Last SD Resident Season

[SD_Prairie_Goat]

Well, with my move out of state delayed due to the housing market being shit right now, the biggest benefit was the fact that I was able to hunt in South Dakota this fall. Originally when I took my new job it was a pretty big risk that I would be moved out west already, but the hunting forces helped me out by tanking the housing market so that my house sits for an unusually long time. Not everything this bad news in life, so I decided to make the most out of my last fall in South Dakota.


If you're looking for the TLDR, just skip further down and you'll find photos of the successes. Otherwise lets go on an adventure. One thing I will promise is to include lots of photos. Not sure why, but I have started to enjoy sharing my outdoor experiences with people. Now I take lots of photos to share, and to help remind me later in life I suppose. Many photos included will be through the spotting scope. I upgraded to the Olin mounting system, and I absolutely love it. So easy to use, that now I can grab even quick photos of deer running away. Man, I sound like a salesman for Olin, but it really has changed the way I share the outdoors.



Ok, last house keeping before we dive into the story. I will take some time to write all of this, so stay patient. Additionally, I was finally able to convince my dad to come hunt in South Dakota with me. Took many years and me buying his tag, but most of this adventure involves hunting with him to fill his state wide Any Deer Tag. He has never killed a mule deer, so that was the main priority for his hunt, try and do spot and stalk on a mule deer buck. Now on to the story!




Prior to my Dad arriving Oct 10th, we have waterfowl opener in SD. I won't bore you with many details here, but I will say that I got my first banded waterfowl this fall!

Goose ended up being tagged on the same piece of water that I shot him off 5 years ago. Pretty cool as it was banded on my buddies farm by SD GFP but no one that has hunted the farm has gotten a band out of the 400 or so birds they banded that summer.






Ok, now back to deer hunting. So my Dad arrives and we head out west in search of a mule deer for him. Additional tags we are working on filling are my archery buck tag and my rifle antelope tag. The plan is we are going to hunt my rifle deer unit because I know the unit well and know there are a lot of mule deers along with decent quality. The antelope tag is further west, so we plan to hunt the first part of the week for deer then spend the final weekend out further west to get my antelope during the final weekend of the rifle season.



We drive out and set up camp on Saturday afternoon. We get all parked and set with enough time for an evening hunt that day. Knowing the unit, I decide to drive around and check the usual spots to see if I can spot up some deer for us. Saturday doesn't yield much in the way of deer, but I did get to see a nice thistle flower that I enjoyed, and right after telling my Dad antelope are fairly rare in this unit, turn up a couple of nice herds of antelope. Nothing crazy like my antelope unit will produce, but still rare to see 20 total antelope this far east.






Sunday morning rolls around and I decide to set up on an area that I see many hunters watching during rifle season and where I have seen some smaller bucks in the past as well. Unfortunately this area doesn't have a ton of public, so often you see animals you can't chase after, which will be the theme this morning. We spot a decent group of mule deer this morning, but they are 600 yards on the wrong side of the fence and only moving further from the public. No monsters in this group, but a few respectable deer, especially for archery bucks!





We keep driving around and checking spots in the morning after those bucks moved off. My Dad isn't used to prairie hunting, so he's pretty fixated on the idea that it will be impossible to sneak up on these animals without them seeing us from miles away. I keep telling him it just takes a bit of luck to make it work. You get lucky and spot them in their bed facing downhill, all of the sudden you can sneak up on them from behind without them ever knowing. But he's used to tree stand hunting in Wisconsin or black tail hunting in Alaska, so this is all very very foreign to him. I should also mention that as he is getting older (68 now) his endurance and physical capabilities has decreased. Unfortunately, he is limited to about 35 yards for archery and walking over a mile a day will be a challenge. I knew about the range limitation, but didn't realize how limited he was going to be for walking and stalking. I asked him to get a crossbow permit for this hunt (he would qualify for the medical exemption in SD) but I was constantly rebuffed. I think he views a crossbow as cheating, even though he can't hold binos up for longer than a min before his arms start to shake from previous surgeries and years of hard labor. I also told him he needs to get walking while at home to prepare for this hunt, but he was too distracted with fishing back home to go out walking every day to build up his endurance. I don't fully understand these limitations at the start of the hunt, but my wife will help me see sense later on with how I can best help him with this hunt.


Okay, back to hunting. After taking a midday nap, I decide to take us an hour away in the unit to where I have seen many great bucks before and always love hunting there. I don't camp closer to this spot only because of the lack of BLM land to camp on.

One of my secret spots is over here, so we decide to check that out to start with. Let me show you why this is my favorite secret spot.. This is the spot that I found this guy on. I wasn't able to close the deal because of a strange shape of public land, but this guy crossed me at 50 yards. Little further down the road and he would have been the crown jewel...




