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TasunkaWitko’s 2009 Hunting Season

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    Posted: 26 October 2009 at 06:25

Started on 25 October 2009 with the usual delays and last-minute brushfires - didn't get out until morning was half-over. I'd forgotten how bad opening day can be, when all of the yahoos come out of the woodwork. One of our areas wasn't bad at all - we saw two vehicles but only 2 other hunters who were leaving as we arrived. We figured all the deer would be gone, but actually saw about 7 mulies - unfortunately, they were pretty far away and also saw us, so they went bounding over the hill. hunted around some more but saw nothing else at that place - we didn't explore it to its full potential since it is so big, but none of us is in too big a hurry this early. the boys are holding out for a big buck, and i am kinda-sorta waiting for later around thanksgiving when my oldest son will be home to go hunting with him.

we went to another area and it was like a sweater sale at old navy. folks in trucks, folks on ATVs, guns bristling out of every orifice - it was insane. no one was rowdy or anything, but it was utter mayhem. we sat and watched for a while and noticed that while all of the others went to far remote corners of the property a half-mile away or so (all of these areas we go to are quite large), they tend to scare up deer that run nearly right too us - sure enough, after sitting for a few minutes we saw at least a half dozen go in front of us about 300 yards away and into a draw that has a lot of cover and a dry reservoir with good terrain. since we were doing nothing to antagonize or spook them, i hoped that the mulies would have calmed down when they reached those areas and sent the two older boys to check out the area. they were quite familiar with it after hunting in the same place last year. they came back and said that the group of deer had kept on going and were long gone, but billy, my 15-yr-old, said that he had a 3x3 buck running right in front of him, maybe a hundred yards away. he didn't take the running shot, but we found it interesting that such hunting pressure would have a good number of deer to be sighted. as far as we saw, none of the other hunters bagged any game that day.

as the sun creeped toward the west, we decided to give the same areas one more look-over to see if any deer were going through there to come to feeding. we went back to our original place (no other hunters since we had been there earlier that day), searched a few likely draws and creekbeds but saw nothing. we packed up to head home.

as we were starting to drive back home, i passed through a small coulee that looked like a perfect track for deer coming to feed in the second area we went to. i asked my older boy, mike, if he wanted to give it a try and we would pick him up after he went through the brush, about a half-mile away and back where we had parked and walked before; he said he'd give it a try. we drove back to the parking spot and saw nothing at all there except one large, fat doe practically standing in the parking spot. it was her lucky day as we both stared at each other, then she turned around and trotted off, unconcerned. we waited for mike as the last minutes of the day played out; i thought that after seeing the doe that he might encounter something in that brushy draw that leads to the dry reservoir mentioned earlier, but no luck. we headed home and saw probably 50 or 60 mulie does and fawns along the way coming to feed on a property that is no-hunting.

all-in-all - we hunted long, but not too hard - it was great to be walking around in familiar country and also be going to a couple of new areas within those hunting spots. the country is huge, so we did drive from one area to the other since they are different properties across the main road from each other. both are excellent and the cover found there (brush, old irrigation ditches, draws, coulees, and trees at the "second" place) is so vast that i am sure we will be seeing good things as the season progresses. after the first week, things settle down quite a bit and we probably won't see more than three or four other hunters the rest of the year.

here are some pix taken yesterday at the first area:

signing in at block management

keep head and rear down!

it's not as desolate as it looks, but in the fall it sure seems to be

the coyotes left nothing behind

bough from an old cottonwood tree

taking a rest

some bedding areas

more excellent terrain

this panorama didn't quite line up right

found this little draw/bedding area to be an excellent place from which to observe movement as it is almost right in line with feeding trails

a creekbed providing a lot of cover (yes, i should have kept a better eye on that muzzle - didn't notice until after pic was taken - nothing was in the chamber but that is no excuse).

there could be deer anywhere in there

badger hole

the area in these pictures is about 1/8 of the first property we went to

ground lichens are very common here - i am told that deer etc. browse on them during the winter, but have never observed it



Edited by TasunkaWitko
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Wing master Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 October 2009 at 09:49

Any Deer?

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I have always considered myself to be quite the bullshitter, But ocasionally it is nice to sit back and listen to a true professional......So, Carry on.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote TasunkaWitko Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 October 2009 at 10:37
none for us on opening day, but i am not too worried - we saw quite a few but all were in bad places to be shooting, plus the boys are holding out for big bucks. both of these areas produce very nice bucks; even though the does outnumber them by quite a margin, anyone who hunts smart has a very fair chance of a respectable buck, and could encounter a true trophy.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote TasunkaWitko Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 07 November 2009 at 02:27
one tag filled - #3 son billy shot a mulie doe. brief story and pix to folow.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote rivet Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 07 November 2009 at 02:57
Excellent! Good deal, looking forward to the recounting and pics! 
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote TasunkaWitko Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 08 November 2009 at 06:00

here's bill's account of yesterday's hunt:

