Region 7 Montana

[Warchild]

Hunted 7 for the first time last year. My son and I drove out and pitched my Davis Wall tent thinking that we would be in for the long haul. Our hunts lasted 2 hours each. First morning he shot a 125-130" 4x4 Whitetail buck, the second morning I shot a 141" 5x5 whitetail. Every whitetail that we saw was a shooter to us. We didn't have a total of 4 hours into actual hunting. Unfortunately, we didn't draw tags for the same area this year.....bummed.

 

[8andcounting]

Hunted 7 for the first time last year. My son and I drove out and pitched my Davis Wall tent thinking that we would be in for the long haul. Our hunts lasted 2 hours each. First morning he shot a 125-130" 4x4 Whitetail buck, the second morning I shot a 141" 5x5 whitetail. Every whitetail that we saw was a shooter to us. We didn't have a total of 4 hours into actual hunting. Unfortunately, we didn't draw tags for the same area this year.....bummed.View attachment 137482View attachment 137483

That’s a nice buck nice and heavy and tall

 

[Shangobango]

I wanted to come back to this thread give the results of my first western hunt.

I spent the last 12 days camped on the Custer. The first week was hot. It was warmer in SE Montana than in Louisiana most of that week. I spent the first day and a half gawking at the beautiful landscape. I managed to see a good many deer in that time but no bucks with any age on them. A lot of forkies with does mainly.

Monday morning I saw my first 4 point while hunting and not driving. This was the first mule deer I ever spotted first through glass instead of with the naked eye. I spent an hour and a half getting within a couple hundred yards of him only to pass on him.

I had to drive into Billings Monday evening to pick up my son from the airport. His flight arrived at 8:30 P.M. The drive back to camp was grueling since I had been up since 4 AM but it was also eye opening. I got to see my first bucks of the trip with a little age on them in the headlights, all on private.

The next morning my son wanted to sleep so I went it alone. I got to my glassing spot right as day was breaking. Shortly after I spotted the biggest buck I would see on public land on this trip. He was at 250 yards feeding in the canyon below me. I passed.

I hunted with my son through Friday morning until I had to drive him back into Billings to catch a 7:30 AM flight on Saturday. We saw plenty of deer. He passed on 2 small 4 points, several forkies and dozens of does and hen turkeys. I was disappointed that we didn’t find anything he wanted to shoot but the only disappointment that he expressed to me was that he couldn’t see a gobbler among all the hens. Kind of a proud dad moment knowing hunting means more to him than the kill.

The weather turned on the second Sunday of the trip and the number of deer I started seeing tripled. I looked at numerous small 4 points and dozens of does.

it was interesting to watch the bachelor groups of bucks begin to bust up. Instead of seeing 3 or 4 bucks together most of my buck sightings starting on this last Monday were lone 4 point bucks. That is something that happens much longer before the rut back home.

Finally on this last Tuesday, which was my last day to hunt, I made up my mind to shoot something.

I spotted this buck at the same time he spotted me. Luckily he stopped to look back just before he went out of sight and I took him cleanly with a shot from my new .280 ( thanks @Scott85) at 176 yards. I haven’t been that emotioal after a shot since the first buck I killed after my grandpa passed.



I passed on a couple of larger racked bucks during this earlier parts of this trip. I felt a little tinge of regret knowing I ended up taking a probable 2 year old deer but I got over it. After all this is my first mule deer and will likely be my smallest.

Out of 4 deer tags and 2 turkey tags that we held between the two of us only the one tag got filled. Who cares. All in all I would rate this trip a success based on the experiences had and memories made with my son.

I learned so much from getting to spend hours observing mule deer, camping in the low teens and snow, and just being out looking at sign and habitat. It is hard to process it all.

I was mentally prepared to not see many older bucks given the situation in the area. I was still surprised to have seen so many 1 and 2 year old age class bucks and not one that I think was older than that on public, especially given the amount of time I spent and the amount of walking and driving I did. Perhaps I was a little early or perhaps I should have tried different areas. Or perhaps like many have said there aren’t many bucks making it to older age classes.


Last but not least I got to meet a great local fellow with a wealth of knowledge about the area and the animals in it. It was nice to stand around and soak in some of his knowledge for a little while.

I will be back to SE Montana. It won’t be for the big mulie buck hunting for sure. It is just too wonderful of a place not to go back to.

 

[Kiwi]

Nice one. Sounds like a great hunt.

 

[Labman1127]

Nice one. Sounds like a great hunt.

Nice work!
were you hunting the area of Custer North of 212 or South? How was the hunting pressure?
I hunted the area North of 212 and the hunting left much to be desired. Beautiful country but most of it was ravaged by the last forest fire. Similar to you, I saw lots and lots of doe and a few small bucks.
I just got back home on Monday and I am already planning my next trip out in a couple years but thinking of hunting the area around Alzada or possibly heading up to CRM around Fort Peck. Two totally offering areas but both look like tons of public access opportunities.
Any input in Alzada area vs CRM Fort Peck is appreciated.

 

[antlerradar]

Alzada is mostly antelope country but those wide open sage prairies will have some mule deer.

It is nice to see new bee asking for info that a half a year later has 500 posts and puts up a great fallow up.
Makes you feel like you didn't get used if you give out a little info.

 

[rtraverdavis]

Sounds like it was an epic, almost spiritual journey. There are worse ways to spend two weeks than out in the woods looking at mule deer. Congratulations on you buck.

 

[Shangobango]

Nice work!
were you hunting the area of Custer North of 212 or South? How was the hunting pressure?
I hunted the area North of 212 and the hunting left much to be desired. Beautiful country but most of it was ravaged by the last forest fire. Similar to you, I saw lots and lots of doe and a few small bucks.
I just got back home on Monday and I am already planning my next trip out in a couple years but thinking of hunting the area around Alzada or possibly heading up to CRM around Fort Peck. Two totally offering areas but both look like tons of public access opportunities.
Any input in Alzada area vs CRM Fort Peck is appreciated.

The pressure didn’t seem too bad compared to Louisiana public land at least. I have nothing in the West to compare it to. 95% of the pressure was people driving the roads. I only saw a handful of trucks or ATV’s parked. I never actually saw another hunter in the field. Of course, from what most say the pressure should ramp up over the next week or two. I spent most of my time in some of the more thickly timbered areas away from the roads though.

We may be back to the area as early as this spring. We have pronghorn points as well. Have to decide if we are using our Wyoming deer points this fall. If not we will probably put in for pronghorn in Region 7.

 

[Shangobango]

Sounds like it was an epic, almost spiritual journey. There are worse ways to spend two weeks than out in the woods looking at mule deer. Congratulations on you buck.

It was almost spiritual.

This trip turned a deep interest in mule deer into an all out obsession.

I am not sure if that is a good thing or bad thing yet. Lol.

 

[Scott85]

Congrats!!!

 

[Shangobango]

Congrats!!!

Thanks Scott!