2019 Alaska Bison Hunt - Start date November 2nd

[npaden]

Fairly discouraging opening morning. Perfect weather, fresh snow overnight and still snowing for most of the morning.

Walked the perimeter of the place that I paid the trespass fee on and didn’t see any fresh tracks and not many old tracks either. Pretty much zero elevation gain or loss and 5.5 miles on the boots.

Took several pictures, but they pretty much all look about the same. Long hay fields with wind rows of trees between them.



Going to go check out some state land this afternoon and see if we can at least see some fresh tracks.

I’m trying to talk my buddy into going back to where we saw the 2 on the way into Delta yesterday but they were probably 1/2 mile off the road and he doesn’t seem super excited to be packing bison on our backs to the truck. There wasn’t much of a place to even pull off the highway where we saw them so we would have to figure that part out too. And most likely we wouldn’t be able to find them again anyway.

I’m still trying to talk him into it anyway.

 

[dirtclod Az.]

Once in a lifetime.1/2 mile? My Dad shot his in the 1960's
in a corral.Big ol' flatbed truck to lift em' up.They cut them in half.
Half for you,half for Raymond Ranch.If you want the whole Buff,
break out your wallet.
I'll help..pick me up in Phx. Az.!

 

[Bambistew]

Asked to not shoot a wolf? A
Did you ask if they were from Kalifonia?

Good luck!

 

[Jape]

Bummer first morning but lots of time left and excited to see what you found on the state land. Keep it up!

 

[npaden]

Well, day one is in the books with zero Bison seen today.

We ended up checking out some state land and saw a lot of older sign but no fresh tracks. For sure we found a field that they have been feeding in. It is a very big field, maybe 1/4 mile wide and at least 2 miles long. It had been hayed but there had been enough regrowth that there was green stalks sticking up out of the snow.

We decided to just sit that field for the rest of the evening and see what showed up.

Right off the bat a cow moose and calf came out into the field and started feeding. The cow kept looking back in the trees where they had come out so we were hoping that maybe there were some bison back there that might be coming out soon.

As we are watching another cow moose comes out, then a bull that we decided would be a legal 50”+ bull.



We sat for almost 2 hours and by the time it was getting too dark to where we felt like we could positively ID a bull vs a cow bison we counted 22 moose in the field.

On our way out we ended up seeing at least 7 more moose that hadn’t made it to the field yet.

We did see another pickup drive through on one end of the field and another hunter on foot that turned out to be in a different pickup that we saw on our way out so for sure more competition than we would have at the place we paid the trespass fee on but there was also way more sign than we were seeing there as well.

Current plan is to hit the state land again in the morning and then go back over to the place we are booked on and at least check for tracks.

Wish me luck, I think I’m going to need it.

Thanks, Nathan

 

[Bowhuntrben]

I hope you find ‘em today!

 

[npaden]

Day 2 in the books. Still no bison seen.

Started the day back on the state property and saw 20+ moose again but no bison.

Moved back over to the property that I have access to and no new tracks there.

The owners are getting up there in age and the man had some knee problems and had mentioned that he was behind on his chores and there was a pretty big stack of wood that needed split so we volunteered to split the wood for them. He took some convincing but agree as long as he helped. Between the 3 of us we got it done in about an hour using his hydraulic log splitter. We added an entire row of split logs, probably about 30% of what he already had split. Sounded like he was still going to have to cut and split some more though to make it through the winter. I guess they need a lot of wood for a long winter.

After we got the logs split we hiked an old road to the west hoping to cut some bison tracks but we didn’t see any fresh tracks there either. Did see a set of fresh wolf tracks but didn’t see the wolves.

Took a picture of the road we were walking down.



Went back to the property and walked it again before dark but no bison or tracks. Another picture of an empty wind row.



Hopefully our luck will turn and we will at least see some bison tomorrow.

 

[Gellar]

Stay strong, one night they will show up on the property and you will be in the thick of them!

 

[Duck-Slayer]

Hope your luck changes today!
Matt

 

[npaden]

Coldest day so far but not bad at all. 8 degrees this morning. First time I’ve seen the sun since I’ve been to Alaska this trip.

Hiked around the perimeter of the property I have access on and saw a fresh set of wolf tracks but still no fresh bison tracks.

Beautiful morning though. I’m not normally a selfie kind of guy but thought my frosted beard might make a good one.



We decided to drive around a bit and see if we could find some bison, even if they were on property that we didn’t have permission to hunt. We found some on one place that charges a $2,000 kill fee but there was actually another hunter there already and they told us that they only allow one hunter at a time (the hunter told us that, I still hadn’t decided if I could justify the $2,000 fee or not).

We were thinking about checking out the state land again and stopped back by the cabin and got gas and talked to the lady there and she told us that there had been some killed recently on another place that only charges a $50 access fee. $50 sounded a LOT better than $2,000 so we drove over to check it out and we didn’t see any bison but we did see some fresh bison tracks!


I got back to the cabin and got the phone number for the neighboring property as well since the bison were obviously moving back and forth between them and he gave me permission with a kill fee of 50 pounds of meat. Still more expensive than the $50, but I think that is a pretty cool access fee and I told him I would be very happy to pay it because that would mean that I was successful.

We are going to head that way for the evening hunt in a few minutes. The way the properties are set up it is going to be tougher to get one because these are some big open fields but I would love to see one and have a chance to actually hunt one.

Hoping that day 3 is the day!

 

[Carl 9.3x62]

Good luck!

 

[rmyoung1]

I hope it works out for you, Nathan!!! Keep after it.

 

[brownbear932008]

You got them now it looks like

 

[bobbydean]

Great selfie. Keep waiting for it to happen. Good luck.

 

[Duck-Slayer]

Awesome selfie lol, wish I could just grow a beard ha ha
Matt

 

[OverlordBear]

I love the idea of a trespass fee in pounds of meat. That is a hunter/land owner after my own heart. Good luck with the bison and maybe a wolf over the carcass.

 

[npaden]

I love the idea of a trespass fee in pounds of meat. That is a hunter/land owner after my own heart. Good luck with the bison and maybe a wolf over the carcass.

I agree. Looks like I owe him 50 pounds of meat. Still work to be done but we got him quartered up and mostly skinned, covered him back up with his hide and are going to go retrieve him tomorrow.



Not the biggest bull, not even the biggest bull in the herd he was in, but he was a bull.

I’ll try to get the story told soon, no guarantee it will be tonight though.

 

[Carl 9.3x62]

Awesome! Glad you got one!

 

[ashersdad]

Congratulations! Loved following along. Thanks for sharing.

 

[elkantlers]

Good deal. Glad it all worked out for you.