H
HighSierra
Guest
LAST EDITED ON Sep-10-06 AT 10:16AM (MST)[p]LAST EDITED ON Sep-10-06 AT 10:05?AM (MST)
Last weekend I had the pleasure of accompanying 2 of my long time friends (elememtary school days!) on a pronghorn hunt in Northern California. This would be the tag holder's first CA pronghorn hunt. The other two of us have had the pleasure of hunting these goats several times previously. In fact, one of us (not me!) has drawn this zone twice before...even when there was the 10 year waiting period.
Here's the story:
We rolled into our hunt area in two seperate trucks the day before the 2nd season opener. As you will see, one truck was needed to pull our "not so secret" weapon...a duck boat. We utilized this boat, which was rigged for shallow water running, to access areas that 4WD wouldnt even get us into. Sure, we could have burned some shoe leather, but in CA...when it's hot...if you you are on foot and several hours out...and shoot a got...you are asking for meat spoilage! In fact, the temp was well in the 90's the day we arrived with more of the same expected for the weekend.
During a short scouting run in the boat, we spotted 5 mature "potential" shooter bucks. The came in all shapes and sizes, as pronghorn do. Some tall and thin. One really laid out wide...but a bit short. One with 13"-14" horns...but HUGE prongs... possibly 6-7"+. Another looked to be long (15"+), heavy, good shape/curl, but mediocre prongs. Then there was MR. Big....Oh my God...At over 1000yds, through our 60x spotting scope he looked HUGE! Needless to say, after watching him herd a doe around for a while we decided to slip back to the boat and return in the AM....hopefully for a closer look...like in hand!
The next morning came with the sound of our alams going off simultaneously at 5:00AM...we quickly checked our gear and jumped into the truck for our drive out the our launching site. The boat ride was a bit "western"...even though we had thoroughly scouted the route out the the hunting area, it was very hard to navigate through the shallow waters in the moonless night. We managed to scrape bottom a couple of times, fortunately no damage to the motor occured. THE HUNT WAS ON!.
After ditching the boat and making a short hike to a high point, we began our search. It didnt take long to start spotting antelope...5 mins into our glassing out popped a nice herd at about 800 yds, moving away from us toward a remote body of water. The herd buck looked familiar, he was seen the afternoon before a couple of mile away from our position. We all agreed the day before he was a nice buck...probably a shooter...but we really wanted to see MR. BIG. Well, at this point you probably are guessing where this story is going...Well, maybe this will suprise you...maybe it wont. We decided that to wait for "Mr. BIG" might be a bad choice...After all, we really didnt get a great look at him the day before. Sure, we knew he was big...but how big??? He was a long ways off when we saw him. There was a lot of mirage in the spotting scope view with all the heat waves... Right before our eyes was a georgous buck heading to a very stalkable area. Through the spotting scope we were to really look him over good. It's amazing the difference it makes to spot during the cool hours rather than when its hot. The image was crisp...and we were certain he was big...maybe not a BOONE and CROCKETT buck...but still mighty nice. We decided to give it a go. We waited til the buck moved his does through some rocks and dropped out of sight toward the water before making our move. Without delay we moved toward at the last point the buck was seen taking great care to stay in the lowest lying areas as possile. We ended up moving about 15-20 mins out...probably 1000-1500 yds?... before we spotted one of the does. We now dropped down into our low level approach, duck walk / crawling and managed to gain another 100+ yds on the herd. At this point we now could see several 5+ does and they were all feeding from left to right. Having stalked these critters before, we knew that the buck would most likely be in the rear of the feeding does...so we concentrated our glassing to the left side of the visible does. Sure enough, he stepped out and made his presence know fairly quickly. We ranged the buck at 310yds...long but VERY makable. The herd had no clue of our presence at this point so we set up the shooting sticks and got ready....
Well, in true pronghorn fashion, the buck caught a glimpse of us as we were setting up, the does still had not alarmed though. Here's where it got really neat. The buck started to walk toward us. I have always heard pronghorn were curious but had never experienced it first hand. Usually when I've been spotted, all I see next are flared white rumps heading for the horizon. No so today. The buck continued to move toward us for several minutes, stopping every once in a while. He didnt seem to "peg" us though...he was looking to both the left and right of our position. We figured he must have only got a glimpse of one of our heads or backs when setting up and thought we might be a coyote or something. Well, to bring this LOOOONG story to a close, the buck moved in to under 75 yds where he turned broadside and presented a great shot. We looked him over for what seemed to be an eternity and even discussed letting him walk. But, alas, the temptation of such a good buck, at short, range, so close to where we could load him into the boat (less than 100 yds to the shoreline)...my buddy's mind was made up. He took him. And you know what, it was a good decision! His buck taped out at 15 5/8 on both horns! He had great mass and a nice curl. sure his prongs were a bit weak, but we knew that and were OK with it.
Take a look at the pictures and tell me what you would have done:
By the way, I cant wait for my turn to draw a tag in this zone so I can maybe chase Mr. Big. But, if I have to settle for a buck as nice as the one we took on this great trip...that would be fine with me. Heck, even if I dont shoot one at all and have the pleasure of sharing a QUALITY hunt with my good friends...well, that's what it's really all about.
