So you heard what the first couple days were like from Stan. First morning I get into Tucson, rent my truck, grab my gear and head for the border. Get there about 2pm and do some driving and glassing to get familiar with the country a bit. I see 3 bucks including this one and figure that if this is the first afternoon the rest of the hunt I should see a ton of bucks! boy was I wrong. On the 4th day I never even saw a Mule deer, and for some reason saw 6 WT bucks instead.
good looking country though, you would never guess it is AZ
Stan shows up around midnight or so and almost gets my 41 mag in his face for waking me up at my "camp" yes, I found a safe place I guess when I was alone because I found a rest area about 100 yards from the Border Patrol HQ and crawled in the back of the truck to sleep. I never camped. I ate pop tarts on the defrost duct, and cans of ravioli on the intake manifold.
When Stan was there we parked the trucks together one night at Parker Canyon lake and when I woke up in the AM to piss I had to kick the doors open because they were frozen. this is the dash when I fired the truck up
Like Stan said, we saw a few bucks but nothing I wanted to smack that early in the game. Stan stayed the 2 days he could and had to go and do family duty back home. The next day was perfect weather, but no Mule deer, not even a doe. I took a 3 hour hike into a creek bed and jumped a couple dozen rat WT deer and one good buck at that. I messed around with the spotting scope too long and he got into the creek bottom and was gone. I think he was a 4X around 90inches. I would have shot him if I had the second Chance
The weekend came and the mearns hunters were everywhere and really messed the hunting up in the low grass lands. Here is one that I almost ran over!
The next morning I glassed some areas that I did the first day and came up with a heard of deer just into private. As I turned around to glass behind me here was this huge! i mean HUGE 3 point coming at me, but he had one side busted off
damn!! that ended the morning. I went and did something that gay Miller would do and hit a nearby Winery and did some tasting of 8 samples for lunch. After that I headed to a new spot just to look it over for the evening hunt and had not much intention of seeing much as it was 70 degrees this day. Long story short, I am parked at the gate reading the sign trying to figure out if I can hunt this land and another truck rolls up with a hunter and his guide so I ask them and they say it is open to anyone with a hunting tag. We shoot the bull a little while, and all the sudden across the open grassland about 1/3 mile away this buck appears and is walking toward the fence. The Guide says they saw it first so they are going to make a go at him and start the truck to head down the 2 track to intercept him. I asked if they would mind if i just pull across the gate a little and get out in case they mess up on him and he come my way. The rest of that you can figure out... The buck was hauling ass full blown run (not the hop hop, but run) and headed my way now as they blew their stalk and I was standing with my tall shooting sticks making every noise known to man trying to stop him. As he got past me I thought fugg it, and threw the cross-hairs out in front of him and pulled the trigger. He was about 125 yards away, and I was blinded by the smoke, heard a loud WHACK! and a couple seconds later i am standing there going where the hell did he go?? The grass was nuts deep, and it was pretty flat and then I started thinking "did i just kill that thing?
I reloaded, and just stood there waiting. The other guys now drive back into the section I am now in and walk up to me. I ask the guide the same thing as I have been asking myself "did i kill that thing?" He said he saw it one second, and it was gone the next and then heard my shot.
We waited 10 minutes, and I walked up there and there he was dead.
he has 2 little drops that are really cool but hard to see.
I work hard on my hunts, but sometimes just being persistent puts you in the right place at the right time I guess, and this was one of them. Sorry about the bloody photos but this was something that never happened to me before. I took a gallon of water out there (seen in picture) and washed his face off 4 times but the blood kept foaming out his nose like I never seen before, it just never stopped for probably 20 minutes! you can even see some on the ground where I tried to drag him away from the blood for the pictures. Anyone aver see that before
good looking country though, you would never guess it is AZ
Stan shows up around midnight or so and almost gets my 41 mag in his face for waking me up at my "camp" yes, I found a safe place I guess when I was alone because I found a rest area about 100 yards from the Border Patrol HQ and crawled in the back of the truck to sleep. I never camped. I ate pop tarts on the defrost duct, and cans of ravioli on the intake manifold.
When Stan was there we parked the trucks together one night at Parker Canyon lake and when I woke up in the AM to piss I had to kick the doors open because they were frozen. this is the dash when I fired the truck up
Like Stan said, we saw a few bucks but nothing I wanted to smack that early in the game. Stan stayed the 2 days he could and had to go and do family duty back home. The next day was perfect weather, but no Mule deer, not even a doe. I took a 3 hour hike into a creek bed and jumped a couple dozen rat WT deer and one good buck at that. I messed around with the spotting scope too long and he got into the creek bottom and was gone. I think he was a 4X around 90inches. I would have shot him if I had the second Chance
The weekend came and the mearns hunters were everywhere and really messed the hunting up in the low grass lands. Here is one that I almost ran over!
The next morning I glassed some areas that I did the first day and came up with a heard of deer just into private. As I turned around to glass behind me here was this huge! i mean HUGE 3 point coming at me, but he had one side busted off
damn!! that ended the morning. I went and did something that gay Miller would do and hit a nearby Winery and did some tasting of 8 samples for lunch. After that I headed to a new spot just to look it over for the evening hunt and had not much intention of seeing much as it was 70 degrees this day. Long story short, I am parked at the gate reading the sign trying to figure out if I can hunt this land and another truck rolls up with a hunter and his guide so I ask them and they say it is open to anyone with a hunting tag. We shoot the bull a little while, and all the sudden across the open grassland about 1/3 mile away this buck appears and is walking toward the fence. The Guide says they saw it first so they are going to make a go at him and start the truck to head down the 2 track to intercept him. I asked if they would mind if i just pull across the gate a little and get out in case they mess up on him and he come my way. The rest of that you can figure out... The buck was hauling ass full blown run (not the hop hop, but run) and headed my way now as they blew their stalk and I was standing with my tall shooting sticks making every noise known to man trying to stop him. As he got past me I thought fugg it, and threw the cross-hairs out in front of him and pulled the trigger. He was about 125 yards away, and I was blinded by the smoke, heard a loud WHACK! and a couple seconds later i am standing there going where the hell did he go?? The grass was nuts deep, and it was pretty flat and then I started thinking "did i just kill that thing?I reloaded, and just stood there waiting. The other guys now drive back into the section I am now in and walk up to me. I ask the guide the same thing as I have been asking myself "did i kill that thing?" He said he saw it one second, and it was gone the next and then heard my shot.
We waited 10 minutes, and I walked up there and there he was dead.
he has 2 little drops that are really cool but hard to see.
I work hard on my hunts, but sometimes just being persistent puts you in the right place at the right time I guess, and this was one of them. Sorry about the bloody photos but this was something that never happened to me before. I took a gallon of water out there (seen in picture) and washed his face off 4 times but the blood kept foaming out his nose like I never seen before, it just never stopped for probably 20 minutes! you can even see some on the ground where I tried to drag him away from the blood for the pictures. Anyone aver see that before