Okay, so that's why I love this piece, but we don't see a monster like him, but we do see a small 3x3 in a ravine with a couple of does. We stare a little too long and they start to move, but at no real pace like they are going to run 2 miles. I get us turned around and head to cut off their escape. Here is where my Dads endurance is going to be a challenge. Normally, when I get something like this happening, I rush to cut the deer off and get set up before they will reach what I hope is the cut off point. But I will soon learn that my Dad needs frequent rests while walking to catch his breath. So we move a lot slower than I am used to, but what choice do we have? I will adapt and make it work. We circle around where they are and start to work towards a pinch point. I can see them on the hill side, so we have to watch our viewing angles to try and come in unseen. Using the Moo Moo Bessy cow decoy to move around we get set up in the bottom of the ravine where two ravines join. We have to make a guess at which one to focus on since my Dad has limited range. We wait for a while, but no buck appears. Looking up the ridge I can see that they are feeding on the hillside rather than walking the ravine down. We wait for a while, but eventually it becomes clear they aren't in any big rush. We get to talking and the buck isn't the size my Dad is looking for so early in the hunt anyway, so we decide to back out while there is still a little light left in the day.

We check a few more pieces, but don't see anything so I decide to take him over to a piece that I missed a decent whitetail on the previous year and always seems like a great piece of land. Normally I would have hiked out and used the spotter from the middle of the section, but with the limitations on my Dads endurance I decide to watch as much as possible from the road. I find a good spot with a good view of the hillside and set up. 30 mins or so before sundown we hit gold! Great mule deer right in the middle of public with enough time left for a stalk! Looks like there is a bachelor group of about 7 bucks with one or two studs, two decent bucks, and then a couple of much smaller young bucks. Obviously, the biggest one would be ideal, but the couple of other decent bucks would suit our needs just fine.


The studs

 

[SD_Prairie_Goat]

So, we're running out of daylight to chase after these bucks. Basically as soon as I took a picture I started to figure out how we could get close. I check over the terrain and figure out a way we can sneak close and use the rolling terrain to our advantage. Plus given that my Dad moves slower than I do, I know we don't have any time to waste. We drive closer and park at the corner of the public. The idea is to walk the fence line down to the middle of the section and then cut up using the dried creek bottom as our cover to get closer. First part of the plan works great. We sneak into the middle of the section without once seeing the deer or them seeing us. Once we get to the middle there is a stock dam. Last I saw of the bucks they were headed in that direction, so I figure they might be getting a drink. So I very slowly stalk up to the water while my Dad stay down low in the creek bottom. The idea being that I'm sneakier than he is, plus I don't mind walking up and down a hillside on a chance there might be deer there. Well there turns out to be no deer drinking from the stock pond. Which is probably good because where they'd likely be would be 100 yds plus from the side we walked up on.

We decide to walk further up the creek bottom and see if they are further up the public ground. Again, using all the terrain to keep us hidden. Not too far up the creek bottom I spot one of the little bucks overlooking the creek bottom while feeding. He didn't spot us yet, but he's in a real tough spot to sneak up on further. He can overlook the entire creek bottom. We sneak up to a bend in the creek bottom that allows me to send my Dad up the hillside while I try to sneak further up. But at 300 yards I have zero chance to move closer without being seen. I do try when the small buck is heads down feeding, but eventually the other 6 bucks feed over and its just too many eyes to beat. With the sun setting, and no way to sneak closer I call it quits and back out with the deer on alert but not panicked.

Talking with my Dad, he was excited to have gotten that close in the prairie but still doubts how we'll ever be able to get a buck out there. I tell him to have patiences and with a little luck we might just get one.

That night was a moonless night, really wish I had brought the gopro to do night lapse because it was spectacular. Being able to clearly see the milky way with the naked eye sure is a treat.




Obviously, we plan to go back and chase after those bucks the following morning.


We get up early and arrive at the same glassing spot before shooting light. Early on the only thing I spot is a bouquet of grouse on the hillside sunning themselves
Always love watching animals, even if I'm not actively trying to hunt them at that moment!


Back to deer hunting. Finally we spot some movement, a couple of does coming down the public. Not what we were looking for so we just watch and wait for a buck. Don't see any bucks coming, but do notice that the does were going to feed off the private ag fields, so maybe we should get a better look at that. We drive up the road to better overlook the private while still being able to watch the public. We see a small forky mule deer on the public, but my Dad has no interest in trying for him. While watching over the ag field (corn) we see easily 50 does out feeding along it and no real bucks to speak of. But then I finally spot a nice whitetail buck heading over to the corn pile. He's never on public land, but still a pretty nice buck. Too bad he's off limits while eating his corn


We watch for a while, then I suggest we go up and check the top side of the public and see if maybe the mule deer are hidden in some of the draws. My Dad is a little pessimistic and suggests that the big bucks must be scared off and won't be hanging around here. I know they are likely not far off, but when your old man says something, it carries weight so I start to second guess myself.

