Kaibab Plateau Early Rifle Hunt

npaden

npaden

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Well, this is the last of the big tags that I drew this year. With all of the other tags I had this year, I knew I wouldn't be able to do any scouting and so I felt that hiring an outfitter was the way to go on what is most likely a once in a lifetime tag. This is the easiest to draw tag of all of the Kaibab and Strip tags and based on that and discussions with lots of different people I'm not going into this with super high expectations.

Just got back from a work trip last night, so trying to get some things sorted at work today, then get things sorted at the house getting everything loaded up and hopefully hitting the road some time this evening to get a start on the 12 hour drive to the unit so we can get there at a reasonable time tomorrow afternoon or early evening to meet the guide and get things setup.

My wife is going with me on this one so that will be different. She's planning on just hanging out at camp and relaxing for the most part but that should be nice having her there at camp.

Had a change of plans with the outfitter, the guide that had helped sell me on booking with them ended up not being able to guide for me so they are switching that around and I have a different guide now. Did get a chance to talk to him yesterday and he seems like a nice guy, but not the same confidence level as the first guide. Hopefully he is more along the under promise and over deliver type guy as he is talking about much lower numbers than the first guide but it isn't all about numbers and my goal is a mature buck more than anything.

Lots of stuff to do so not going to be super long winded right now but will probably get there before it is all said and done for sure. The guide said we would have cell coverage at camp so I should be able to keep this updated daily if I don't end up with coverage during the day but will try to update it as often as possible.

Wish me luck, I think I'm going to need it!
 
One other big thing I forgot to mention in the opening post was how the Dragon Bravo fire has been and most likely will be a big factor in this hunt.

Starting in early July and running rampant until nearly the end of September a big part of the unit burned.

| InciWeb

Incidents Page of for the Inciweb site.
inciweb.wildfire.gov inciweb.wildfire.gov

There have been extensive forest closures and even now a good chunk is closed completely and several roads are closed as well. The guides have all assured me that the area where the fire was and the area that is still closed was not an area where they typically spent much time hunting so it doesn't seem like it will be a big impact but just dealing with the closure notices and wondering how this is going to affect deer movement and everything else is going to have to impact it somewhat either positively or negatively.

www.fs.usda.gov

Kaibab National Forest : Alert - Effective Oct 8, 2025 - UPDATED - White Sage & Dragon Bravo Fires Temporary Area Closure

On Wednesday, October 8, 2025, the Kaibab National Forest will once again reduce the forest closure, reopening just over 7,000 additional acres of forest lands west of Highway 67 in the Murray Lake area where the Dragon Bravo Fire Incident Command Post was located. In total, the public will have...
www.fs.usda.gov www.fs.usda.gov

During the archery hunt nearly the entire area was closed. The outfitter asked me just a week ago if I wanted to turn my tag back in so that wasn't exactly encouraging but I can't turn it back in because I was too cheap to buy point guard.

Only other thing that I hadn't ever thought about until people started mentioning permit #'s but I have permit #17 out of I think 60. Does that mean that I had enough points to draw the tag? Not that it matters but I thought I was still several years away from having enough points for the tag.

Okay. I have a bunch to get done today, on top of everything else I just found out we have to use a notary to sign our closing documents selling our property so a mobile notary is coming buy at 5:00 today to have us sign those.
 
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NHY said it best.

Having your spouse in camp will be nice. having never hunted the Kaibab, I know there is the possibility of some big deer, but it is still hunting.

I'm sure you are going to enjoy the experience nevertheless. look forward to the updates
 
npaden said:
One other big thing I forgot to mention in the opening post was how the Dragon Bravo fire has been and most likely will be a big factor in this hunt.

Starting in early July and running rampant until nearly the end of September a big part of the unit burned.

| InciWeb

Incidents Page of for the Inciweb site.
inciweb.wildfire.gov inciweb.wildfire.gov

There have been extensive forest closures and even now a good chunk is closed completely and several roads are closed as well. The guides have all assured me that the area where the fire was and the area that is still closed was not an area where they typically spent much time hunting so it doesn't seem like it will be a big impact but just dealing with the closure notices and wondering how this is going to affect deer movement and everything else is going to have to impact it somewhat either positively or negatively.

www.fs.usda.gov

Kaibab National Forest : Alert - Effective Oct 8, 2025 - UPDATED - White Sage & Dragon Bravo Fires Temporary Area Closure

On Wednesday, October 8, 2025, the Kaibab National Forest will once again reduce the forest closure, reopening just over 7,000 additional acres of forest lands west of Highway 67 in the Murray Lake area where the Dragon Bravo Fire Incident Command Post was located. In total, the public will have...
www.fs.usda.gov www.fs.usda.gov

During the archery hunt nearly the entire area was closed. The outfitter asked me just a week ago if I wanted to turn my tag back in so that wasn't exactly encouraging but I can't turn it back in because I was too cheap to buy point guard.

