Mule Creek Outfitting Hunt Report
By Len Backus, Publisher of LongRangeHunting.com
Outdoor writer, Jack O'Connor, would have enjoyed high country mule deer hunting on the licensed national forest concession of John and Jacob Berger, owners of Mule Creek Outfitting in Wyoming. In fact, maybe he once did hunt there! After all, for decades he hunted all of the western states during his long prolific writing career.
I grew up reading Jack O'Connor's stories of hunting high country mule deer on horse back. Jack was the most important outdoor writer of his time and to me he was the ultimate authority on this subject. I dreamed of someday emulating his style of horse back high country mule deer hunting.
Jacob and Tom.
Well, on this horse (and mule) based trip I got to live my early dream. The style of hunting was to get up high, glassing down into the sides of bowls and the edges of heavy timber. The idea was to see these deer early mornings while feeding in the unusually green grassy areas before they head back to their bedding areas, and in late afternoon to spot them shortly after they enter these same feeding areas. Shots could be as long as any long range hunter wanted.
Click picture to enlarge.
To me, hunt trip success is determined 50% by the beauty of the land and 50% by the hunt experience itself, including the persons I spend time with on the hunt. I see the land through the eyes of a serious outdoor photographer. I've hunted in many of the western states plus Alaska and Mexico. And this land is spectacular! More than any I have hunted before. As I see it there are many places where you can go to shoot stuff. Why not choose from the prettiest land out there?
I met John and Jacob at a Deer Expo in Wisconsin 2 years ago and then again this past spring. We three enjoyed great Mexican restaurant meals twice. I could see the twinkle in John's eyes when we talked about the beautiful national forest land he shares with hunters like me.
Jacob, Shawn and Joe. Three great guys to spend time with.
John has an interesting "day job". He is a physician specializing in nuclear medicine. He is part of a large group practice and has always been able to arrange to have off quite a few weeks in fall to fuel his passion. What a dream!
John had hunted the western mountains with his own string of 9 horses and mules for 20 years. In those earlier years John hosted friends and family on small group hunts using the same kind of camp equipment as on my hunt with him. So it was no stretch when John and his son, Jacob, bought an existing US Forest Service licensed hunt concession in 2010, a very successful year for his first paying hunters.
This area of the Bridger mountains has been successfully hunted for many years. Black bear, elk, mule deer and moose are there for the taking. Antelope are hunted just a few miles away on flat land areas of leased private land and BLM land.
My hunt was for the second rifle week. The deer hunters in camp the prior week went 4 for 5 on very nice bucks with the fifth hunter passing on several deer that would have been the largest in camp. He was holding out for something larger than what was already on his walls at home.
John and Jacob's hunts are held in the Bridger Forest west of Pinedale, Wyoming. I met the group at their utility building just east of the mountains. Tom Young from LRH had exchanged emails and phone calls with me so I felt I already knew him. He turned out to be as nice as I expected. I'd hunt with him again anytime!
By Len Backus, Publisher of LongRangeHunting.com
Outdoor writer, Jack O'Connor, would have enjoyed high country mule deer hunting on the licensed national forest concession of John and Jacob Berger, owners of Mule Creek Outfitting in Wyoming. In fact, maybe he once did hunt there! After all, for decades he hunted all of the western states during his long prolific writing career.
I grew up reading Jack O'Connor's stories of hunting high country mule deer on horse back. Jack was the most important outdoor writer of his time and to me he was the ultimate authority on this subject. I dreamed of someday emulating his style of horse back high country mule deer hunting.
Jacob and Tom.
Well, on this horse (and mule) based trip I got to live my early dream. The style of hunting was to get up high, glassing down into the sides of bowls and the edges of heavy timber. The idea was to see these deer early mornings while feeding in the unusually green grassy areas before they head back to their bedding areas, and in late afternoon to spot them shortly after they enter these same feeding areas. Shots could be as long as any long range hunter wanted.
Click picture to enlarge.
To me, hunt trip success is determined 50% by the beauty of the land and 50% by the hunt experience itself, including the persons I spend time with on the hunt. I see the land through the eyes of a serious outdoor photographer. I've hunted in many of the western states plus Alaska and Mexico. And this land is spectacular! More than any I have hunted before. As I see it there are many places where you can go to shoot stuff. Why not choose from the prettiest land out there?
I met John and Jacob at a Deer Expo in Wisconsin 2 years ago and then again this past spring. We three enjoyed great Mexican restaurant meals twice. I could see the twinkle in John's eyes when we talked about the beautiful national forest land he shares with hunters like me.
Jacob, Shawn and Joe. Three great guys to spend time with.