Originally posted by BambiFever BambiFever wrote:

so we start at to some bma land just north of chinook. as we drove there we happened upon to deer in huntable land. so we got signed in and drove down a ways so the deer folk (2 does) couldnt see us. my brother mike and i made our way up a hill and into a ditch. we walked along in the ditch and see these tow good-lookin does. unfurtounitly the sun was in our eyes. so we went though the ditch the other way so the sun was behind us. we saw the does and got down. next we got up aimed and fired. sadly i missed (but we didn't know this at the time). so we jogged after this bounding creaters and we spotted them up on a hill. i took a second shot and epiclly missed. one doe ran off to who knows were, but the one we thought i hit ran down into a weird vally thing and into a creek bed.  we chased her around for a few minutes and she ended up on a cliff like sturcure. i took a third shot and it went through her spine. mike and i worked our way up to the top of the cliff to finish her but she had crawled down to the bottom of the cliff. we got down to her and saw the position she was in.  sadly i hade to shoot her in the head to finish her off. after that we did what most people do and gutted her out, hung her up and stated our 10 day wait. out of my four deer i have gotten this is only the second that i have had to finish off like that. so 4 shots and about 50 minutes landed us our first deer of the season.

and here are the pix - unfortunately, we had forgotten to take the camera with us, so the pix had to be taken when we got home about an hour later:

bill

and of course after that, the whole family wanted to get in on it...

bill and mike:

bill and roger:

bill, mike and roger:

as bill said, she's now hanging in the shed out at my parents' place, waiting 10 days or so for aging. hide is on and will come off when we skin her and quarter her. two weeks from now, she will be in the freezer.

 

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today's hunt was interesting and unexpected. we hunted in the morning and then due to wind and other obligations (roger blew the lid off of popcorn sales for recent memory in the distrct, and now it's time to deliver all that popcorn!) we came home around 1pm. this morning, we hunted one area but unbeknownst to us some other hunters were farther in. they chased several deer toward us, but they were much too far away, and spooked, to attempt a shot.

we went to another area that had no people (the area in the pix above) and set out on an optimisic stalk. there were signs that folks had been there recently (probably the day before), but we figured anything is possible. bill stayed in the van with roger while mike and i split up and started working the likely bedding areas and draws. early on, i found the carcass of a young rattlesnake (maybe 18 inches to two feet long) that had been killed two or three days previously. whoever had killed it took the rattles and cut off the head. i was mildly surprised that there were still snakes around this late in the year, and then continued on to a nice draw where we had seen fine deer before.

not fifty yards later the ground about four feet from my right foot came to buzzing life. i looked down to see a larger rattlesnake coiled, tail buzzing and mouth wide open with fangs glistening. yes, these things can kill you. i had time to shout a very bad four letter word as i jumped back, jacked a shell into the chamber of my .308 (looking back, this was dumb) and fired a shot at it literally from the hip.

i claim absolutely no skill, but tremendous luck; the 180-grain hornady spire point (a very accurate load loaded by rob1 back in 2002) blew a hole in the "chest" of the snake a few inches below the head. it dropped but refused to die. the back section of it stubbornly coiled around and rattled, but it was obvious that it couldn't move itself around voluntarily. the front section hissed and bared its fangs several times. i reloaded and fired again with the muzzle at the top of the head and finished it off, then i removed the head and took the carcass back to the van at the parking area as a lesson to roger that he needs to be careful outside.

when i nudged the rattler with the muzzle of my rifle after it was dead, i managed to get a chunk of dirt in the bore, so we cleaned it at the van. mike had continued on his stalk and and actually scared a good-sized doe and fawn up, which ran over to where i had been when i encountered the rattler, but we did not know this at the time. when he made his way back to us, he had no other deer to speak of, but he did have a shed skin of an even larger rattlesnake that had to be fairly recent.

looking back, i probably didn't need to shoot the thing, but surprise and revulsion will force people to do many things. on top of that, my sons and i had been hunting there since the season began and plan to keep hunting there, and i'd hate to not shoot the thing only to have it bite someone later on.

after killing it, i realized (remembered) that my camera was in my pocket. i regret having no live pictures, but here it is. all laid out, it was probably three-to-three-and-a-half feet long, when it had its head:

here's a closer view of the hole from the first shot:

and here's the snakeskin that mike found:

we tried a few other coulees but it just wasn't a good day. we came home soon after and had some very nice liver breaded with crushed/powdered pretzels with a mushroom-chive gravy.



