Average Joe Hunting Adventures with Dan and CJ

[sn.outdoors]

Hey guys, are you done for the year or what? I'm not ready for this adventure to be done yet.

We're not really ready for it to be over either. Thanks so much for following along with us all year. It's been a great season, but it's not quite over yet.

Dan is still chasing after the big buck, and he's being extra careful and patient. He laid eyes on him during daylight hours a few days ago, but it was in a closed area.

I'm heading down to Arizona this weekend for my first javelina hunt. As I said earlier, there will be four of us and we'll all be using longbows that my buddy's dad built. Even if we're unable to connect on some stink pigs, we'll definitely have some fun.

I got out yesterday to do some "coyote hunting," but as it always seems to happen, I kept getting distracted by all of the deer I can't help but find. It helps that I got a new pair of 15's with all of the Cabela's gift cards I got for Christmas.





Once I'm back from Arizona, I'll be done for the 2017 season, and I'll do a final wrap up. Dan's deer season goes into February, so he might be posting on and off until he kills that giant.

 

[Lostinthewoods]

Hey guys, are you done for the year or what? I'm not ready for this adventure to be done yet.

I’m still out chasing bucks down here in Florida!

My big buck is still alive and I am chasing him as hard and as smart as I can.

He was originally with two other bucks
However on Christmas the big buck broke away from them and started to do his own thing. I was actually 45 yards away from him and he’s.... BIG!!!!

Then the next day these two showed up on one of my cameras mid day.

I’ve mentioned it before, but Florida has odd seasons.
This phase closes Jan 1st and then opens again Jan 20-29 and then February 10-19.
Most of the bucks are still bachelored up, but they are starting to break up and we should be seeing rubs and scrapes here soon.
That’ll be great because I’ll really be able to crack down on the big boy.
I’ll also take some time between these two phases to hog and coyote hunt.

I’m not going to end the season until the big buck goes down or until I legally have too.


The cool thing about Florida is deer ends mid February and then my 2018 season starts in March with spring turkey!


I’ll try to post some more updates from down here in Florida.

 

[Lostinthewoods]

I’m out right now in the pouring rain and it’s “chilly” in Florida standards. A grueling 43 degrees ��

However I’ve decided to work smarter, not harder.

Here’s to hoping big boy or one of his two smaller buddies come out.

 

[Crossbowguy]

Nice! You should pat. that harness for other hunters!!!

 

[Graham]

Thank you for your service. Good luck on all your hunts this year!

 

[Lostinthewoods]

Thank you for your service. Good luck on all your hunts this year!

Thank you for your support, Graham!

 

[Lostinthewoods]

Nice! You should pat. that harness for other hunters!!!

Thank you for sending me some of your "cooler" weather. Temps have been dropping down here!

 

[Lostinthewoods]

Just a few more days and I can start hunting again!

To keep me sane I’ve been eating some delicious elk creations....


Elk lumpia anyone?

 

[sn.outdoors]

I'm almost back home from the javelina hunt in Arizona. Man, what a blast! Unfortunately none of my journal entries were backed up on my phone or in the cloud, so I'll have to rewrite everything tonight and tomorrow.

What Arizona lacked in cell phone coverage, it made up for with beautiful scenery and abundant wildlife.

 

[Crossbowguy]

Did it hit -32' F like it did up here or the -55' we had in Saranac Lake the other night???

Thank you for sending me some of your "cooler" weather. Temps have been dropping down here!

 

[Crossbowguy]

Awesome pic of AZ!!!

 

[sn.outdoors]

The idea to do this javelina hunt was conjured up during my buddy's elk hunt back in September. Back then it was one of those "we'll see" type of deals, and luckily our schedules were all able to line up to make it happen.

As I said earlier, the primary weapons of choice for the javelina hunt would be longbows Ryan's dad made. Since all of the bows are called Hualapi Bows, we dubbed the trip the first "Hualapi Bow Bash" in hopes that it will become a regular occurrence. Unfortunately, a mailing mix up and the fact all of the leftover tags were sold out for the unit, only Ryan and I had tags for javelina. Ryan and his dad did have deer tags, so all was not lost.

----

We arrived in camp the day before the season and had a few minutes to glass before the sunset. I was immediately blown away with how beautiful the desert is. I might have been a little distracted by the scenery... We didn't find any pigs that night, but it did help me get my desert eyes back a little bit.

After appropriately bringing in the new year, the morning of day 1 started a little later than first light, and we moved a little slower than I'm used too. It got warm pretty quickly, and we only saw 7 pigs that morning. Since they were between us and the vehicles, we decided to leave them alone until we hiked out in the afternoon if we didn't see anything else.

