Back From Wyoming

[TCKev]

Well after 4880 miles were back home. We where told the weather we got while Mulie hunting only happen's every 20 year's. The first night in Riverside it snowed and the last day in Riverside it was snowing enough that you couldn't see the surrounding Mountain's, it snowed 5 to 8 inches and got down to 17 degree's. I actually had to drive into Saratoga and buy chain's just to be able to drive in the mountain's on the maintained road's. We just couldn't figure out where to find Mulie Buck's we saw over 40 doe's and one buck as he ran across the road never to be seen again. On Sunday we drove into Casper to hunt for Lope's in Unit 73. After getting our bearing's straight, where we could and couldn't hunt my buddy was first up. We spotted a large herd with 30 to 40 Lope's some small buck's and one really nice buck. After a discussion on where we were we decided it was BLM, so the stalk was on. After getting split up by 30ft or so buddy was on his own, I couldn't get down to him without spooking the herd and coach him along or spot for him. All the prep with the gun's, practice, load development and using a ballistic calculator for the fist time(Bulletflight) he made an awesome 355yd DRT shot, the only problem was he shot the wrong buck and ended up very disappointed. It's alway's good to have a spotter in your ear coaching you along(Thanks Again Steve). I was up next the following day. A little side note for the future Western hunter's out there that plan on shooting at longer distance's in the wind's that we encounter BUY A KESTREL!!! it is a very important part of long range hunting/shooting. And here's why, I had the chance at the same buck my buddy did only I had a 20 to 30 MPH wind from 2 to 3 o'clock and we as a team underestimated what it really was. After dialing in for 300 yard's we put in a 15 MPH value for the wind, after dialing it in I got settled in squeezed the trigger and it was a clean miss. We had the elevation spot on but the bullet strike was right in front of him. Needless to say we looked for that buck several more times to no avail. Here's another important lesson as you plan your hunt's, buy the right unit map's thru the BLM and by all mean's have GPS!!! and learn how to use it. We were trespassing(not on purpose of course) and thank goodness the landowner was not upset with us. We were following 3 nice Lope's and were on this small sliver of private land when my buddy went back to the truck to make sure of where we were the landowner show's up and tell's us that his land was as far as the eye could see(not quite true) so after asking a few question I paid a trespass fee and off I went to find the buck I had seen earlier. Sure enough we spotted him and again the stalk was on, we could only get within 400yds so I dialed it in, the wind had laid down that afternoon so no worries there. I squeezed off one and he hit the ground. I couldn't believe I had just killed the buck I had dreamed about since last year. The only problem is it was dark so no real pic's, I took some of him sticking out the icechest the next morning. He's much bigger than last year's buck. He's off to the taxidermy on Friday. I'm going to get my pic's downloaded this weekend and get what I have posted. We saw more Mulie buck's on the side of the road in Casper than we did while hunting them down in Riverside. When we left on Thursday the weather was warming up and the Lope's were everywhere. Both these Lope's were killed with an XP-100 pistol in 300 Dakota 16" barrel, 3x12 Burris scopes and 168 grain Barnes TSX's going 3100fps. I would also like to Thank Cinch for his tip's on hunting in unit 73

 

[HUAINAMACHERO]

Nice story, thanks for posting. Congrats on the buck. Will be waiting to see the pictures.

 

[cinch]

I'm glad you guys had a good time! I'll be heading back down there Saturday with my 6 year old daughter to try again, if the weather holds. I'll post pics if we get lucky.

 

[Long Time Long Ranger]

You are right about the Wyoming weather. We have had the wettest, coldest summer/fall on record where I live. Ruined my elk hunt for a monster bull on a premium tag. I was busy working on my house the first week but I wasn't worried because the season was three weeks long. Third day of the season it started snowing and kept snowing and turned bitter cold below zero. Very atypical for where I was. The elk headed for the wintering areas on private land I could not hunt. I waded through deep snow and cold temps for 7 days looking for a huge one but just couldn't cover enough country in the deep snow. The big bulls had left out with the cows to lower elevations or been shot out of the herds while they were bugling before the snows while I was working on the house. I found quite a few 6x6 bulls in the 260-310 range and finally took a very heavy old bull the day before the seaon ended. It would have been a fantastic hunt in a general unit but the snows ruined a tag that takes years to draw.

 

[Long Time Long Ranger]

Forgot to tell about the deer. They ran out of the mountains fast and were on the winter areas by the second week of october. I saw some huge bucks on the tail end of the herd going down. Did not have a deer tag. When I was driving out with my bull I saw over a thousand deer on the wintering areas. 100 yards from the road I saw this big dead snag sticking up out of a sage brush. No, couldn't be, way to big, so I kept driving. 1/2 mile down the road I couldn't stand it and turned around to go back and check. 35+ inch 210-230 mulie buck with extremely heavy horns bedded in the sage. 5x5 frame with many stickers. Deer season was in but didn't have a tag for this premium unit. The deer hunters were all up camped where I was elk hunting and this guy is bedded on the wintering area 100 yards from the road on a little section of public land. The only monster bull elk I saw was a 390-410 class 8x7 bull in a ranchers hay field 200 yards off the road. I tried hard and offered a substantial trespass fee to take that elk but he was adamant that he had never allowed any hunting and would never allow any hunting on his place.