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This hunt is definitely worthy of capping it off with some father/son DQ!As I get older I try to figure out what are the triggers that excite me about hunting, and why. I've given a ton of thought to why I am so smitten by pronghorn and pronghorn hunting. As we built the story line for this hunt over the summer planning meetings, it became pretty apparent why pronghorn has been such a favorite past time of mine.
Pronghorn was the big game species that Matthew could tag along with and have a blast as a 2, 3, 5, 10 year-old. We'd hike all over the place, looking for fossils, camping, building a fire, letting him pee on the campfire and laugh like he'd just robbed the bank, explore places that interested him as much as it interested me. The weather was often nice. After the craziness of opening day, we'd almost have the Montana prairies to ourselves.
Giving it more thought, pronghorn and the places they live, were more about the memories Matthew and I made along the way. If I drive the Montana prairie, it is an endless ramble of stories about pronghorn hunts.
When he got of hunting age, he took three Montana bucks, three Wyoming bucks, and a New Mexico buck before heading off to college. All of those were memorable trips. I laugh at the time I went on a stalk and left him the keys for the truck. He was too young to drive, but when I returned, I noticed the truck was pointed in the opposite direction and the tire tracks told me he went for a little cruise while I chased a buck over a few high ridges. Things a 14 year old gets to do on a pronghorn hunt; not much you can hurt when testing your driving skills on a Wyoming two-track.
Montana 2003.
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Wyoming 2004.
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New Mexico 2007.
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I've come to realize that these trips and these memories are the biggest reason pronghorn is so compelling to me. And when I get to spend a week with Matthew, as we did together in Nevada last year and what we did for the last week in Utah, there is not much that is going to put a bigger smile on my face.
With my tag punched, we slept in the next morning, as we didn't get back to camp until 11pm. We showered at the public campground and washed some sweaty and bloody clothes, then headed back out for an afternoon hunt.
We ended the day at buck number 142 for our two days of scouting and our two days of hunting. Still nothing that got Matthew real excited.
Since he first started hunting I'd often ask him what he planned/hoped to shoot. His answer was the same then as it is today, "Not sure. I'll know it when I see it." And that was his same answer when I asked him many times over the course of this hunt.
That reply has become a big inside joke with us. I ask, just to make sure he hasn't changed his mantra about what animal he might shoot. When he replies with the standard reply, I chuckle and he smirks.
The night of Hunting Day 2 I grilled up both of my tenderloins and half of one of the backstraps. What a great way to end the day.