were a 10-15% target harvest rate for 40-70 bison killed each year, 150-200 tags given out, for an approx 25-30% LEH winner harvest rate.

Again, I don't want to speak in absolutes saying there are no bison there right now but our experience does not align with the numbers the LEH hunt was based upon. It was tough driving up from Vancouver Island for the area to appear to be devoid of bison. I would feel more settled if there was at least fresh sign but we just couldn't connect, or we spotted them in the zone but too far from the road to pack out. Really anything at all would have been nice. We weren't looking for a gimmie (although that does happen sometimes with bison), we just wanted an actual hunt. I wonder what would happen if the end-of-year hunter survey shows 0-1 bison harvested?

I do hope hunters who see it through to the end are rewarded with a harvest opportunity. We just couldn't justify it.

[1prime]

YIKES!!! Not the news I was hoping for! Thanks guys for posting the info, I appreciate it. Sorry it didn’t go well for you, i sure as hell hope that our luck turns out to be a bit better. Going for two weeks and not seeing a bison will be absolutely brutal! How about elk?? Any around?

[1prime]

At least moose are open while we’re there.. would love to know where you saw them… :-D

[moosinaround]

Weather is playing a HUGE role in where the critters are hanging out!! We did a moose hunt up north in 7-39, and the moose were still up high as is was very warm down low, and the bugs were actually bad!! As soon as the frost hit, the guys that stuck it out, found the moose!! Not much for snow up high, so why not stay up high, where it is cooler, and the food is easy pickings! The Bison will come down to the lower valley meadows, and will need a bit of snow and cooler weather to make thier move! Ive done that hunt in November, and it took a couple days to find the bison, but we had equipment issues, and -38 weather, so we bailed for warmer climates. If I was to do the bison hunt again, I'd stay at the outfitters, and I'd do the late season, dec-Jan hunt for them!! Moosin

[Rampager]

YIKES!!! Not the news I was hoping for! Thanks guys for posting the info, I appreciate it. Sorry it didn’t go well for you, i sure as hell hope that our luck turns out to be a bit better. Going for two weeks and not seeing a bison will be absolutely brutal! How about elk?? Any around?

We never saw any but other groups we talked to did, cows and small bulls. We let a few bugles rip when we were in the hills but never did hear anything back. Could very well be the odd 6pt bull still hanging around though!

[Rampager]

Weather is playing a HUGE role in where the critters are hanging out!! We did a moose hunt up north in 7-39, and the moose were still up high as is was very warm down low, and the bugs were actually bad!! As soon as the frost hit, the guys that stuck it out, found the moose!! Not much for snow up high, so why not stay up high, where it is cooler, and the food is easy pickings! The Bison will come down to the lower valley meadows, and will need a bit of snow and cooler weather to make thier move! Ive done that hunt in November, and it took a couple days to find the bison, but we had equipment issues, and -38 weather, so we bailed for warmer climates. If I was to do the bison hunt again, I'd stay at the outfitters, and I'd do the late season, dec-Jan hunt for them!! Moosin

Our experience was the bison is they aren't up high in the ridges/hills in the zone D LEH area (we know because we hiked to the top of a few of them, glassed all around, and saw zilch), I have the feeling they are deep in the mountains in the back of zone C right now.

But I totally agree with your thoughts. Vern said this is the 3rd year in the row this has happened. Next time I put in for this LEH I will also do the later season, I have also been successful previously in a late November hunt with a bison above Horse Camp.

[Rampager]

Wondering if anyone knows of anyone who harvested or even saw a bison so far this year?

[sed8ed]

We just got back... did a run up to Liard hot springs after the hunt to relax.

I know of 3 bison harvested, 2 from Zone C and one from the open area. One was by a guy who flew into Trimble lake, one by a group on horseback out of the halfway river side and the last one was taken out of Redfern but that one was just word of mouth at the gas station.

When we left, the elk were just starting to move south, missed connecting with a nice whitetail but there were lots of whitetail does and a few bucks starting to show up. Nothing really on the 156 side except tons and I mean TONS of grouse. Seen two great looking moose in the pink mountain area, one massive one right in the middle of the road that wouldn't move for a bit... never thought i'd see the day where i'd be shooing a 4x4 brow tine moose away during the rut.

[Coaster2]

Hello all,

Just returned from a 12 day adventure in the Sikanni valley. Camped at airstrip. Been in the area many times before but things were very different this time around. Hiking in shorts was new, basically no fresh bison sign was also new. Sadly, we came home empty handed this time. Only two small bulls were taken that we were aware of and no herded animals to be found in the area. And noooooo, we were not on the quads hoping for one to cross the road, our boot sole wear bars can prove it. Similar reports from the outfitter and the CO's we talked to said herd sizes have dropped dramatically over the past few years for unknown reasons. Oh well though, Its always a beautiful spot to hang out and we saw a fair amount of non legal animals. Also a few nice moose come out which when the bison were around was rumored to be rare to see. All in all I'd do it again though, its a great vacation spot! haha but for everyone giving it a shot be aware its a costly venture for no guarantee, but hey isn't all hunting that way? hahaha.

Anyway hopefully the Nov and later draws work out for the folks with those tags. They cant be gone forever....

[JMCFIRE]

We were up in zone D beyond the airstrip this year Oct 1-15. We saw the outfitter take one down by the river. We walked a ton of miles and climbed a bunch of hills. We couldn’t locate the herd again. Not a lot of sign. We did a few trips to get out back to the airstrip (that was an adventure) and didn’t see any fresh sign or animals. It’s a beautiful area, but not near as successful as the last time we had that draw.
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