John has an interesting "day job". He is a physician specializing in nuclear medicine. He is part of a large group practice and has always been able to arrange to have off quite a few weeks in fall to fuel his passion. What a dream!
John had hunted the western mountains with his own string of 9 horses and mules for 20 years. In those earlier years John hosted friends and family on small group hunts using the same kind of camp equipment as on my hunt with him. So it was no stretch when John and his son, Jacob, bought an existing US Forest Service licensed hunt concession in 2010, a very successful year for his first paying hunters.
This area of the Bridger mountains has been successfully hunted for many years. Black bear, elk, mule deer and moose are there for the taking. Antelope are hunted just a few miles away on flat land areas of leased private land and BLM land.
My hunt was for the second rifle week. The deer hunters in camp the prior week went 4 for 5 on very nice bucks with the fifth hunter passing on several deer that would have been the largest in camp. He was holding out for something larger than what was already on his walls at home.
John and Jacob's hunts are held in the Bridger Forest west of Pinedale, Wyoming. I met the group at their utility building just east of the mountains. Tom Young from LRH had exchanged emails and phone calls with me so I felt I already knew him. He turned out to be as nice as I expected. I'd hunt with him again anytime!
Mule Creek Outfitting Hunt Report
The Mule Creek Outfitting building is located right up against some of the land where they had hunted antelope just a few weeks earlier. From where my car was parked we toyed with my new G7 rangefinder as we watched 2 shooter antelope bucks just 650 yards from where we stood. The building is situated on top of a hill with views of the Wyoming range to the east and the Bridger range to the west.
Tom's buck.
Soon we headed out to the trail head where we mounted up and headed up a drainage for about an hour. As we got higher we started to experience the mountainous beauty we would be spending 5 delicious days in.
Then we dropped down into a shady little woods set up with large wall tents and a corral for our steeds. Each tent was equipped with wooden floors and a wood stove. We used the wood stove the first night only as the temperature was mild.
Camp in the trees.
Shawn, the camp cook, made sure we were quite satisfied with the quality and quantity of food that evening and each day we were there. I think I even gained a few ounces! John Berger showed up just after dark that first evening with Mark, the archery elk hunter he was guiding. Mark was so excited to tell the story of his long chess match with a shooter bull. No shot but the close encounter had left Mark with very unsteady legs and an elevated pulse rate.
Shawn and our camp dog.
The first morning we left camp as soon as the sure-footed horses and mules could see to walk safely in the dim moon light. We headed for the back side of a nearby mountain and set up. It was a good first chance to work out a hunt routine with our guide, Jacob, and the horses and mules. Tom and I were riding mules. This was my first time on mules. Mules are more comfortable than horses. They are not as broad to sit on and their gait is smoother. I would now choose a mule over a horse any time I have a chance.
Joe glassing a basin. Click picture to enlarge.
Each day we made it back to camp for lunch and maybe a short snooze before going back out for the late afternoon magic time. On the first afternoon we set up at the base of the same mountain. Tom shot a huge bodied 4X4 mulie just before dark. It had one of the largest bodies I've seen on a mule deer and seemed to be an older deer in its declining years of antler growth. A very nice deer!
It was too late to get a pack animal back to retrieve the deer. So the next morning Jacob, Joe and Tom set off to recover it. John Berger was guiding his brother-in-law, Mark, on an archery elk hunt but they escorted me up a different mountain in the dark. When they dropped me off at the peak I was very happy to have this mountain all to myself for a solo morning hunt. I worked on along on foot staying below the crest while glassing below. As the magic early morning hours ended I couldn't wait to get out my camera and I spent a couple hours taking pictures and wandering further down the trail. Eventually I made my way back to camp.
A large black bear had been seen nearby a few days earlier and Tom decided he would go to town with Joe and buy a bear tag for himself. So that afternoon Jacob Berger took me out for a 2 or 3 hour setup on the side of a nearby mountain. From the spot we chose I could have had shots out to 900 yards in a couple different directions.
Jacob and I were comfortably seated on soft ground below some pine trees that shaded us from the late afternoon's low sun angle. In the last hour of shooting light we saw a coyote at 500 yards, 2 groups of mule deer does and fawns at 600 yards, a very large black bear at 620 yards and several cow elk with a 300 class bull at 920 yards. All in all, it was quite a display of the varieties of game in the area. I have never seen anything quite like it!
Tom's buck.
Soon we headed out to the trail head where we mounted up and headed up a drainage for about an hour. As we got higher we started to experience the mountainous beauty we would be spending 5 delicious days in.
