Pucky Freak
Well-known member
Heading to WY and MT with @Bowmannate2000 in a few days to catch the tail end of the antelope season. Four units, three weapons, and hopefully a big cooler full of meat here soon!
Five antelope, seven days
- Thread starter Pucky Freak
- Start date
- Joined
- Aug 4, 2016
- Messages
- 972
Good luck and have fun!
WNC2500
Well-known member
Love to follow along with the speed goats
Nick87
Well-known member
5 antelope in 7 days will be a walk in the park. Good luck!
WildWill
Well-known member
One of my favorite animals to hunt. Unfortunately no tags for me or my group this year. Goodluck will be following along.
CPAjeff
Well-known member
Good luck and safe travels!
duckhunt
Well-known member
Good luck
Buffs35
Well-known member
Best of luck
Pucky Freak
Well-known member
If all else fails, at least we’ll have premium snacks. 3 lbs of jerky that was a live deer before last Friday.
Gravelyctry
Well-known member
Best of luck and have a safe trip!
cgasner1
Well-known member
- Joined
- Apr 24, 2016
- Messages
- 3,102
Sometimes that’s also important information to haveGood luck! If you drew the MT unit 700 south tag, I can tell you where NOT to go
Forkyfinder
Well-known member
- Joined
- Dec 13, 2023
- Messages
- 2,693
Good luck with the prarie lobster. 
CouesKelly
Well-known member
Good luck! Hope you fill those coolers up!
Darkside
Member
Keep us posted.
Have Fun and be safe.
Have Fun and be safe.
Pucky Freak
Well-known member
Friday afternoon, drive up to my folks place to visit with them and my sister, and then crash for the night.
Sat I’m up an hour early at 3 AM like a kid on Christmas morning, and can’t get back to sleep. Make the short drive to Nate’s to load up his gear in the dark. I’m greeted by his wife, whom I have not met before. She is very friendly, but also asks for some documentation to prove that I am not a serial killer, and I gladly oblige.
Drive to WY is largely uneventful. We alternate driving and spotting wildlife off the freeway. We cross my unit boundary just after sunset en route to our BLM camping spot. A few miles along Nate spots a group of antelope, and we do a fire drill stalk to try and beat the clock. I took a conservative approach and we didn’t relocate them. As best as we could determine they just wandered off to bed before we got there.
Next off to camp and set up in the dark. After some fried rice and coconut curry we were both feeling the effects of a full belly and sleep deprivation, so stumbled off to the tent for the night. I discovered that my sleeping bag did not get packed - it is probably still sitting on my side of the garage at home - so I put together a makeshift sleep sack with whatever we had available to make do for a couple of days before the cold front rolls in.
Sat I’m up an hour early at 3 AM like a kid on Christmas morning, and can’t get back to sleep. Make the short drive to Nate’s to load up his gear in the dark. I’m greeted by his wife, whom I have not met before. She is very friendly, but also asks for some documentation to prove that I am not a serial killer, and I gladly oblige.
Drive to WY is largely uneventful. We alternate driving and spotting wildlife off the freeway. We cross my unit boundary just after sunset en route to our BLM camping spot. A few miles along Nate spots a group of antelope, and we do a fire drill stalk to try and beat the clock. I took a conservative approach and we didn’t relocate them. As best as we could determine they just wandered off to bed before we got there.
Next off to camp and set up in the dark. After some fried rice and coconut curry we were both feeling the effects of a full belly and sleep deprivation, so stumbled off to the tent for the night. I discovered that my sleeping bag did not get packed - it is probably still sitting on my side of the garage at home - so I put together a makeshift sleep sack with whatever we had available to make do for a couple of days before the cold front rolls in.
Pucky Freak
Well-known member
Sun AM no alarm set, so we can catch up on sleep. I got up before sunrise to catch a little walk.
I got several panorama photos that are better, but the file size is too large to upload.
Sun AM slow start as planned. About 9 AM we leave camp to try and relocate the group of animals from the night before. Upon arrival they had crossed the unit boundary. We later determined that they were likely pushed there by a deer hunter - this would become a theme for the rest of the day.
