Well I'm not one to brag but I have enjoyed everyones stories and pictures of this archery season, so I guess I should post mine.
First of all, Nitrobass what an incredible bull!! That is awesome! I've seen some like that but have never been able to clode the deal. Congratulations!!
Second, Tailchaser I've looked forward to your story about packing in for a long time. When you started and then didn't finish, I thought I was gonna freak. Sounds like a good time, sorry you didn't bring one home. Great story anyhow.
Third, I hunted out of La Pine on opening weekdend, took my boys, 5 & 8. Drove around looking for tweezer bucks that just stand there waiting for something bad to happen to them. We saw 3 bucks all weekend. :depressed: The kids just like to drive around and see who can spot the most deer. :smile: It was a fun trip but no luck, Oh Well.
Second weekend stayed home.
Third weekend I had plans with a friend to hunt out of burns for three days. Really looking forward to this one. Two days before we are supposed to go he calls and cancels :depressed: .
I thought about staying home, but then decided not to let him ruin my trip!! I decided that I would go by myself. The wife wasn't to crazy about this, but she got over it. So I leave work early on friday the 12th, go home, kiss the wife and kids goodbye and headout. I was going to a new spot that I had never been before, so I wanted to get there before dark, well I missed it by about an hour. So I just find a wide spot in the road and throw out my cot and its bedtime.
I woke up about 4:00 am and freezing, there just happens to be frost on everything including me!(my sleeping bag that is.) So I decide to just get up and get everything put back in the truck and fire it up so I can use the heater to warm myself up. About 6:00 am I decide its time to start driving again, not quite daylight yet and I think I need to be up the road a little furtherbefore I start hunting. Well, while I'm driving I notice that there are no tire tracks in the road, and its starting to look "elky" so I decide to park and start walking. I grabbed my fanny pack, marked the truck with my gps and off I go! So I start walking and calling, walking and calling, just about an hour goes by as I am working my way up the head of this draw and I haven't seen anything or heard anything.So I cut the to the side and head up to the top of this ridge. When I just about get to the top I stop and bugle, about 4 seconds later I get an answer, sweet!! He sounds like he is pretty close, maybe 300 yards or so away. So I begin to close the distance. I go about 100 yards and stop and cow call, nothing, so I bugle, and immediately he answers back, sweet! So I close the distance some more and stop again and call, cow call and nothing, bugle and he answers right back, sweet! Finally I get to the top of this hill and can here him thrashing a tree just over the rise. So I set up beside a decent size tree, knock an arrow, and cow call and nothing so I bugle and he rips one back at me before I can finish my call, Oh this is awesome. Then he starts really tearing up a tree, so I grab a dead branch and start thrashing the tree next me. Then it kind of goes quiet, I grabbed my hoochie mama, gave a call and as I'm looking on the ground putting the call down I look up and I can see antlers coming up the rise, I start to pull back and decide I don't have time so I stop and wait. He gets to the top and stops and stairs right at me. It seemed like forever, but I didn't move or blink an eye. Then he made his mistake, he turned to his right a little and starts walking around to try and get the wind in his favor. I look ahead of him and see 2 trees that he will have to walk behind, if he keeps going. So when he gets behind the first tree I start to draw and have to stop halfway because he starts coming out the other side, when he got behind the other tree I finished my draw and swung out in front of him. I let him keep walking until his shoulder got in my sight,(about 25 yards) and let it go. I watched it bury deep, up to the fletching. He turned and ran back down the hill so I grabbed my cow call to stop him. I watched him go up the other side of the liitle draw and fall over!!!!! It was awesome. So I wait a couple of minutes to try and collect my thoughts and calm down and make sure that he doesn't somehow get back up. I walk up to him and say a little thank you, I can hardly believe this just happened! The time was 7:40 am!!! I had been hunting this new spot for about an hour and had just killed my first good bull :grin:
I get my gps out and punch in go to the truck, 1.54 miles, oh crud , did I mention that I was all by myself!! Luckily I looked down the hill about 20 yards and there is a road, sweet. So I follow this road back down the hill and guess what, it came out about 100 yards from my rig!! What a great trip this turned out to be..
The fourth weekend I was supposed to start my vacation that would last through the end of the season. I cancelled the vacation :depressed:
The fifth weekend I go back over east to help my buddy in John Day try and call in a bull. We never saw an elk, but on sunday around 9:15 I found a big forked horn/3 point at 30 yards, so I let him have it. He went less than 50 yards and fell over. I couldn't believe my luck. What a great season. I wished I had this kind of luck more often
So all in all it was a great season, I didn't get to hunt elk as much as I wanted to but I guess I can't complain.
[ 10-04-2003, 12:33 PM: Message edited by: seadog ]
Good Archery Season/ Now with pics!
Mello-Yello
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