BackCountryMulies
Member
Let me start off by giving you a little history. When I first met my Fiance she had never even held a gun let alone thought of harvesting an animal. After several years and many succesful trips with me and my friends she is now an avid archer and loves to hunt with us. She has put in allot of time and boot miles for this buck and it was well earned and she Made a great shot on him.
With my odd work schedule and her busy schedule we had 4 days to hunt during archery season and 4 days during rifle season well the second to last day she could hunt everything came together for her.
This tag is a high country area that opens mid september for rifle and closes mid october it is normally an area we take respectable bucks out of but with the big snow storm we where un-able to get into the high country. This put me in a pinch because I have never had to hunt this area below the alpine basins. After a couple days of no deer and moving drainage to drainage trying to locate a buck we finally caught a break and spotted a 150" buck bedded in some timber.
With no hesitation she said she would take him if we got an opportunity. With the luck we have been having our stock came up empty handed some time while closing the distance the buck got up and fed out of the patch of timber and over a ridge. With fresh snow all the way around I picked up his tracks and we went over the ridge as well to start doing some glassing. After finding a nice pile of rocks with a good vantage point to glass from we nestled in and started glassing it wasn't 30 seconds and my dad picked out a doe then another soon we had 7 does spotted and 3 bucks 2 of them were small 2 points and one was a really nice heavy horned 3x3 with back forks he was 375 yards off, while getting the camera and her setup a gun shot broke our excitement from the bottom of the canyon the deer split and and headed up and away from us still with in range but something caught my eye from the general direction of the gun shot, It was a group of deer scrambling towards us and there was 3-4 160"+ bucks I could see in that group of 30+ deer well the went by at less than a 100 yards and never stopped for a shot so we let them go by in hopes they would relax once in the burnt timber behind us.
There was a few stragglers that were still coming so we stayed put not wanting to scare them as they were almost by another heard of 12-15 came up from one more draw over and started crossing the hillside above us there was one buck in that group that was a huge 5 point im guessing if his other side matched he would go upper 180 maybe even break 190 but his week side was more of a clump of antler that looked like it molded over the side of his head!!
I told her that would be a cool buck if she wanted it and she looked at my dad who disagreed because one of the bucks in the big group he thought would go upper 170-180 so she passed and we let them go by. After they calmed down and passed by us we backed out and went down and around to try to catch the big group after about 500 yards we came out in a saddle over looking a big valley and the burnt timber the group had headed for, it didnt take long and I picked up the deer but I couldnt find the bucks. I was starting to worry they had split off and went over the top but my dad picked up 4 bucks feeding on a grassy hillside 525 yards off and the bigger buck was feeding broadside. we got all set up and I gave the thumbs up that the camera was rolling... What happened next Im going to contribute it to the fact that she was looking at a stomper buck on 22x and got a little bit of the fever because as the shot rang out, I watched the vapor trail go between his main beam and his head.
All 4 bucks picked there head up and looked around not knowing where the shot came from but that buck turned and walked into a little draw only showing us his back and when he came out he was behind a tree and still feeding away. It was only minutes but it felt like hours as he finally walked out on the hill @ 698 yards I told her to dial to 700 give it 3 moa for wind and picture that steel plate being his shoulder well she got over the fever quick because that shot hammered him right through both shoulders he did the 30 yard death march and fell over!! It was Awesome, I think I was more jacked up watching her fill that tag than I have ever been on any of mine!
After doing a little celebration we made our way over to him we took a bunch of pics then quartered and caped him up to pack out. while we where doing this I seen a pack string and a bunch of riders coming out of the high country and I told my dad I bet thats my buddy hes an outfitter up in this country and always takes big bucks and bulls so we set the spotter up and sure enough they had a couple really great bulls one was 394" and a hole muley on one mule I told dad I bet they shot that buck out of this group and pushed them up here to us!! any way after we got off I sent him a pic and told him thanks!! lol all as he txt back was I figured that was u seen your truck heard the shots call me asap! He had his client lined up on this buck and he got confused and shot the smaller one lol the smaller one had a couple nice kickers but was 7" smaller
Link to the Video-
http://vimeo.com/76557965
With my odd work schedule and her busy schedule we had 4 days to hunt during archery season and 4 days during rifle season well the second to last day she could hunt everything came together for her.
