What an epic adventure with my brother and a few friends than came and went throughout our time in Wyoming. We ended up leaving a couple days early to get there when some weather hit in one unit. That weather fizzled on us and that unit was pretty weather dependent. It was cool to watch the migrating herds come into the unit but the bigger bucks were holding back a couple miles according the the biologist we spoke with (matched what we were seeing). I think we spent 8.5 days in this unit and had spotted a great buck a cpl miles away in the closed unit and he was moving closer by the day with a herd of doe. We decided to sit on him and see if we could catch him crossing into the unit. This unit gets crowded with no weather. Everyone is in the same area and 15 tags turns into 75+ ppl/vehicles when everyone brings their buddies with their own trucks and outfitters have guys running around etc as well. One morning this buck was following his girls down to the river to cross before shooting light, we had picked him up in the scopes, he was 200 yards from the river. Here comes two trucks with headlights blazing right down to where the deer cross the river at shooting light. He rounded them girls up and moved into the next bowl and spent the rest of the season up in some rocks barely visible (we kept eyes on him the whole time). Was a cool hunt though, tons of glassing and watching migrating herds of deer was pretty cool. I could see this hunt being awesome with some weather just wasn't to be this year. We left a half day early to get into the next unit.
This next unit was the unit I wanted to hunt the most from my summer trip anyways. The first couple days were a little warm and no snow but it gave us a chance to familiarize ourselves and look at some new areas as well. Weather started moving in pretty quick on this trip and we hunted a total of 11 days in this unit with one afternoon off due to a snowstorm with winds in the 65-80 range (I don't think the wind ever blows under 30 in Wyoming). Temps ranged from minus 15 to 35ish on the few warmer days. We didn't have any doors on the ranger and were asked multiple times if we were crazy or just dumb (little of both) but we had the clothes and went at it hard. Up at 4 am and usually in bed by 8 or so every night.
Wild Wild country up in this unit, we cut some fresh sets of wolf tracks (blew those deer out), multiple fresh sets of grizz tracks, and plenty of lion tracks in the snow. We saw tons of Elk, passed on countless bucks, saw some stud moose, bald eagles, golden eagles, just tons of wildlife in general. We hiked into places, we covered ground in the ranger (put 450 miles on it in this unit in 11 days), we glassed so much my eye bones hurt but were not turning up anything to hang this tag on. Got the truck and trailer sideways somehow one morning on the highway and got stuck in the ranger a few times just all kinds of adventures. I had passed on 2 deer that I was starting to regret by day 10 or so in this unit (both were high 60s/low 70s deer but they just didn't do it for me. I was never hung up on score, was just looking for a big mature buck with mass, some width, and good forks. We had lost Deer for a few days at his point so with it getting into the single digits we went high again that evening after not seeing what we wanted low that morning on a 3 mile hike. We saw like 70 deer that evening with some decent bucks and finally we thought things were about to pop off.
Day 11 (Day 19 I think total) was cold cold. We had to drag each other out of bed at the cabin, we were wearing down pretty good at this point too. It was just my brother and I left hunting and we argued the entire way up the hill that morning on what to do and I think we were both saying the same thing to a degree (Brotherly love). We were a little late getting into this area so we decided to just roll in the ranger on the main road slow to get back to a glassing area. 5 minutes out of the parking area I caught a good buck on a hill, giant typical 4x4 but kind of spindly and no eye guards, let him go. We rolled up to our intersection where we were going to turn and I caught another buck on a hill, got the scopes out and one was a 5x5 with split g3s, good buck but didn't make it move. I stood on my tippy toes to look over a hill and all I saw was mass coming out of the bottom. I turned to my brother and told him "Get my sticks, this marathon is over, there's a shooter coming out of the bottom". It was nothing special stalk wise, closed the distance to about 250. had my brother whispering does he have eye guards the whole time, I didn't care so finally just told him yes and watch the deer I'm about to shoot. My first shot was not great, I had a little buck fever after 18 days and hit a touch back but put another one in him and pancaked him. Few high fives and hugs I told my brother man I hope that isn't like a 150 or something, He goes it don't matter now if he is he's a super 150.