Edited by TasunkaWitko
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote rivet Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 November 2009 at 01:17

That's some mighty fine snake-shooting you did, Tas~!! Excelllent work! Nice doe too, congrats  

 

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote 24mod12 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 10 November 2009 at 02:05
Originally posted by TasunkaWitko TasunkaWitko wrote:

today's hunt was interesting and unexpected. we hunted in the morning and then due to wind and other obligations (roger blew the lid off of popcorn sales for recent memory in the distrct, and now it's time to deliver all that popcorn!) we came home around 1pm. this morning, we hunted one area but unbeknownst to us some other hunters were farther in. they chased several deer toward us, but they were much too far away, and spooked, to attempt a shot.

we went to another area that had no people (the area in the pix above) and set out on an optimisic stalk. there were signs that folks had been there recently (probably the day before), but we figured anything is possible. bill stayed in the van with roger while mike and i split up and started working the likely bedding areas and draws. early on, i found the carcass of a young rattlesnake (maybe 18 inches to two feet long) that had been killed two or three days previously. whoever had killed it took the rattles and cut off the head. i was mildly surprised that there were still snakes around this late in the year, and then continued on to a nice draw where we had seen fine deer before.

not fifty yards later the ground about four feet from my right foot came to buzzing life. i looked down to see a larger rattlesnake coiled, tail buzzing and mouth wide open with fangs glistening. yes, these things can kill you. i had time to shout a very bad four letter word as i jumped back, jacked a shell into the chamber of my .308 (looking back, this was dumb) and fired a shot at it literally from the hip.

i claim absolutely no skill, but tremendous luck; the 180-grain hornady spire point (a very accurate load loaded by rob1 back in 2002) blew a hole in the "chest" of the snake a few inches below the head. it dropped but refused to die. the back section of it stubbornly coiled around and rattled, but it was obvious that it couldn't move itself around voluntarily. the front section hissed and bared its fangs several times. i reloaded and fired again with the muzzle at the top of the head and finished it off, then i removed the head and took the carcass back to the van at the parking area as a lesson to roger that he needs to be careful outside.

when i nudged the rattler with the muzzle of my rifle after it was dead, i managed to get a chunk of dirt in the bore, so we cleaned it at the van. mike had continued on his stalk and and actually scared a good-sized doe and fawn up, which ran over to where i had been when i encountered the rattler, but we did not know this at the time. when he made his way back to us, he had no other deer to speak of, but he did have a shed skin of an even larger rattlesnake that had to be fairly recent.

looking back, i probably didn't need to shoot the thing, but surprise and revulsion will force people to do many things. on top of that, my sons and i had been hunting there since the season began and plan to keep hunting there, and i'd hate to not shoot the thing only to have it bite someone later on.

after killing it, i realized (remembered) that my camera was in my pocket. i regret having no live pictures, but here it is. all laid out, it was probably three-to-three-and-a-half feet long, when it had its head:

here's a closer view of the hole from the first shot:

and here's the snakeskin that mike found:

we tried a few other coulees but it just wasn't a good day. we came home soon after and had some very nice liver breaded with crushed/powdered pretzels with a mushroom-chive gravy.

While on a Univ of AZ winter wildlife mgt field trip in 1960's  in the Santa Rita Mtns of Southern AZ where we checking out deer & cattle exclosures  quite a bit of snow had fallen.We walked up on a rattler sunny himself,he was lethargic but still dangerous.After that experience we were all on guard for the unexpected from then on. 

Edited by 24mod12
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote TasunkaWitko Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 10 November 2009 at 06:49
i don't mind admitting that i was shocked and shaken a bit, especially afterward when i got to thinking about my 7-year old trouncing around out there.
TasunkaWitko - Chinook, Montana

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote TasunkaWitko Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 17 November 2009 at 07:07
no luck hunting this last weekend but it was definitely interesting! we slogged and trudged around in the brush, up on cliffs and through sage brush all weekend, only to find that the deer were very skittery this weekend. saturday we only saw them as they were running off from a very long distance, much too far to shoot, and in once case, running only about 100 yards away but away from us and then down into some thick creek bed, where they managed to disappear. i abhor running shots, so i almost never take them.
 
on sunday we saw no deer at all during the entire day in spite of some hard, old-fashioned hunting. here's the funny part: as we were walking back to where we parked, we saw a small herd of very good-sized deer grazing in a field about 250 yards away. they were very clsoe4 to a property and so we knew our chances were slim, especially at that distance. we each got a shot off, but between the wind, the distance and the fact that we hadn't spent enough time at the range this year, we missed and ended up watching them all bound to the fence, hop over and carry on. this was literally in the last few minutes of legal shooting hours for the day, so we went home empty handed. looking forward to some better luck next week.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote millirond Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 24 November 2009 at 07:04
 Good looking doe Ron she should be good eating.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote TasunkaWitko Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 24 November 2009 at 10:29
thanks, randy! looking forward to adding one or two more to the freezer as well. i've got a little bit of a story and some pictures from last weekend to share, but it is going to have to wait. i've got it written down on my computer at work and won't be there until next week!
TasunkaWitko - Chinook, Montana

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