Quarantine is awesome on the San Juan! Year in review.

utah450 · Dec 18, 2020

For 2020, I decided to stay home. I never seem to get around to doing the hunt adventure challenge. I don't post as often as I should. I do appreciate all of you guys taking the time to post and share your experiences! As we all need a little positivity, I thought I would share my experience of staying at home.

The draws started off pretty slow with a strikeout in Arizona and Wyoming on elk. I am in a really weird place in Colorado on deer points. Too many to waste and not enough for anything good.

That left Utah, which was likely to only produce some archery deer tags, Wyoming for deer, and the possibility of an Arizona coues hunt. My youngest son has enough deer points to be guaranteed the deer tag he wants in Wyoming, but he made a better choice and enlisted. We are pretty proud of his choice.

I had some fun waiting for results in Utah. I am not a big shed hunter, but I like to get out in the hills and see some country. It is always fun to walk upon a set like this.

My nephews have hounds, and I really enjoy spending time out with them. It is amazing to watch the dogs work. Luckily this year, my niece and a good friend both had spring bear tags.

Bri killed a nice boar in a nasty old canyon.

David killed the biggest boar I have ever seen in a hunt that got seriously western more than once. His bear didn't have the biggest noggin but what a thick old dude.

With spring bear wrapping up, Utah draw results came out. My oldest son drew a deer tag on Elk Ridge and one of my godsons, Tanner, drew the late San Juan elk tag. Well, that was some unexpected luck. Just to put it in perspective, Ashton is 24 and Tanner is 20. If you put your grey matter to work you can figure out that it wasn't their turn yet. Thank heavens for some random tags.

We made a difficult decision and decided to put everything into these Utah hunts and just send the great State of Wyoming some money for points. We love to throw the backpacks on and enjoy the high country and we really missed it this year.

A side benefit of missing out on the Wyoming deer is that it conflicts with the early rifle elk hunt here at home. I have been buddies with Dan and Joe at Local Boys Hunting for many years and was excited to be able to hunt with them this fall since I am usually gone during that hunt.

The summer was awesome dreaming of big bucks and bulls and putting in many hours with trail cams and behind the glass. I think that I may have spent more time than ever on the mountain this year and I enjoyed every bit of it. I was able to turn up some giant bucks and bulls.

Archery was fairly uneventful, we chased some decent bucks around and never quite connected. I did kill a spike bull, so that was fun. Dan took the last week of the archery off to try and find a bull that I had filmed in early July. In the end, he did what he always does and helped out some folks with archery tags, rather than scout for his bull. If I remember correctly, Dennis killed with a day to go, and yes we had some snow in archery. I missed out on this one, as I was back at work but I did get to spot for several days of his hunt.

Shannon actually arrowed her bull right before dark on the last night. Talk about taking it down to the wire. I got to watch the bull early in the evening but didn't get to see the shot. These animals are so tough. This bull rutted around all night and then dropped to the bottom of a canyon to die, all while leaving just enough of a blood trail. The best part about hunting is often the people you meet along the way.