A Novice... Some Pronghorn... and Pioneer History

I loaded the family suburban with my three oldest boys and picked up my brother-in-law and niece before heading towards Wyoming to try and fill a couple of doe/fawn pronghorn tags. I had two tags in my pocket and my niece had two in hers. She had hunted without any shot opportunities for muzzleloader deer in Utah and we were hopeful, if not confident, that this would be her first chance to fill a big game tag.

As we drove my brother-in-law counselled me to fill my tags first, getting mine out of the way rather than trying to fill her tags first and risking running out of time to fill my own tags. I complied with his wishes and vowed to try and take care of things quickly on my end.

As we pulled off the freeway and onto the dirt county road we immediately began spotting mule deer in the sage. The kids enjoyed seeing the mulies but knew that was not what we were after, my boys had accompanied me on this hunt before and they knew the drill, begging me to hurry it along to the first spot we like to check… a pivot sprinkler that they like to call “the circle field.” Sure enough, the tan and white dots that we hoped to be there were there and we parked the car and began stalking thru the cut field. The herd was easily 50 head strong and we pushed them around the field pretty good that morning.

At one point in time I had pushed them down out of the field to the north and into a creek bottom and once they got out of sight I figured they would huddle up down in the bottom. Sure enough, as I peeked over the edge there they were in a huge huddled mass. I knew that my niece was making her way over to the fence line to the west so instead of taking any shots myself I decided to just go on a full trot down into the creek bottom circling towards them from the east to try to push them back up into the field along that west fence line. I’ve rarely had success with one of these types of plans as the animals never seem to go where I want them to… but this time the pronghorn followed the script to the letter and I watched them hurry back up to the field along that fence line. A few seconds passed and I heard a single gunshot. I made my way up back up to the circle field and was told how all the pronghorn ran past them at 20 yards, one slowed to a stop, she fired… and missed completely!

The great thing about pronghorn hunting is there is no time to sit and lament your misses… you need not go very far to find another potential target. So we quickly turned our attention from the miss to other nearby groups of pronghorn and split up to make stalks on different groups. I spotted a group of 7 does making their way through the sagebrush just a couple hundred yards away near an old gas pipeline road. I was able to put an obstruction between myself and the does and sneak my way in close. I steadied the rifle, popped out from behind the obstruction, picked out my target and fired. The bullet hit its mark with the telltale smack of a bullet hitting flesh and six pronghorn does ran off. I was trying out some Hornady GMX bullets out of my 7mm-08 on this hunt… and being such a close shot I was grateful for the solid copper construction of these bullets. I had taken pronghorn at close range with standard cup & core bullets in previous years and the amount of shrapnel and meat loss was unfortunate. The terminal performance of the bullet was textbook and no shrapnel!

I noted where the doe I had shot went down but kept tabs on where the herd ran off to. They slowed to a stop about 200 yards away. I again took aim at the herd, picked out my target and pulled the trigger. The smack of bullet hitting flesh confirmed the shot and 5 pronghorn does ran off.

I began the work to process both pronghorn, trying to get the meat into the cooler as quickly as possible. As I was working on processing the first doe I heard a shot close by. Walking the meat back to the car I crossed paths with my niece and found that she had shot a big old doe. I hustled my meat back to the car and returned to help them out but by the time I got back they were all finished up. It was barely 10am and we had three does in coolers in the back of the Suburban.

There were still pronghorn out milling about in the circle field but we decided to leave them alone for a bit and come back if needed. We hopped in the car and drove down the road about 30 yards before spotting a large herd coming from the south in the direction of the circle field. We shadowed them along the road for maybe a hundred yards before the herd put themselves in a vulnerable position so my niece jumped out of the car and used one of the barbed wire fence posts as a rest. The herd milled around there for what seemed like forever and I found myself muttering “shoot… you gotta shoot… sweetheart, you gotta shoot now” from my vantage point in the driver’s seat of the Suburban. She finally picked out a pronghorn bringing up the rear of the herd and fired. I watched it take off and run about 20 yards before tumbling. She wasn’t sure of the shot and her dad was a bit concerned that the shot wasn’t great but I reassured them I saw the pronghorn go down.

