2024 WY pronghorn wrap up

BuzzH

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Joined
Jan 9, 2001
Messages
17,765
Location
Laramie, WY
Short season, but productive.

A friend drew a great tag and we spent a few days prior to the season looking over some awesome country and wildlife.

Saw a lot of these guys:

71612.jpeg


Also saw some pretty fair pronghorn bucks, 3-4 that we figured were worthy of the tag my friend had.

The first choice buck we found about noon the day before the opener. We got there the next morning right at light and found another vehicle was also there. We didn't want to disrupt his hunt as he was there first and watched as he shot the buck. We walked out to have a look and talked to the hunter and found out he had been watching this buck for a couple weeks prior. Well earned for him and a great buck for sure:

71712.jpeg


The second choice buck we found was living right on the border of 2 hunting units, spending about half his time in each unit. We found him right away, but on the wrong side of the road. Decided to shift gears and go look around and come back to check on the second choice buck later in the day.

72077.jpeg


We next went back to an area where we saw good numbers of pronghorn a couple days prior to make sure we didn't miss something. Found a shorter heavy buck with great prongs. Watched him at about 340 yards for about 20 minutes and my buddy decided he just couldn't pass it up.

We moved out to the herd and fortunately a small buck that was behind us caught the attention of the heavy buck and he ran right toward us to run the small buck off. Big mistake on his part, 150 yard shot and done deal.

All kinds of mass and prong:

IMG_16611.jpeg


Headed back to Laramie Saturday morning, got my buddies pronghorn in the freezer and had about 4-5 hours to try a unit about 20 minutes from the house where I drew a tag. I had zero time to hunt pronghorn other than Saturday (just too many sheep and moose tags), so after looking over some bucks, decided this one was good enough. Short stalk, 261 yards with my 7-08 and a single 140 grain accubond, that was a wrap for pronghorn until next season.

71843.jpeg
 
Short season, but productive.

A friend drew a great tag and we spent a few days prior to the season looking over some awesome country and wildlife.

Saw a lot of these guys:

71612.jpeg


Also saw some pretty fair pronghorn bucks, 3-4 that we figured were worthy of the tag my friend had.

The first choice buck we found about noon the day before the opener. We got there the next morning right at light and found another vehicle was also there. We didn't want to disrupt his hunt as he was there first and watched as he shot the buck. We walked out to have a look and talked to the hunter and found out he had been watching this buck for a couple weeks prior. Well earned for him and a great buck for sure:

71712.jpeg


The second choice buck we found was living right on the border of 2 hunting units, spending about half his time in each unit. We found him right away, but on the wrong side of the road. Decided to shift gears and go look around and come back to check on the second choice buck later in the day.

72077.jpeg


We next went back to an area where we saw good numbers of pronghorn a couple days prior to make sure we didn't miss something. Found a shorter heavy buck with great prongs. Watched him at about 340 yards for about 20 minutes and my buddy decided he just couldn't pass it up.

We moved out to the herd and fortunately a small buck that was behind us caught the attention of the heavy buck and he ran right toward us to run the small buck off. Big mistake on his part, 150 yard shot and done deal.

All kinds of mass and prong:

IMG_16611.jpeg


Headed back to Laramie Saturday morning, got my buddies pronghorn in the freezer and had about 4-5 hours to try a unit about 20 minutes from the house where I drew a tag. I had zero time to hunt pronghorn other than Saturday (just too many sheep and moose tags), so after looking over some bucks, decided this one was good enough. Short stalk, 261 yards with my 7-08 and a single 140 grain accubond, that was a wrap for pronghorn until next season.

71843.jpeg
Congratulations!
 
I had zero time to hunt pronghorn other than Saturday (just too many sheep and moose tags), so after looking over some bucks, decided this one was good enough.
Great buck! How where the numbers looking? Lots of fawns?

Also... did I miss something? I'm not the jealous type (well sort of because I'm swamped with work this time of the year), but I hope you keep us apprised of these hunts.
 
Great buck! How where the numbers looking? Lots of fawns?

Also... did I miss something? I'm not the jealous type (well sort of because I'm swamped with work this time of the year), but I hope you keep us apprised of these hunts.
Numbers are still depressed for sure. Fawns, really depended. We would run into a herd of 6-8 does, maybe 2-3 fawns. Very next herd with 6-8 does, maybe 7-8 fawns.

IMO and from what I'm seeing, there is something going on with pronghorn fawns statewide. It's also interesting talking to a warden in the area my friend hunted making the claim that the "pronghorn are really recovering". They simply can't be in that short of a time after the 22 winter and when I pointed out the fawns from last year wouldn't even have fawns of their own until next spring, there seemed to be some confusion. In that particular unit, I would say numbers are 50-60% of what they were prior to the 22 winter.

The area I hunted near town, that unit is slowly recovering from a severe case of lead poisoning. Fawn numbers were in the fair-good range. Nice to see things going the right direction though.
 
Enjoyed the thread, congrats on the bucks.

Now I'm going to be an outsider and comment on numbers. Drove I-80 second week of September heading to the west part of state for an elk hunt. Literally saw hundreds of pronghorn. My mind was blown. The interesting part was the lack of bucks per doe around the Laramie area. Then we started seeing multiple good bucks and with a little unit research saw how great of units (tough to draw) those south central units are. But the outlook definitely wasn't grim for the easier to draw units. I saw fewer pronghorn in 2020 on the same route, and expected way less this trip given the winter kill reports. But like I said, just an outsider looking in. I was glad to see all the pronghorn and feel confident i could burn my current points and kill a decent buck in that corridor.
 
Nice bucks! Congrats.

My son and I are pronghorn hunting tomorrow and Sunday (he has the tag) so good to get a reminder of what nice bucks look like.
 

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