We hiked the 300 yards up the hill and I happen to have service so I got to facetime my Son and wife of the yr when we first got up to him, it was pretty special moment for everyone involved. We facetimed the guys that came and helped and had to go back home as well. One thing about the snow, you can drag a horse in it. We moved him down the hill gutted him then drug him back to the ranger and quartered and caped him there. Couple residents that we had been talking to the whole time stopped by, we chatted, everyone was stoked for me. Couldn't ask for better hospitality up there. Sorry that was long winded but really it was short for this kind of adventure I could have went on for pages. We had a once in a lifetime tag and we took full advantage of it and did it right we think. We'll be back one day with our max points but next week we are off to Colorado for a 4th season deer tag my brother has. Hopefully we can find him a Stud as well.
This next unit was the unit I wanted to hunt the most from my summer trip anyways. The first couple days were a little warm and no snow but it gave us a chance to familiarize ourselves and look at some new areas as well. Weather started moving in pretty quick on this trip and we hunted a total of 11 days in this unit with one afternoon off due to a snowstorm with winds in the 65-80 range (I don't think the wind ever blows under 30 in Wyoming). Temps ranged from minus 15 to 35ish on the few warmer days. We didn't have any doors on the ranger and were asked multiple times if we were crazy or just dumb (little of both) but we had the clothes and went at it hard. Up at 4 am and usually in bed by 8 or so every night.
Wild Wild country up in this unit, we cut some fresh sets of wolf tracks (blew those deer out), multiple fresh sets of grizz tracks, and plenty of lion tracks in the snow. We saw tons of Elk, passed on countless bucks, saw some stud moose, bald eagles, golden eagles, just tons of wildlife in general. We hiked into places, we covered ground in the ranger (put 450 miles on it in this unit in 11 days), we glassed so much my eye bones hurt but were not turning up anything to hang this tag on. Got the truck and trailer sideways somehow one morning on the highway and got stuck in the ranger a few times just all kinds of adventures. I had passed on 2 deer that I was starting to regret by day 10 or so in this unit (both were high 60s/low 70s deer but they just didn't do it for me. I was never hung up on score, was just looking for a big mature buck with mass, some width, and good forks. We had lost Deer for a few days at his point so with it getting into the single digits we went high again that evening after not seeing what we wanted low that morning on a 3 mile hike. We saw like 70 deer that evening with some decent bucks and finally we thought things were about to pop off.
Day 11 (Day 19 I think total) was cold cold. We had to drag each other out of bed at the cabin, we were wearing down pretty good at this point too. It was just my brother and I left hunting and we argued the entire way up the hill that morning on what to do and I think we were both saying the same thing to a degree (Brotherly love). We were a little late getting into this area so we decided to just roll in the ranger on the main road slow to get back to a glassing area. 5 minutes out of the parking area I caught a good buck on a hill, giant typical 4x4 but kind of spindly and no eye guards, let him go. We rolled up to our intersection where we were going to turn and I caught another buck on a hill, got the scopes out and one was a 5x5 with split g3s, good buck but didn't make it move. I stood on my tippy toes to look over a hill and all I saw was mass coming out of the bottom. I turned to my brother and told him "Get my sticks, this marathon is over, there's a shooter coming out of the bottom". It was nothing special stalk wise, closed the distance to about 250. had my brother whispering does he have eye guards the whole time, I didn't care so finally just told him yes and watch the deer I'm about to shoot. My first shot was not great, I had a little buck fever after 18 days and hit a touch back but put another one in him and pancaked him. Few high fives and hugs I told my brother man I hope that isn't like a 150 or something, He goes it don't matter now if he is he's a super 150.
We hiked the 300 yards up the hill and I happen to have service so I got to facetime my Son and wife of the yr when we first got up to him, it was pretty special moment for everyone involved. We facetimed the guys that came and helped and had to go back home as well. One thing about the snow, you can drag a horse in it. We moved him down the hill gutted him then drug him back to the ranger and quartered and caped him there. Couple residents that we had been talking to the whole time stopped by, we chatted, everyone was stoked for me. Couldn't ask for better hospitality up there. Sorry that was long winded but really it was short for this kind of adventure I could have went on for pages. We had a once in a lifetime tag and we took full advantage of it and did it right we think. We'll be back one day with our max points but next week we are off to Colorado for a 4th season deer tag my brother has. Hopefully we can find him a Stud as well.
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