It was shortly after lunchtime and we had all four tags filled… but we determined that it was still too early to head home. I had heard that there were some old pioneer landmarks nearby so we went off exploring the pioneer and early settler history of the area. It was cool to stop and read the markers and see the landmarks, the kids really enjoyed seeing the old ghost town homes and poking around some of the other sites.

That consumed the remainder of the afternoon and we stopped for dinner at Arby’s on the way home.

I processed the meat over the next couple days. The backstraps, tenderloins, and a couple roasts were wrapped for steak and 18 pounds of ground earmarked for hickory and spicy lime jerky that I’ll make at a later date.

WY not?

I had always held the opinion that hunting outside of my home state of Utah was likely not a possibility due to time and cost. I had briefly researched a handful of the surrounding states and came to the same conclusion with each state when I looked at the table or list of fees, “Ouch, yikes… no thanks.”

That is, until a couple years ago. Friend of the blog Doug, then a Utah resident, had struck out on drawing his usual Utah general rifle deer tag and was now eternally bitter. We began to investigate other opportunities and I was perusing the Wyoming Game and Fish website. I found that in relation to surrounding states the antlerless (cow/calf & doe/fawn) opportunities were “cheap” and with a little bit of effort and research tags could be had with relative ease.

Doug, myself, and a handful of other friends have successfully drawn doe/fawn pronghorn tags in Wyoming every year since. In my opinion, any hunter looking to come out west and have a fun and easy hunt should look at cutting their teeth on one of these antlerless hunts. The amount of opportunity is sky high between cow/calf elk, doe/fawn deer, and doe/fawn pronghorn and for me the price is right. For two doe/fawn pronghorn tags, all costs included (application fee, permit fee, and conservation stamp) the cost is right around $110… that makes a per tag cost on par with any resident general tag or antlerless tag that I can acquire here in Utah.

The Wyoming Game and Fish website is excellent and their “Hunt Planner” makes it quite easy to find all the information that you’d need to research where to apply and access. These are often the two greatest hurdles to overcome as a non-resident… and their website brings everything to within the click of a mouse. Interpreting drawing odds is very straightforward because there are is no point system for WY antlerless hunts… it really is as easy as looking at the number of tags offered and comparing that to the number of applicants to get a feel for your chances of drawing a tag.

The Hunt Planner also makes solving the access riddle easy. On the interactive map as you zoom in and investigate individual units the map will show you land ownership but it will also show you any Hunter Management Areas (HMAs) and Walk-In Areas (WIAs) within the unit. HMAs and WIAs are private lands that are made available to public hunters through the Access YES! Program. This program has played a vital role in my success in both drawing and filling my tags. I will forever champion the HMA and WIA programs… there is even an option during the Wyoming application process for donations to help fund Access YES! which oversees the management of the HMA and Walk-In Area. I would strongly encourage any who apply for tags in Wyoming to donate.

There is a real possibility of finding a diamond in the rough here and locate units where tags can be had easily on an annual basis with sufficient access to the general public hunter through Access YES!. This is where your individual research will be critical depending on where you are coming from and how far you are willing to travel. The general trend is that tags on the eastern side of the state are easier to get but access can be more difficult… this is where finding those HMAs and WIAs is critical. Areas in the central and western parts of the state tend to be more difficult to draw but seem to have more or better access to the public hunter.

My friends and I have been able to figure out Wyoming in just a few short years and it has provided us with a number of great memories and full freezers. Pronghorn, when cared for in the field properly and cooled quickly, is some of the finest game meat that I’ve ever had.

Don’t be intimidated, Wyoming has put all the necessary information right at your fingertips to have a fantastic hunting experience and there’s really no better way than a low cost but high entertainment doe/fawn or cow/calf hunt. If my group of friends and I can figure it out… anybody can.

