How to make antelope hunting tough.

shoots-straight

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Bitterroot Valley
1). Find an area with declining populations of game.
2). Find an area with enough water that blind hunting can be risky.
3).Move blinds every day looking for a lope.
4). Stalk said antelope when thunder storms are present allowing for wind swirls.
5). Find a place that holds 20 antelope in 4,000 acres and hunt one of the 5 bucks living in the area.

So I've been hunting this place that's fairly close to my home, (little over an hour drive). 4 years ago you would see 200 antelope this time of year, and now we're down to 20.

I don't know if the Fish and Game are trying to sell more tags to make up for the loses in the eastern part of the state at the expense of our game, or just kill them off because the perception that they compete with cattle is the issue.

Either way, I did some research on the area. In 2011 the population estimate was over 2000 head. That was after several years of liberal seasons, so it was safe to say that wasn't a peak. Also this area hasn't experienced any disease or winter kill in a long time.

So the estimate last year was a little over 1400. The department issued 500 either sex tags, and 450 doe fawn tags again this year, even after the decline. That's not including the 900 tag holders that use the area.

If 60% of the tag holders are successful then around 570 lopes will die, leaving us with around 900 for the area. if you have a 40% recruitment you end up adding back 300. That end result is a continued downward spiral of mismanagement. This is all hypothetical of course but gives a guy an idea of what's going to happen.

I'm not done with this and will be working on the bio for the area in the near future.

The winter range is almost all public lands. Many of the antelope do summer on private but the area by and large is always lush. I think many people in the area feel they lose dollars from the animals. I'd really like to know how much antelope compete with cattle for resources.

After a 15 hr day in the blind with no lope closer than a mile, I moved that blind within 50 yards of a county road. I'm sure some snickering went on as locals drove by my position. I did have 5 lopes come in bow range, but the biggest buck was around 10 inches, and knowing that was all the lopes there I moved again.

Then after another 15 hour day of seeing nothing closer than a mile, I packed up everything again and moved to a place where the ditch jetted out of a field full of cattle a little ways to give water to other pastures. Before I set up I had noticed some tracks had hit the ditch on the side with no cattle.(you can see them in the picture below) On the downwind side was a pump house enclosed by railing fence. I set the blind inside the railings hoping that the movement wouldn't scare off any spooky lopes coming to water.

At 1:00 bells in the afternoon, just as I settled in to the Zune, and "Transformers the Dark side of the moon" I looked up and was totally shocked to see 5 lopes headed my way. They really covered the distance in short order, with the buck coming to water first. He went a little farther than I like (41 yards) and started drinking. I figured that if I can't make that shot now I never could. I hit him maybe a tad higher, than where I was aiming, but it was still plenty good. He sped off as fast as lopes can run and crashed in dramatic fashion about 100 yards off.

Even though he's not the biggest lope I've ever taken, the effort to take him makes this hunt memorable.
 

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Very nice . Way to stick with it. I saw the same thing where i was hunting this year. In the past 30-40 bucks and this year it was 10-12. Congrats again. HUNT
 
FW&Ps upped the number of permits in the Madison Valley I think. At land owner request. I'm not certain it will turn out well for the antelope. We'll see.
Good for you to be on your stand for as long as it takes.
 
Great buck shoots. Way to stick with it and make something happen.
 
Very nice! Sometimes hunts are memorable for more than just inches.

FYI... The dietary overlap between pronghorn and cattle aren't super high, however they do like many of the same plants. The general rule of thumb for forage allocation is that 6 pronghorn/month = 1 Animal Unit Month or the equivalent of 1 cow or cow/calf pair. See the link below for more detailed info:
http://ag.arizona.edu/arec/pubs/rmg/1 rangelandmanagement/1 aum93.pdf
 
Nice! You guys with the archery goat tags are making me jealous! Come on Sept!

I have a feeling there is a bull waiting to die by one of you arrows soon...
 
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