While up on top, I go to the high point to start searching around for the deer. My biggest mistake was letting my Dads negativity affect my hunting style. I know better than to skyline myself while searching an area, but I figured why not be lazy? All the deer are down feeding on corn and they don't care if I'm up here.

So I stand skylined while looking for deer. Then I look down in the bottom of the ravine I'm situated over and see the two big mule deer come out from the East and just stare right at me.


Of course I'm busted, but I still tell my Dad to go grab his bow while I sneak back and out of sight. If I hadn't of been spotted, I think they would have fed up the ravine right towards us. No way to ever know, but they were coming that direction before they saw me. I am still kicking myself for being so exposed while glassing. I know better, but I listened too much to the Old Man and it might have cost us a chance. Of course the deer ran away from us towards the corn field with all the other deer. Nothing can be done at this point besides learning from my mistakes and trying to improve.


We decide to drive to an area in the next hunting unit that I have never visited because I don't get a rifle tag for there. We see a lot of beautiful country, but don't see any deer while we are over there. Too many spruce trees in the ravines to see anything. Ultimately we decide that we don't want to spend any more time hunting here, and would rather focus on the prairie. Worst case if we spotted something in this new area, I don't think my Dad has the mobility to chase after them in these steep hills.




So we decide to quick run back to where I know from rifle hunting and see what we can find before the sun goes down.


I decide to head towards a butte that I haven't killed a deer on, but have seen nice deer hanging around it, and have been 5 mins too late while someone else killed a nice buck on it.

As we round the corner, I see a nice buck coming around the butte perfectly. I see him and instantly know this might just work out perfect if we can get to the top of the butte before he rounds the butte and sees us.


So, I punch it and park at the public approach. He's still rounding the corner, so I beg my Dad to get ready faster as we need to get over the fence right away to get out of his line of sight. Well, he doesn't move as fast as I do, and takes longer to get ready, but somehow we get over the fence before the buck gets too weary of us.

Now this butte isn't all that tall, but being on the prairie its basically like a mini devils tower, but only 200' tall max over the prairie. But walking up the side of it, we have to take half a dozen stops to catch breath. Its killing me, but I keep telling myself that I need to have more patiences than I'm showing, so I slow down and try my best not to rush my Dad. As we get close to the summit I go in the lead to scope it out while my Dad catches his breath. Up on top it is fairly flat but with a lot of boulders around the edges. I am hoping the buck stayed put under one of those boulders so that we could sneak above him and fire down on him.


When I get close to the edge I see him and half a dozen does. I instantly drop down and back out on my hands and knees. I go report back my Dad and let him know we are in play here.




This time I sneak up with my Dad next to me. I leave him closer to the top so I can get a look and see where the deer is at. I look over the rock and spot him, but he's pinning me down with his stare and no escape

I'm pretty well pinned by the buck and his does. I can't see a way to escape without them seeing so I am stuck, but my Dad is 30 yards back and they can't see him. If I can keep them interested in what I'm doing, he'll be able to sneak up on their side and blammo, muley in the bag! So I try and explain all of this with hand signals, which goes about as poorly as you would expect. He finally understands that I want him to back out and stalk up on them, but stalks up 25 yards away from me, instead of the 100 yards to come up blind on the buck. Ultimately, the does tire and run below me and start feeding. They get to about 80 yards away while they cross below me. The buck stays put, but I figure that if he is going to leave he is going to follow them, so I try to slide down the butte to get a closer shot. I am touch out to 60 yards with my bow, so my goal is to try and get to 50 yards from where they crossed. I hardly make it ten yards scooting down on my butt and side before the buck gets to anxious and starts to head out. Sadly he crosses me at about 80 yards and I never get a chance to take a poke. I watch as he runs across the public and goes and feeds out in the middle of the public with no way to sneak up whatsoever without being seen from a mile away. Tricky deer!


I report back what happened to my Dad. He thought the deer was almost right under me and I wanted him to stalk for the deer being there. I didn't have the heart to tell him that if the deer was right under me, I would have been trying to shoot it with how it was staring me down! Oh well, I did the best I could in the conditions but fell flat.


Remember how I said I tried to get my Dad to get his crossbow permit? That sure would have come in handy when the buck was staring at me from 80-90 yards... Sure would have been a nice spot for someone with a crossbow to set up and whack him while he was staring at me... Oh well, you can't change the past but you can sure say I told you so in your head!