Grumpa Joe
11-14-2009, 08:42 AM
My son and I just got home from our 4 day deer hunt in the Kootenays. What beautiful country! We saw all kinds of big game including: Big Horn Sheep, Mountain Goat, Elk, Wolves, Mule Deer and tons of Whitetails. We hunted hard, racking up about 100 km of walking/hauling for the time we were up there, and I've got the blisters on my feet to prove it. This is my son's third hunting season and I was trying so hard to get him a larger animal. He's shot ducks and grouse but he was itching for something bigger. We met 5 friends up there on Sunday after a 12 hour drive from the coast. The drill for each day was get up at 5 a.m., eat a quick breakfast and hit the trails by 6 for the 1 1/2 hour walk in. On Monday and Tuesday my son, Thomas, and I hunted together, exploring the area as this was our first time there. We saw tons of does but nothing with antlers. Tuesday night over dinner one of my friends said he would take Thomas the next day and guaranteed him a buck. He has hunted the area many times and knows all the best places. I told Thomas to listen to Ron, stay close and he would have success. The 3 of us walked in Wednesday morning about 8 km where we split up. I hunted a flat meadow area while they went up to the next bench. About 1/2 an hour after we split up I hear 2 gunshots ( freehand from the 308 ) coming from the direction they had gone. I turned on the radio and shortly I hear my son saying buck down, just a little bit of excitement in his voice. I bail out of my area and hike up to find him gutting his first deer, a little cold because it was snowing but totally pumped. A hug and some high fives then back to business. We finish gutting his spike buck and start the haul out, him carrying the packs and rifles and me toting the deer on my shoulders. I made it about 3 km before we ran into our other friends with the game cart (thank god) and we hauled it back to camp for the skinning and celebratory supper. I was beat but thought that next day I would give it my best shot to get a deer for myself now that Thomas had his (he decided to sleep in). Same routine as the other days except I leave about 10 minutes later than the others. I get about 4 1/2 kms in when I see a deer moving across the trail in front of me. It wasn't legal shooting light yet so I curse as I try to make out the species and points (I could tell it was a decent buck). Determine it's a 4x4 Whitetail and wait and pray for it to stick around until it's light enough to shoot. No dice. He starts moving up hill, pausing every now and then to tease me. I give silent chase ( yeah right, me in my size 12s) working my way uphill after him. Stalked him for 1/2 an hour until I got into the right position to get a clean shot at him. I grunted to get him to stop and after missing the first shot (combination of buck fever and puffing so hard to keep up with him) I nail him with the second from the 7mm. He dives down hill and I chase him, thankfully not that far. The 150grain Nosler Partition took out 3 ribs and his heart so he piled up on the bench just below. After catching my breath and giving thanks, I dragged him about 400 yards down the 500 feet of elevation that I'd chased him. I gutted him just above the trail, hiked in to find my friends and helped them haul their 4x4 Muley and 4x4 Whitetail from about 14 km in, and picked up mine on the way back to camp. It took 6 of us about 5 hours to haul those 3 deer out. Boy were we tired. Ate a good pasta and meatball dinner, drank a toast to our successes and packed the vehicle for what turned out to be a 14 hour drive home Friday (trailer had a flat and stopped to help at 2 accidents due to the snowy road conditions). Sorry for the long winded post but hope you enjoyed the read and the pictures. (If my attempts to get the pictures in the thread don't work they are in my gallery)
Joe
Joe