After taking a midday nap, we decided to go after the pigs we, but got distracted by this decent 3x3.

We tried to put a quick stalk on him, but soon realized he wasn't in a spot we could get close enough for a longbow shot. While we were waiting for him to make a move, a random doe we didn't know was there decided she wanted to bed somewhere else. Of course the buck followed her, and my buddy wasn't able to get a shot off as the buck passed by just below his love is sight and out of range.

After the deer encounter, we weren't able to relocate the javelinas, so we walked back to the top of the hill to spend the afternoon glassing for more deer and pigs, and to talk over the next days plans with the Jeff and Steve. They saw several groups of javelina earlier in the morning, so we decided to give that a try on day 2.

---

We were greeted with a stereotypical Arizona sunrise, and a few javelinas not far away.

 

[sn.outdoors]

This is where the struggle of hunting with a longbow was realized.

I was able to get within 20yds of several javilena, and had a lot of animals within 10yds but hidden inside the brush. I waited for a few minutes, surrounded by pigs, before a shot was finally presented at roughly 18yds. I drew back, found my anchor, gapped the arrow point and let 'er fly.... right over its back.

I pulled a second arrow out of my quiver, moved closer to the commotion in the brush and a second pig stepped out to stared at me. I drew back, found my anchor, gapped the arrow, and let it fly... right under it's belly.

I don't miss animals very often, and I knew going into this hunt missing was something I would likely have to deal with. I spent a considerable amount of time shooting my longbow ever since I got it last February, and I was drilling dots and felt confident I could get it done. But that just wasn't the case in this moment. I missed, and there wasn't a thing I could do about it except retrieve my arrows, sharpen my broadheads, send a few practice arrows, and keep hunting.

---

For the afternoon we decided to check out a new area near a water tank that was absolutely covered in javelina tracks. We decided to split up to cover more ground. I would be hunting with Steve, and Ryan would hunt with his dad. Not long after leaving the vehicles, we found a group of muleys with a decent buck. Neither of us had a deer tag, so we sent the other guys a text, waited a few minutes with no response, and pressed on to a good vantage point.

The sun was out in force and it was pretty warm, and despite looking at a ton of fresh sign and what looked like great country, we didn't see any javelina up and walking setting. So we decided to cover some ground. We walked really slow and spent more time glassing than walking.

Roughly half a mile and an hour later we faintly heard a rock fall and a pig grunt not far from us. It was so faint that we couldn't quite determine an exact location, but we knew it was in front of us and the wind was good for a stalk. So we moved in slowly.

As we approached a small rocky outcropping, Steve gave me a, "psssst." I immediately stopped and slowly looked back up at Steve. "I think I got a pig." He said that just as my eyes settled on a decent boar laying on his side, in the wide open, 100yds away from us.

I took a few steps back to get behind cover and dropped my pack. As I was making my way down to the sleeping pig, he decided the sun was just a little too warm and slowly got up to stretch. He was well outside my range, so I stood and watched as he tucked himself into the brush.

I kept closing the distance when I saw a few pigs cross the opening in front of me from left to right. The commotion of the moving javelinas woke the rest of the group up, and there were suddenly pigs everywhere.

I watched a javelina slowly appear from under the brush at only 17 yards. I slowly drew back, and loosed the arrow. The arrow appeared to have flown true, the pig jumped straight forward and got tangled in the scrub oak for a few seconds before running off. I felt good about the shot and walked up to check my arrow, but it was clean.

While standing over my arrow, a boar broke out of the brush and came straight to me to check out what was going on. I drew back and he stopped at roughly 5 yards, but stared directly at me. I didn't have a clear shot, so I had to wait for him to turn. As soon as he did, I flung the arrow right over his back. He was too close! I blew it.

That boar ran up the hill a few yards into an extremely thick patch of oak scrub just above a very large boulder. He grunted and clicked his teeth at me and wasn't leaving, so I climbed up to the to of the rock. There were pigs in literally all directions. When the next shot opportunity presented itself, I was perched on top of a small rock precipice standing above the oak scrub. I drew back and sent the 3rd arrow of the stalk. It glanced off the pig's upper neck and the animal rolled on the ground and ran in a few circles. It was clearly a non vital hit. I immediately nocked another arrow and got a second shot at the same animal as it was sprinting toward me but I missed over its back.

Steve and I watched as the pig I hit ran over half a mile with the rest of the herd and never missed a step. We walked to where we'd last seen it, followed tiny specs of blood for another hundred yards or so before we lost the trail.

The long walk back to the vehicles had me doubting the whole traditional gear thing. I'd never shot 6 arrows in one day, and I've never gone 0 for 6. The thrill of getting close to so many animals was soured by the disappointment of missing so many times.

