I just got back from another great Wyoming antelope hunt. This year I had the good fortune of taking two first timers with me. Chris used to work for me and his friend Jim decided last year to take me up on my offer to go and we applied for tags. Jim only wanted doe tags and Chris only wanted buck. As it turned out we drew first choice doe and second choice buck which would require us to move camp, assuming tags got filled.
We left my place on Wednesday, September 30th late afternoon and we pulled into Casper about 22 hours later. We got in early enough to pick up last minute supplies and find dinner. Next morning we drove to the unit we drew doe tags as that had been open for a week or two and the buck unit opened October 1. I figured we would hunt doe first and avoid the first couple days goat rodeo for buck. Once we got camp set up we went for a hike to see what we could find. Glassing turned up a few small groups a mile away so we started working towards them. On the way I caught a flash of movement and an unusual noise. It took a second for my brain to register rattlesnake and high-stepped it a little. I was surprised how close he let me get before buzzing, probably 3 feet so.View attachment 157659
After a couple blown stalks, Jim was finally able to belly crawl into a position he was comfortable shooting and made a perfect 265 yard shot on a big doe. View attachment 157660I saw the hit and knew she was about to drop. The rest of the group was milling around so I got in position and took down a doe also. That was Jim’s first western big game animal so we were all stoked. I got mine quartered and in the pack and helped Jim with his. The pack out was pretty easy and we celebrated in camp with beers and enjoyed the sunset.View attachment 157663
Next day was pretty much a repeat only this time without the rattler. We got on a small group and I had the best position and dropped another doe at 220. I packed it back myself while Jim and Chris went out on their own. After many blown stalks and a miss they were working there way back to camp and as luck would have it, there were 2 bucks a doe less than a quarter mile from camp. After a perfect stalk and shot, Jim had his second doe.
Next morning, we broke camp, and moved to the unit we drew buck tags, and reset camp. We went for a 6 mile hike and didn’t see too much. Next morning we went on a much longer hike and glassed some of antelope way off. With a lot of private ground to navigate it necessitated going through some pretty deep draws and out of the way but we did catch up to a group. I held back while those two put on a long stalk but unfortunately never got within 350 yards, which Chris was not comfortable with. We also saw several other hunters off in the distance, a few on foot and a couple on side by sides.
Next morning, I had just got dressed and was sitting outside the tent looking across the valley we were in and thought I saw something. A quick look through the binos and sure enough a buck was walking along about 1000 yards away. I grabbed my rifle and had to sprint a few hundred yards then work up a small draw to where I thought I’d intercept him. As I got out of the draw I glassed and found the buck staring right at me about 200 yards away, only his head visible above the sage. I stayed on the bipod just in case and inexplicably, he took a couple steps towards me onto a small rise giving me a relatively easy broadside shot. View attachment 157661Chris later said that buck did everything wrong. My rangefinder showed us to be 890 yards from camp, making for a very easy pack out! Jim and Chris went out by themselves while I took care of my buck. They put in a lot of miles but never got any shot opportunities.
The next day we covered around 5 miles trying to get to a water source I knew of and saw nothing besides other hunters. There were at least 4 groups of hunters working the same area and I knew that Chris was getting a little down with having only a day and a half left. We chatted with a couple guys we ran into walking out from where we were going. They were having a similar experience as us, very few antelope and other hunters making things difficult. We pressed on and wasn’t long before I spotted 3 antelope in a draw that wasn’t visible to the two other groups of hunters I was keeping an eye on. We crawled into position and by the time we got there, they had disappeared. I glanced up to see a large herd trotting over a ridge on a diagonal path towards us. A quick sprint and some more crawling and we got Chris into position. A small group of 4 were visible and he had to wait until a doe cleared before he could get a shot. At the shot, the buck dropped like a rock and just like that Chris had his first animal with a rifle.View attachment 157662 I wish we had taken a better field photo but the temperature was close to 80 and we had at least 6 miles back to camp so quartering and caping was done as quickly as possible.
That evening was very relaxing as all tags were filled so we enjoyed several beers and was on the road back to Pa the next day. It was a fun time and I think both of my hunting buddies now have the western bug.
