I’ve been procrastinating posting about my archery deer hunt, so here it goes. I hiked in with my cousin Brayden the night before the opener and we made it too camp at about 11:00.
Opening morning we woke up early and got to our glassing point, no shooters were spotted and it soon started raining, the rest of the day was spent at camp avoiding the rain.
Day 2 found Brayden and I on the same glassing point looking for the 4x3 with the double eye guards. We weren’t able to find him but did find 2 other nice bucks, and I decided to put a stalk on them. Here’s a couple of trail cam photos of the bucks.
The bucks fed into a patch of pines so I moved into position above them. We made the decision to have my other cousin Hayden try to push the bucks to me because we weren’t sure exactly where they bedded. Hayden moved across the basin making noise trying to spook the bucks to me but the bucks never came, Hayden was able to walk right up to the bucks and got a 25 yard shot, he misranged and shot right over the back of the 4 point. They trotted out to 80 yards and he shot two more times but couldn’t connect. The rest of the day was pretty slow. Here’s a cool picture I got of Brayden from the glassing point.
On day 3 Hayden and I went to a new glassing point to look for a big 3 point he had been watching during the summer. We were glassing one basin when I decided to peek off the other side and see if there was anything below us. Sure enough there was a 24 inch 4x3 about 150 yards away feeding towards us. I got set up in the cliffs and waited for the buck, he fed below me but was quite alert. I got a range of 90 yards, but with the angle compensation I held for 55 yards. I drew back my bow, settled my pin and let it fly. Unfortunately the buck jumped the string and my arrow flew harmlessly over his back.
Here’s my view looking down where the buck was standing. The yellow dot is where the buck was standing when I shot.
I went down and found my arrow, my broadhead was trashed but the arrow was fine. Here’s a view from where the buck was standing back up towards where I was set up.
We weren’t able to find Hayden’s buck and the rest of the day was pretty was slow.
On day 4 we were able to locate Hayden’s buck but were not able to put a stalk on as Hayden hurt his foot. Day 5 was much of the same with no big buck sightings and not a lot of movement. It was a good 5 days and a lot of fun but I don’t think I’ll head back up with a bow and instead focus on archery elk for the next couple of weeks! I’m super excited for our annual backcountry elk hunt!