My personality doesn't handle outright failure very well. I was disappointed with my preparation and practice routine, but dwelling on my self-pity wasn't going to get me anywhere. So I plugged a few cactus with my judos and got over it.

Luckily, my hunting partners were all very reassuring, and had a lot of experience hunting with traditional equipment. I just had to come to grips with the fact that missing happens. I was really glad to be hunting animals that would provide me with lots of opportunities, and I just had to keep chasing the opportunities.

 

[sn.outdoors]

Day 3 I woke with a fresh set of optimism. It was my birthday after all, the forecast called for sightly cooler temps and overcast does. We were also greeted with another magnificent Arizona sunrise.

While Jeff and Steve would search new areas for deer, Ryan and I decided to head back to the place we hunted the first day which they affectionately refer to as "The Pit." After glassing a few dozen javelina the day before, we felt like we had our javelina eyes back, and thought we stood a good chance of finding pigs in the pit.

Not more that 2 minutes into glassing from the first vantage point I spotted half a dozen pigs all the way at the bottom of the pit. We assessed the terrain, and debated the best options based off where we thought the pigs would go. To play it safe we decided to walk all the way around the t ridgeline the herd was on. This would require at least an extra half mile of walking. Walking to the bottom of the pit and back is a lot of work for a javelina, but we didn't mind. We're still kinda young and dumb.

When we finally got to where we thought the peccary would be, we glassed for a few minutes before we relocated them 2/3's of the way up the ridge and halfway back to where we started from.... Similar to Ryan's elk hunt, we overshot the stalk a little bit. We chuckled a bit and started walking back up the hill to try to cut them off again.

By this time the winds switched from a cool downhill thermal to a warm uphill. So we decided to drop to the bottom of the drainage, walk behind a small finger ridge, and come at them from their elevation. Half of the herd was bedded in a few thick patches of oak scrub and yucca plant, while the other half was still up and meandering around. All of the conditions were perfect for a stalk... except the wind. It wasn't terrible, but it wasn't consistent.

We moved in as slowly as possible. I stayed 1/3 down the ridge, while Ryan walked just below the top to avoid silhouetting himself. We were never further than 30 yards apart.

As it so often happens, just as we were getting danger close, the wind tickled the back of our necks. A few pigs grunted and started moving up the hill away from us; not fast, just moving away at a normal pace. I stayed on course while Ryan ducked out of sight on the ridge and moved forward to cut them off.

As soon as I lost sight of him a mature pig stepped out at 15yds. He stopped behind a prickly pear cactus with most of his vitals exposed. I looked up at where Ryan had been but didn't see him. I knew there were a few pigs close to him, and didn't want to shoot if there was an opportunity to get a double... I saw nothing, so I drew back, find my anchor, centered my chi, and released the arrow.... Straight into the cactus I was trying to miss. (After the fact, I realized I was so concerned about hitting the cactus that I stared straight at it... No wonder I hit it. Oh well.)

The pig I missed jumped to it's left and took off straight toward Ryan and between the two of us. The pig paused for a moment directly between us, we couldn't shoot. It was less than 10 yards from Ryan, but never gave us a safe shot opportunity.

We tried to get close to the rest of the herd while they were still confused but they weren't sticking around to see what the commotion was about. So we walked back up to our packs, debriefed the encounter, laughed at how lucky that pig was, and shot a few cactus to build up my confidence again. It was a fun encounter, one we had to cover ground quickly and work for. It felt good.

While I was putting my pack on Ryan walked away to take a leak. After he was done he said as he pointed down, "I supposed I'm going to have to run down there real quick and pick up that shed..." I looked down across the drainage and said, "I guess you should."

We weren't planning on going deeper into the pit, but I guess it was meant to be. We grabbed the shed and walked up the ridgeline to get a better vantage point and take a lunch break. To our surprise, we immediately spotted a large herd of pigs feeding on top of the adjacent ridge... deeper into the pit, but only 600 yards away.

We devised a quick plan and started making our move. When we were 200 yards out, for reasons unknown to us, the pigs grouped up and beelined straight away from us. We stood and watched as the herd crossed drainage after drainage after drainage. For whatever reason, they were motivated to get out of there. They eventually stopped on the opposite side of the pit, and started to settle down.

They were a LONG ways away by this point, and we debated for a moment whether or not to even go after them. We ultimately decided if we were going to go after them, we had to do it now.

 

[sn.outdoors]

We grabbed a quick bite of food, and started making our way down to the herd. They were bedded and feeding on a steep, south facing slope, thick with prickly pear, oak scrub, and cat-claw. Getting close was going to be... fun.