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A Deer Hunt Turned Grouse Hunt

This is a story about a deer hunt… at least it started out as a deer hunt…

Opening morning found me and my 11 year old son, Logan, perched at the point about two thirds the way down a canyon we call Jack’s. For three years this has been my vantage point for opening morning, leveraging hunters who would start at the top of the canyon and push the canyon searching for deer… pushing said deer right into my lap. It’s an interesting sight to see, the morning thermals are such that they are not favorable for those hunters yet for whatever reason said hunters continue in spite of those thermals every single year. I can watch the deer stay two small ridges ahead of the hunters the entire way down Jack’s, it’s like clockwork on opening morning every year.

This morning would be no different… hunters starting at the top of the canyon and deer staying just out of reach ahead of them. As we sat on the point I scanned the canyon ahead of me and picked out numerous deer being pushed our direction but light was currently too faint and distance was too great to put antlers on any of them thru the binos. On the small ridge nearest me I noticed a gray body just at the edge of a small cluster of trees and at 280 yards I was able to tell it was a decent buck. I watched the buck mill around the edge of the trees then enter the trees and bed in a spot that was still visible to me. I decided to keep an eye on him and wait him out until the morning thermals shifted before making a move on him… unless something better comes along.
I began to scan the next ridge in the distance and notice a cluster of odd tan ovals in the knee high sage… it didn’t take long to see those tan ovals begin to move and it was clear I was looking at a small herd of elk. Fortune would have it that I did have a cow elk tag for the area… and right, wrong, or indifferent I decided that I would prefer to pack out a cow elk than a buck deer that morning. The herd fed into the trees and I lost them so my attention turned back to the bedded buck in the trees. After about 20 minutes of keeping tabs on the buck I noticed movement in the trees next to him. The herd of elk was coming my direction and now walking a trail just a few yards from where the buck was bedded. I watched as cow after cow filed over the ridge and into a clearing between 260 and 280 yards away. I commented to Logan that if we were rifle hunting then we’d have a dead cow elk right now… but 250+ is just outside of my comfort zone with the muzzleloader… but the path they were on would bring them into range shortly. As I was preparing and trying to find the best possible rest to be ready to take the shot when presented I spotted the herd bull. He was fun to watch and Logan was able to keep an eye on him and get a good look through his binos. Just when I had settled on good rest and was getting settled in I watched every cow in the herd turn her head and look to the west (my left) and to the top of the ridge… within a couple seconds four hunters emerged from the trees and were walking through the clearing that I was projecting the elk to actually walk through if they continued on their current trajectory. Within seconds it sounded like a herd of elephants crashing through the trees as the lead cow barked alarm and led the herd away from harm to safety of another county.
I chatted with the guys for a bit, they were good guys and I’ve crossed paths with them during previous hunts. They apologized, but there was no need to… they did nothing wrong and I let them know that I wasn’t upset or mad… it was just cool to see that herd of elk.

Logan started to complain he was hungry so we made our way back to the car and on the way back to the cabin we crossed paths with “the road hunting crew” (my brother, Dad, and Grandpa) and found that my dad shot a nice little 2pt earlier that morning.
Back at the cabin I started skinning and quartering the buck that they had shot while they ate breakfast. I have an agreement with my dad and brother that if they shoot something that I will take care of the cleaning & butchering and in return I get to keep the majority of the meat, it’s a mutually beneficial agreement.
For the evening of opening day Logan wanted to hang out with his cousins so we drove around with the road hunting crew. We came around a small curve in the dusty dirt road to find a grouse walking across. Logan had completed Hunter’s Education over the winter and I acquired a youth model 410 shotgun with the intent of him doing some grouse hunting… so we seized the opportunity. We walked to where the grouse had entered the brush, located it, and he efficiently made his first kill of a game animal.