Then we dropped down into a shady little woods set up with large wall tents and a corral for our steeds. Each tent was equipped with wooden floors and a wood stove. We used the wood stove the first night only as the temperature was mild.
Camp in the trees.
Shawn, the camp cook, made sure we were quite satisfied with the quality and quantity of food that evening and each day we were there. I think I even gained a few ounces! John Berger showed up just after dark that first evening with Mark, the archery elk hunter he was guiding. Mark was so excited to tell the story of his long chess match with a shooter bull. No shot but the close encounter had left Mark with very unsteady legs and an elevated pulse rate.
Shawn and our camp dog.
The first morning we left camp as soon as the sure-footed horses and mules could see to walk safely in the dim moon light. We headed for the back side of a nearby mountain and set up. It was a good first chance to work out a hunt routine with our guide, Jacob, and the horses and mules. Tom and I were riding mules. This was my first time on mules. Mules are more comfortable than horses. They are not as broad to sit on and their gait is smoother. I would now choose a mule over a horse any time I have a chance.
Joe glassing a basin. Click picture to enlarge.
Each day we made it back to camp for lunch and maybe a short snooze before going back out for the late afternoon magic time. On the first afternoon we set up at the base of the same mountain. Tom shot a huge bodied 4X4 mulie just before dark. It had one of the largest bodies I've seen on a mule deer and seemed to be an older deer in its declining years of antler growth. A very nice deer!
It was too late to get a pack animal back to retrieve the deer. So the next morning Jacob, Joe and Tom set off to recover it. John Berger was guiding his brother-in-law, Mark, on an archery elk hunt but they escorted me up a different mountain in the dark. When they dropped me off at the peak I was very happy to have this mountain all to myself for a solo morning hunt. I worked on along on foot staying below the crest while glassing below. As the magic early morning hours ended I couldn't wait to get out my camera and I spent a couple hours taking pictures and wandering further down the trail. Eventually I made my way back to camp.
A large black bear had been seen nearby a few days earlier and Tom decided he would go to town with Joe and buy a bear tag for himself. So that afternoon Jacob Berger took me out for a 2 or 3 hour setup on the side of a nearby mountain. From the spot we chose I could have had shots out to 900 yards in a couple different directions.
Jacob and I were comfortably seated on soft ground below some pine trees that shaded us from the late afternoon's low sun angle. In the last hour of shooting light we saw a coyote at 500 yards, 2 groups of mule deer does and fawns at 600 yards, a very large black bear at 620 yards and several cow elk with a 300 class bull at 920 yards. All in all, it was quite a display of the varieties of game in the area. I have never seen anything quite like it!
Mule Creek Outfitting Hunt Report
On another morning Joe and I worked our way across the lower face of some ridges and bowls carefully. Sometimes we were on foot with me going just ahead of him and our mounts. We saw both elk and deer but nothing to shoot.
That evening we sat at the same spot where Jacob and I had seen so much game. Early on Joe briefly saw a shooter buck heading away from us at 700 yards but we never saw him again that evening. The wind was not our friend. A bull elk (a different one) and his cows that appeared 450 yards away became nervous, proving that our scent had somehow worked its way down to them – and any deer that may have been about to show themselves. Mountain winds are very tricky!
Tom and Len with mules.
On the fourth morning Joe and I headed out to hunt the area just past the spot that I solo hunted a couple days earlier. We rode in the pre-dawn darkness lit by a sliver of moon and a gazillion stars. We planned to reach the far end of my prior solo hunt spot as legal shooting light appeared. We would then start hunting, working our way further than I had gone. At that point we'd be able to look down on both sides of this mountain ridge.
We reached the far end of the bowl 5 or 10 minutes into shootable light as we rounded a curve in the trail. Joe, just ahead of me, said, "Does" in a quiet but urgent voice as he stopped his horse. Then he quickly said, "One buck -- I think."
While mounted I could see them, too. There were three does and one larger body of a buck. They had seen us but were unconcerned at well over 200 yards in the dim light. And what light there was came from behind us. So we smoothly but quickly dismounted and Joe took the reins of my mule and stepped off to the side to tie them up.
By now I knew it was at least a decent buck and quickly assumed a prone position and determined that the buck was indeed a shooter. The buck continued to purposefully move away from us until it was just over 300 yards away where it stopped to look back at us.
Joe had finished tying our mounts and was now standing just off to my side. I think he was a little surprised at how quickly I got off my 308 yard, quartering-away shot. I am primarily a white tail hunter from Wisconsin and they don't hang around like these western mule deer often do.
Jacob and Joe recovering Len's buck. Click picture to enlarge.
The buck reacted to the shot the way you like them to. But he didn't go down. Instead he hobbled unsteadily forward another 10 yards and stopped again where I finished the job with a second quartering-away shot.