When we got to the hillside, almost an hour later, we found it to be A LOT steeper than we initially thought it would be. We'd have to come at the pigs from above; side-hilling wasn't feasible. The only feature we could see to help point is in the right direction was a lone, dead-standing juniper. The herd was somewhere below it.

It didn't take long to start hearing the group of pigs fighting, rustling around in the brush, and making all of the standard pig sounds. It was looking good... except for the fact we couldn't see ANYTHING. We moved as close as possible and stood in wait on the only small openings we could find. Eventually one of the javelina would step out. We could see over a dozen pigs weaving through the thick vegetation within 20 yards of us, but there just weren't any shots.

Eventually, after what seemed like a half hour, one of the pigs spidey senses cued them off to our presence, and it started clicking it's cutters and grunting at us.... Me specifically.

It walked straight to me, and stopped and less than 5 yards behind a large prickly pear. No shot. All I could see was his beady little eyes staring at me through the brush. He wasn't happy that I ruined his nap, and grunted and clicked at me for a minute or so before he bolted to the bottom of the canyon.

He woke the rest of the herd up and they took off in all directions, but mostly down to the bottom. We moved down to where the opposite side of the canyon was only 30-40 yards away. Below us on both sides of the drainage was a cliff roughly 20 feet high, and the pigs were trying to climb the other side.

I don't know how we communicated it, whether through words or telepathy, but we decided to both shoot at the same time at the same pig on the other side.... We both grossly over estimated the distance and sailed the arrows over its back.

This caused massive chaos and pigs were exploding out of the canyon like ants. Target overload! One pig seemed to be stuck in a small patch of hardwoods at the bottom of the canyon, so I sent an arrow after it, but shot below it's belly. Ryan killed another rock with an arrow before the pigs were all out of range.

We looked at each other and laughed... What we thought might have been maybe a dozen javelina, turned into a group of at least 30... and they were all basically in a barrel at the bottom of the canyon. And we somehow missed them all.

A few moments passed by, as we badgered each other for missing some easy shots, when a piglet started squealing for help just on the other side of the canyon. I looked over at Ryan and said, "that might work out in our favor." No more than 20 seconds later 3 pigs came sprinting back to help.

One stopped within my range before I even had an arrow knocked. I fumbled one out of my quiver and rushed the shot... It wasn't even close...

But the pig ran closer to me as I drew my 2nd to last arrow from my quiver. I knocked it, drew back, stared at my spot, and let 'er rip. The pig squealed and rolled down the cliff to the bottom of the drainage. There was blood everywhere....

I regret not taking a photo of the pig directly below me at the bottom of the cliff, but my brain captured that Kodak moment. I stood still, staring at the javelina 20 feet below me, reflecting on the hunt and the season.

In that moment, I felt a strange mix of frustration and joy. I was frustrated with myself. I felt I could have practiced more and been better with my bow, but at the same time I was glad the hunt wasn't easy. It was a blast getting close to so many animals, and the misses tested me in ways my other hunts didn't. It was humbling, and I wouldn't change it for anything.

***I am in no way trying to talk down about hunting with traditional equipment. I love doing it, and looking back on it a few days removed from the hunt, I can't wait to do it again. I admit my perception of my abilities was far better than reality, and I'll strive to perfect my skills as well as understand my limitations better before I take another shot at an animal. It was a humbling experience that I can build off of and learn from. It was also a TON OF FUN... something I often forget about in my pursuit of "success."

 

[Bwana]

Sounds like a grand time, thanks for sharing!

 

[sn.outdoors]

Sounds like a grand time, thanks for sharing!

They are a blast to hunt. It's kind of like getting into a big cubby of quail that don't fly. After the first shot it can be complete chaos, and follow-up shots are very likely. I can't wait to go back and chase them again, but next time I'll have a deer tag too.

 

[Crossbowguy]

Hope they eat better than they look!

 

[sn.outdoors]

Hope they eat better than they look!

They're not the best table fare, but they can be made to be edible. I marinated this hind quarter in zesty Italian for 3 days, dry salted it for a day, then smoked it on low for a few hours. It tasted pretty good, but wasn't the best thing I've ever cooked.



I foil wrapped it after 4 hours of low smoke, then turned the temp up to 300. It ended up being pretty dry, so next time, I'll wrap it around 3hrs, and keep the temp around 200 until it reaches an internal temp of 195. I'll then keep it wrapped off the grill until it cools.

My conclusion is that anything can be made to taste 'good,' but not everything will taste great. Heck, I've even made tender and delicious barbary meat before. So it can be done.

 

[Crossbowguy]

Looks good to me!!! I wonder how it would be to roast one like a pig over open flame so the fat can drip away?