Throughout the entire day two rigs hunting deer repeatedly drove up and down seemingly every road within a few miles of us. The hunters would drive and glass, or get out and walk a few hundred yards. One truck hunter took the same roads a half a dozen times, and the other hunter at least ten times. This had the effect of bouncing around the antelope over and over again until they all piled up in one giant herd deep on private ground.
We were genuinely puzzled by their tactics. The areas they were hunting were full of mulie does, but the bucks were further up in elevation, away from roads, and tucked into secluded cuts or similar less accessible terrain. Apparently they thought hiking 200 yards through knee-high sage would result in deer-zilla springing up out of nowhere. Or that a mature buck was going to wander down to the does in the middle of the day in 70-degree heat in October.
In any event, our day was mostly unproductive. After relocating the displaced group of antelope we drove a finger of BLM and located a dozen more antelope on a flat. The closest were 300 yards, and walking or trotting nervously away. The wind was intense, so no way I was attempting a 350 yard shot. We turned around and let this group alone. There was a dry creek bed that we could loop around and crawl up to get closer, but it crossed private property. We stopped by the ranch house to try and get permission to cross, but no one was home at the time.
Next up, we parked and hiked some bluffs to glass. About a half hour in I spotted 3 antelope down a bluff towards a road. We slowly descended elevation out of their view and got set up for a shot. 200 yards, a buck, doe, and fawn.
Just as I was selecting a steady rest one of the deer hunters drove by and spooked them. Then the other rig did the same thing a few minutes later. The animals were then lost from our view and we tried slowly hiking around to relocate them. The now high-alert doe pegged us first at 200 yards, and they took off.
The entire rest of the day we spent hiking and glassing. We found a lot of deer but no antelope in a huntable spot. Tomorrow we would check out new terrain.
Inactive raptor nest made entirely of dead sagebrush.
I got several panorama photos that are better, but the file size is too large to upload.
Sun AM slow start as planned. About 9 AM we leave camp to try and relocate the group of animals from the night before. Upon arrival they had crossed the unit boundary. We later determined that they were likely pushed there by a deer hunter - this would become a theme for the rest of the day.
Throughout the entire day two rigs hunting deer repeatedly drove up and down seemingly every road within a few miles of us. The hunters would drive and glass, or get out and walk a few hundred yards. One truck hunter took the same roads a half a dozen times, and the other hunter at least ten times. This had the effect of bouncing around the antelope over and over again until they all piled up in one giant herd deep on private ground.
We were genuinely puzzled by their tactics. The areas they were hunting were full of mulie does, but the bucks were further up in elevation, away from roads, and tucked into secluded cuts or similar less accessible terrain. Apparently they thought hiking 200 yards through knee-high sage would result in deer-zilla springing up out of nowhere. Or that a mature buck was going to wander down to the does in the middle of the day in 70-degree heat in October.
In any event, our day was mostly unproductive. After relocating the displaced group of antelope we drove a finger of BLM and located a dozen more antelope on a flat. The closest were 300 yards, and walking or trotting nervously away. The wind was intense, so no way I was attempting a 350 yard shot. We turned around and let this group alone. There was a dry creek bed that we could loop around and crawl up to get closer, but it crossed private property. We stopped by the ranch house to try and get permission to cross, but no one was home at the time.
Next up, we parked and hiked some bluffs to glass. About a half hour in I spotted 3 antelope down a bluff towards a road. We slowly descended elevation out of their view and got set up for a shot. 200 yards, a buck, doe, and fawn.
Just as I was selecting a steady rest one of the deer hunters drove by and spooked them. Then the other rig did the same thing a few minutes later. The animals were then lost from our view and we tried slowly hiking around to relocate them. The now high-alert doe pegged us first at 200 yards, and they took off.
The entire rest of the day we spent hiking and glassing. We found a lot of deer but no antelope in a huntable spot. Tomorrow we would check out new terrain.
Inactive raptor nest made entirely of dead sagebrush.
CRJR45
Well-known member
Where do you get fake documentation ? Asking for a friend .....