Last weekend I had the pleasure of accompanying 2 of my long time friends (elememtary school days!) on a pronghorn hunt in Northern California. This would be the tag holder's first CA pronghorn hunt. The other two of us have had the pleasure of hunting these goats several times previously. In fact, one of us (not me!) has drawn this zone twice before...even when there was the 10 year waiting period.
Here's the story:
We rolled into our hunt area in two seperate trucks the day before the 2nd season opener. As you will see, one truck was needed to pull our "not so secret" weapon...a duck boat. We utilized this boat, which was rigged for shallow water running, to access areas that 4WD wouldnt even get us into. Sure, we could have burned some shoe leather, but in CA...when it's hot...if you you are on foot and several hours out...and shoot a got...you are asking for meat spoilage! In fact, the temp was well in the 90's the day we arrived with more of the same expected for the weekend.
During a short scouting run in the boat, we spotted 5 mature "potential" shooter bucks. The came in all shapes and sizes, as pronghorn do. Some tall and thin. One really laid out wide...but a bit short. One with 13"-14" horns...but HUGE prongs... possibly 6-7"+. Another looked to be long (15"+), heavy, good shape/curl, but mediocre prongs. Then there was MR. Big....Oh my God...At over 1000yds, through our 60x spotting scope he looked HUGE! Needless to say, after watching him herd a doe around for a while we decided to slip back to the boat and return in the AM....hopefully for a closer look...like in hand!
The next morning came with the sound of our alams going off simultaneously at 5:00AM...we quickly checked our gear and jumped into the truck for our drive out the our launching site. The boat ride was a bit "western"...even though we had thoroughly scouted the route out the the hunting area, it was very hard to navigate through the shallow waters in the moonless night. We managed to scrape bottom a couple of times, fortunately no damage to the motor occured. THE HUNT WAS ON!.
After ditching the boat and making a short hike to a high point, we began our search. It didnt take long to start spotting antelope...5 mins into our glassing out popped a nice herd at about 800 yds, moving away from us toward a remote body of water. The herd buck looked familiar, he was seen the afternoon before a couple of mile away from our position. We all agreed the day before he was a nice buck...probably a shooter...but we really wanted to see MR. BIG. Well, at this point you probably are guessing where this story is going...Well, maybe this will suprise you...maybe it wont. We decided that to wait for "Mr. BIG" might be a bad choice...After all, we really didnt get a great look at him the day before. Sure, we knew he was big...but how big??? He was a long ways off when we saw him. There was a lot of mirage in the spotting scope view with all the heat waves... Right before our eyes was a georgous buck heading to a very stalkable area. Through the spotting scope we were to really look him over good. It's amazing the difference it makes to spot during the cool hours rather than when its hot. The image was crisp...and we were certain he was big...maybe not a BOONE and CROCKETT buck...but still mighty nice. We decided to give it a go. We waited til the buck moved his does through some rocks and dropped out of sight toward the water before making our move. Without delay we moved toward at the last point the buck was seen taking great care to stay in the lowest lying areas as possile. We ended up moving about 15-20 mins out...probably 1000-1500 yds?... before we spotted one of the does. We now dropped down into our low level approach, duck walk / crawling and managed to gain another 100+ yds on the herd. At this point we now could see several 5+ does and they were all feeding from left to right. Having stalked these critters before, we knew that the buck would most likely be in the rear of the feeding does...so we concentrated our glassing to the left side of the visible does. Sure enough, he stepped out and made his presence know fairly quickly. We ranged the buck at 310yds...long but VERY makable. The herd had no clue of our presence at this point so we set up the shooting sticks and got ready....
Well, in true pronghorn fashion, the buck caught a glimpse of us as we were setting up, the does still had not alarmed though. Here's where it got really neat. The buck started to walk toward us. I have always heard pronghorn were curious but had never experienced it first hand. Usually when I've been spotted, all I see next are flared white rumps heading for the horizon. No so today. The buck continued to move toward us for several minutes, stopping every once in a while. He didnt seem to "peg" us though...he was looking to both the left and right of our position. We figured he must have only got a glimpse of one of our heads or backs when setting up and thought we might be a coyote or something. Well, to bring this LOOOONG story to a close, the buck moved in to under 75 yds where he turned broadside and presented a great shot. We looked him over for what seemed to be an eternity and even discussed letting him walk. But, alas, the temptation of such a good buck, at short, range, so close to where we could load him into the boat (less than 100 yds to the shoreline)...my buddy's mind was made up. He took him. And you know what, it was a good decision! His buck taped out at 15 5/8 on both horns! He had great mass and a nice curl. sure his prongs were a bit weak, but we knew that and were OK with it.
Take a look at the pictures and tell me what you would have done:
By the way, I cant wait for my turn to draw a tag in this zone so I can maybe chase Mr. Big. But, if I have to settle for a buck as nice as the one we took on this great trip...that would be fine with me. Heck, even if I dont shoot one at all and have the pleasure of sharing a QUALITY hunt with my good friends...well, that's what it's really all about.