I haven’t been that excited in a while, as soon as the gun went off and I saw the puff of feathers I smacked him on the back and let out a hoot. I think I hit him harder than the recoil of the shotgun. He was happy and his cousins ran over and everyone admired the grouse. A plan was made to get the meat cleaned up and grill it back at the cabin for a late snack. I hadn’t had grouse personally before but I got to admit it was quite delicious.
Thursday morning just down the road from the cabin we came across a number of grouse. There was a small spring with some water draining down along the side of the dirt road and there were several birds getting water. Logan jumped out the car and was able to get one bird. It was a big one, considerably larger than the one from the previous night. We tossed it in the back of the car and headed on our merry way after that 90 second delay. The rest of Thursday morning passed without much fanfare and I determined that I didn’t want to ride with the road hunting crew again for the evening so my plan was for Logan and I to go on a good hike and sit over some water where I had some success in previous years. An added benefit would be that I had yet to hike the trail this year without seeing grouse, and after getting his first taste of hunting success Logan was all in on grouse. My deer hunt was slowly evolving into a grouse hunt.
About halfway up the trail we spotted a couple grouse. It took some time to get the gun ready this time so by the time Logan was ready one of the birds had flown away, but a second bird was still on the ground but it was nervous. Just as he was getting ready to fire that bird flew but we watched it land up on a tree branch about 40 yards away. After a short creep up to near the tree Logan took a bead on the bird and fired. Feathers flew and the bird dropped and landed at the base of the tree. We quickly cleaned the bird up and tucked it in a plastic bag in his pack and headed on our way up the trail looking for more grouse.
We arrived at the pond and sat for about an hour before Logan told me that he didn’t want to sit there anymore and asked if we could go find some more grouse instead. I asked him to give it one more hour and if we hadn’t seen anything by then we’d start hiking back. That hour passed and we did have a close encounter with a bull moose, but since it wasn’t a deer Logan wasn’t buying it when I told him that counted and we needed to stay. So we started hiking back and on the trail on the way back we spooked a small 2pt buck that I missed. Logan wasn’t disappointed. In fact, he was glad that we could spend the rest of the evening trying to find more grouse instead of cleaning and butchering another deer. The remainder of the evening was laid back and uneventful.
Friday morning my 8 year old, Dillon, came up with a couple of my cousins. We got a bit of a late start after getting him situated at the cabin but just around the corner from the cabin we saw the gray flash of feathers in the car headlights. There were several birds there and they were already making their way into the thick trees. I could still see one bird but Logan couldn’t see them anymore so he handed me the little shotgun. I took a bead and fired. I saw the poof of feathers and ran up the trail to get my first grouse only to find two birds lying dead in the trail… I did a two for one!!! Both boys thought that was a funny and cool thing and were impressed with their dad’s “skills.” We tossed them in the back of the car and kept driving. We met up with the rest of the road hunting crew farther up the mountain and found that my brother had shot a 2pt just minutes prior.
They suggested that we walk to the edge of the hill there and look down into the canyon, they had spotted several deer in the previous two days in that canyon but hadn’t attempted going after them. On our way to the edge walking through the grass I caught the flash of gray again and Logan took his fourth grouse of the trip. He ended up going 4 for 4 on his shots and between he and I we ended up with 6 birds in 5 shots. The standard Winchester 2 ½” #6 shells that I got from Widener’s performed really well out of this little youth shotgun.

I was able to spot a small buck in a spot that appeared like a doable stalk but I lost him in the trees before the request came from the boys to get back to grouse hunting! We would come back to this same canyon later that evening and my brother would make an epic spot on a bedded buck tucked way back under some trees just minding his own business. I was able to make my way to within range and made what initially appeared to be a good shot. We found blood and a short blood trail but then nothing. We searched until dark and scoured every inch of that canyon for hundreds of yards in all directions. In the end, all we could turn up was about 30 yards of a blood trail starting where he was first hit. It had been a while since I had felt the feelings of hitting an animal and not recovering it. It’s frustrating series of events but it happens.
With other commitments and my calendar booked for the second half of the muzzleloader hunt, that is how my 2018 hunt will end… a couple of missed chances for myself but I got to see my son get his first taste of bringing meat home for the table. I was far more excited to watch and be part of his success than the prospect of my own which was a brand new experience on a hunt for me.
Here's a picture of the whole crew:

Around the table starting at 12 o'clock: My dad, Dawson, Branson, Logan, Devin, Mark, me, my grandpa. At the bar on the right: Darren, Dillon. (I can't neglect my cousin Jesse who took the picture.)

Thanks guys for an excellent hunt, good food, and a ton of laughs... let's do this again next year!