This tag is a high country area that opens mid september for rifle and closes mid october it is normally an area we take respectable bucks out of but with the big snow storm we where un-able to get into the high country. This put me in a pinch because I have never had to hunt this area below the alpine basins. After a couple days of no deer and moving drainage to drainage trying to locate a buck we finally caught a break and spotted a 150" buck bedded in some timber.
With no hesitation she said she would take him if we got an opportunity. With the luck we have been having our stock came up empty handed some time while closing the distance the buck got up and fed out of the patch of timber and over a ridge. With fresh snow all the way around I picked up his tracks and we went over the ridge as well to start doing some glassing. After finding a nice pile of rocks with a good vantage point to glass from we nestled in and started glassing it wasn't 30 seconds and my dad picked out a doe then another soon we had 7 does spotted and 3 bucks 2 of them were small 2 points and one was a really nice heavy horned 3x3 with back forks he was 375 yards off, while getting the camera and her setup a gun shot broke our excitement from the bottom of the canyon the deer split and and headed up and away from us still with in range but something caught my eye from the general direction of the gun shot, It was a group of deer scrambling towards us and there was 3-4 160"+ bucks I could see in that group of 30+ deer well the went by at less than a 100 yards and never stopped for a shot so we let them go by in hopes they would relax once in the burnt timber behind us.
There was a few stragglers that were still coming so we stayed put not wanting to scare them as they were almost by another heard of 12-15 came up from one more draw over and started crossing the hillside above us there was one buck in that group that was a huge 5 point im guessing if his other side matched he would go upper 180 maybe even break 190 but his week side was more of a clump of antler that looked like it molded over the side of his head!!
I told her that would be a cool buck if she wanted it and she looked at my dad who disagreed because one of the bucks in the big group he thought would go upper 170-180 so she passed and we let them go by. After they calmed down and passed by us we backed out and went down and around to try to catch the big group after about 500 yards we came out in a saddle over looking a big valley and the burnt timber the group had headed for, it didnt take long and I picked up the deer but I couldnt find the bucks. I was starting to worry they had split off and went over the top but my dad picked up 4 bucks feeding on a grassy hillside 525 yards off and the bigger buck was feeding broadside. we got all set up and I gave the thumbs up that the camera was rolling... What happened next Im going to contribute it to the fact that she was looking at a stomper buck on 22x and got a little bit of the fever because as the shot rang out, I watched the vapor trail go between his main beam and his head.
All 4 bucks picked there head up and looked around not knowing where the shot came from but that buck turned and walked into a little draw only showing us his back and when he came out he was behind a tree and still feeding away. It was only minutes but it felt like hours as he finally walked out on the hill @ 698 yards I told her to dial to 700 give it 3 moa for wind and picture that steel plate being his shoulder well she got over the fever quick because that shot hammered him right through both shoulders he did the 30 yard death march and fell over!! It was Awesome, I think I was more jacked up watching her fill that tag than I have ever been on any of mine!
After doing a little celebration we made our way over to him we took a bunch of pics then quartered and caped him up to pack out. while we where doing this I seen a pack string and a bunch of riders coming out of the high country and I told my dad I bet thats my buddy hes an outfitter up in this country and always takes big bucks and bulls so we set the spotter up and sure enough they had a couple really great bulls one was 394" and a hole muley on one mule I told dad I bet they shot that buck out of this group and pushed them up here to us!! any way after we got off I sent him a pic and told him thanks!! lol all as he txt back was I figured that was u seen your truck heard the shots call me asap! He had his client lined up on this buck and he got confused and shot the smaller one lol the smaller one had a couple nice kickers but was 7" smaller
Link to the Video-
http://vimeo.com/76557965