Only other thing that I hadn't ever thought about until people started mentioning permit #'s but I have permit #17 out of I think 60. Does that mean that I had enough points to draw the tag? Not that it matters but I thought I was still several years away from having enough points for the tag.

Okay. I have a bunch to get done today, on top of everything else I just found out we have to use a notary to sign out closing documents selling our property so a mobile notary is coming buy at 5:00 today to have us sign those.
Click to expand...
Actually the archery hunters were allowed to hunt the ENTIRE west side of 67, as long as they had a permit.
 
npaden said:
One other big thing I forgot to mention in the opening post was how the Dragon Bravo fire has been and most likely will be a big factor in this hunt.

Starting in early July and running rampant until nearly the end of September a big part of the unit burned.

| InciWeb

Incidents Page of for the Inciweb site.
inciweb.wildfire.gov inciweb.wildfire.gov

There have been extensive forest closures and even now a good chunk is closed completely and several roads are closed as well. The guides have all assured me that the area where the fire was and the area that is still closed was not an area where they typically spent much time hunting so it doesn't seem like it will be a big impact but just dealing with the closure notices and wondering how this is going to affect deer movement and everything else is going to have to impact it somewhat either positively or negatively.

www.fs.usda.gov

Kaibab National Forest : Alert - Effective Oct 8, 2025 - UPDATED - White Sage & Dragon Bravo Fires Temporary Area Closure

On Wednesday, October 8, 2025, the Kaibab National Forest will once again reduce the forest closure, reopening just over 7,000 additional acres of forest lands west of Highway 67 in the Murray Lake area where the Dragon Bravo Fire Incident Command Post was located. In total, the public will have...
www.fs.usda.gov www.fs.usda.gov

During the archery hunt nearly the entire area was closed. The outfitter asked me just a week ago if I wanted to turn my tag back in so that wasn't exactly encouraging but I can't turn it back in because I was too cheap to buy point guard.

Only other thing that I hadn't ever thought about until people started mentioning permit #'s but I have permit #17 out of I think 60. Does that mean that I had enough points to draw the tag? Not that it matters but I thought I was still several years away from having enough points for the tag.

Okay. I have a bunch to get done today, on top of everything else I just found out we have to use a notary to sign out closing documents selling our property so a mobile notary is coming buy at 5:00 today to have us sign those.
Click to expand...
That is kind of funny, I bet your clients appreciate that sentiment though. ;) Good luck on the hunt!
 
BOHNTR said:
Actually the archery hunters were allowed to hunt the ENTIRE west side of 67, as long as they had a permit.
Click to expand...
That was nice of AGFD! I figured they were just out of luck.
Jwill said:
That is kind of funny, I bet your clients appreciate that sentiment though. ;) Good luck on the hunt!
Click to expand...
Sometimes it doesn't pay off but usually it all works out. For a bit I thought I had put the wrong hunt code down and that was scary.
 
npaden said:
That was nice of AGFD! I figured they were just out of luck.

Sometimes it doesn't pay off but usually it all works out. For a bit I thought I had put the wrong hunt code down and that was scary.
Click to expand...
It's not up to AGFD......it's up to the National Forest to allow access.
 
BOHNTR said:
It's not up to AGFD......it's up to the National Forest to allow access.
Click to expand...
I think I'm confused. I was trying not to say the specific unit but doubt it really matters since it is hard to draw and the likelihood of me shooting a really big one is pretty low anyway. I'm hunting the 12AE tag so when you said they allowed them to hunt the west side of 67 I thought you were saying they were allowing 12AE tag holders to hunt the west side. The archery tag holders with the 12AE tag were the ones with a very limited area to hunt with the closures in place during the archery season I thought.
 
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Very interested to see how this goes. I’ve been looking at those areas for an early rifle or maybe even archery hunt with my points as I’ll never catch up to the strip
 
npaden said:
I think I'm confused. I was trying not to say the specific unit but doubt it really matters since it is hard to draw and the likelihood of me shooting a really big one is pretty low anyway. I'm hunting the 12AE tag so when you said they allowed them to hunt the west side of 67 I thought you were saying they were allowing 12AE tag holders to hunt the west side. The archery tag holders with the 12AE tag were the ones with a very limited area to hunt with the closures in place during the archery season I thought.
Click to expand...
Still not completely accurate, but I may have confused you. Sorry. There is no archery 12AE tag. The drawn archery tag is for the entire 12A unit (both West and East). The Forrest service simply did not allow access to the east side (which is only about 25% of traditional summer range for early archery anyways). They closed the east side to all entry, as that is where all the fire equipment and activity was still occurring. Since they opened everything, there’s been pretty good deer activity already in the burn area with some late rains the area received. You should be fine!
 
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