He was on quite a steep side slope and at my second shot he tumbled, rolling about 20 yards down the hill where he came to a final stop. Had he rolled another 25 yards he would have dropped over an even steeper slope, making for a difficult recovery.
My cartridge is the 6.5x284, pretty similar to Jack O'Connor's favorite -- the .270. We found both 140 grain Berger VLD's just under the hide on the far shoulder after fully penetrating the large body transversely.
I spent a very sweet hour and a half waiting for Joe to return from camp with Jacob and a pack mule. While waiting for their arrival I sat on the steep slope next to my deer. I savored the moment in the soft morning sun and snapped pictures of the deer and the spectacular scenery. This was my most memorable western deer hunt ever.
Len's buck.
I have a pretty busy hunt schedule "dance card" these next couple of years but I was thinking I may just have to open up a spot so I can come back to Jack O'Connor land soon!
Mule Creek Outfitting offers hunts for mule deer, elk, antelope, moose and black bear. A mule deer tag in Region H can be drawn with one point and the regular cost deer license or no points with the $200 higher priced "Special" deer license.
Len Backus is the owner of www.LongRangeHunting.com. He has been a long range hunter since the 1990's and is as likely to bag his game with a camera as with a rifle or a specialty handgun. His outdoor photography can be seen at LenBackus.com.
That evening we sat at the same spot where Jacob and I had seen so much game. Early on Joe briefly saw a shooter buck heading away from us at 700 yards but we never saw him again that evening. The wind was not our friend. A bull elk (a different one) and his cows that appeared 450 yards away became nervous, proving that our scent had somehow worked its way down to them – and any deer that may have been about to show themselves. Mountain winds are very tricky!
Tom and Len with mules.
On the fourth morning Joe and I headed out to hunt the area just past the spot that I solo hunted a couple days earlier. We rode in the pre-dawn darkness lit by a sliver of moon and a gazillion stars. We planned to reach the far end of my prior solo hunt spot as legal shooting light appeared. We would then start hunting, working our way further than I had gone. At that point we'd be able to look down on both sides of this mountain ridge.
We reached the far end of the bowl 5 or 10 minutes into shootable light as we rounded a curve in the trail. Joe, just ahead of me, said, "Does" in a quiet but urgent voice as he stopped his horse. Then he quickly said, "One buck -- I think."
While mounted I could see them, too. There were three does and one larger body of a buck. They had seen us but were unconcerned at well over 200 yards in the dim light. And what light there was came from behind us. So we smoothly but quickly dismounted and Joe took the reins of my mule and stepped off to the side to tie them up.
By now I knew it was at least a decent buck and quickly assumed a prone position and determined that the buck was indeed a shooter. The buck continued to purposefully move away from us until it was just over 300 yards away where it stopped to look back at us.
Joe had finished tying our mounts and was now standing just off to my side. I think he was a little surprised at how quickly I got off my 308 yard, quartering-away shot. I am primarily a white tail hunter from Wisconsin and they don't hang around like these western mule deer often do.
Jacob and Joe recovering Len's buck. Click picture to enlarge.
The buck reacted to the shot the way you like them to. But he didn't go down. Instead he hobbled unsteadily forward another 10 yards and stopped again where I finished the job with a second quartering-away shot.
He was on quite a steep side slope and at my second shot he tumbled, rolling about 20 yards down the hill where he came to a final stop. Had he rolled another 25 yards he would have dropped over an even steeper slope, making for a difficult recovery.
My cartridge is the 6.5x284, pretty similar to Jack O'Connor's favorite -- the .270. We found both 140 grain Berger VLD's just under the hide on the far shoulder after fully penetrating the large body transversely.
I spent a very sweet hour and a half waiting for Joe to return from camp with Jacob and a pack mule. While waiting for their arrival I sat on the steep slope next to my deer. I savored the moment in the soft morning sun and snapped pictures of the deer and the spectacular scenery. This was my most memorable western deer hunt ever.
Len's buck.
I have a pretty busy hunt schedule "dance card" these next couple of years but I was thinking I may just have to open up a spot so I can come back to Jack O'Connor land soon!
Mule Creek Outfitting offers hunts for mule deer, elk, antelope, moose and black bear. A mule deer tag in Region H can be drawn with one point and the regular cost deer license or no points with the $200 higher priced "Special" deer license.
Len Backus is the owner of www.LongRangeHunting.com. He has been a long range hunter since the 1990's and is as likely to bag his game with a camera as with a rifle or a specialty handgun. His outdoor photography can be seen at LenBackus.com.
