This is an interesting hunt that turned out to be a successful hunt for Ace who was hunting with his father. This is not the first time I have had similar accounts on hunting Lopes. Lopes can be crafty and escape a great stalk. A hunter can misjudge the distance as Antelope – Pronghorns are smaller than deer, so it can be difficult to judge the distance. WELL DONE ACE!
I hadn’t been applying for the South Wagontire Pronghorn tag for very long. This spring when my brother Derek and I applied as a party we averaged 4 points. We know some people who apply for the same tag and watch the numbers so we know it takes about thirteen Preference Points for a resident to get a tag. So as you can imagine, the last thing I expected was for my brother to call and rouse me out of bed for something “very important” and inform me of the luck we’d both just received. Two Pronghorn tags after only four years of applying; we could only hope for such wonderful luck when it came to killing bucks come August. How could this be? Oregon uses a percentage of the total allotted tags for a hunt to give all applicants a chance at a tag before they draw numbers for those with Preference Points. I for one am glad they do.
As you can imagine we had some work cut out for ourselves if we were going to be ready for this hunt as we didn’t expect tags for at least eight more years. We needed to figure out our options for rifles and loads, transportation, camping arrangements, transport of game, and many other smaller but no less important aspects of this exciting hunt. I read all the books I could find on the animals and spent some time looking at photo and video of Antelope bucks in order to familiarize myself with a “shooter.”
If you think you might want to shoot a Pronghorn, you are going to need to do some homework. You will want to have some hunting experience and you will need to be patient, prepared, and flexible. It helps to know some people who know some people and remember to make friends as you go. I owe a debt of gratitude to several people for their contributions to my hastily prepared, surprise Pronghorn hunt.
The first step was to start asking around. We had never even been on an Antelope hunt before. I personally had never even seen one. I work in the Sporting Goods department at a major Northwest membership store and was able to glean a lot of information from some of my more experienced customers. My brother and I both had good conversations with Craig Foster, a Wildlife Biologist in the Lakeview office. He gave us some good information in regards to herd density in specific areas of the unit as well as what class of bucks we might expect in those areas. He did let us know the overall population in the unit was a little lower than he had hoped for but not significantly so. In a later conversation he told us the major contributing factor to the low populations is due to poor fawn recruitment. If you’ve ever been to this unit this would come as no surprise as the leading predator of Pronghorn fawns, the coyote, are as thick as flies around a sorghum mill. As an aside we have plans to return with dog guns and a FoxPro to give the coyotes a dose of hell for what they’ve done to the young Pronghorns in the area. Overall Foster supplied us with a good understanding of what is going on in the unit.
Being members of an Oregon hunting forum my brother started a thread asking for some help. We got a lot of responses on the thread and after sorting through all the information we had a couple of pieces of good information. The best advice we got on the forum was to try and get ahold of Bwanabubba. Now Bwanabubba isn’t his given name and Cobra isn’t either. I contacted him via email through his site Bwana Bubba and learned he is a fine gentleman known to his friends as Frank. Frank was a big help to me and my brother. He gave us sound information to get our heads wrapped around Pronghorn hunting in South Wagontire. He even sent us GPS waypoints to good areas to look into when we scouted the area and eventually hunted it. One thing Frank did which was a great help to us, was to put us in contact with David K who had hunted the unit two years previous and killed a nice buck. You can read David’s story on the Bwanabubba site too; look for “The Average Joe.” If you have read Franks Guide to Successful Big Game Hunts you know that a successful hunter “listen[s] to people that have been successful in hunting.” That is exactly what I did. I had a real nice conversation with David on the phone and we exchanged several follow up emails. David was able to make time for us and actually came out to scout for us and show us around the unit some on opening day. David gave very generously of his time and even lent me some equipment that I don’t own. I like to think we have made a new friend in David and look forward to spending some more days in the field with him.
Pronghorn Antelope live in wide open spaces on the desert plains of Oregon so it is a good idea to leave the 45-70 at home and bring your flat shooter that chisels bullet holes one after the other. Derek opted to bring a Remington 25-06 borrowed from a friend and I brought my Remington chambered in 280 Remington. One aspect of this hunt I had been looking forward to was the chance to develop a 120 grain load that was hopefully accurate as well as fast. I knew I wanted to use a 120 grain because of the potential for speed. So I looked at the available bullets and compared them across the board from ballistic coefficients to projectile integrity once inside the game. I narrowed it down to either the Nosler Ballistic Tip hunting or the Barnes Tipped Triple Shock X bullet. Both of these bullets are known for their devastating effects on game. I want to eat as much of the meat as possible when I kill a game animal. I have known the Ballistic Tip Hunting bullet to over fragment in game and leave too much behind so I chose the Barnes. The Barnes bullets are a bit more money but if I have to wait 13 years for my next South Wagontire Antelope tag I am not going to worry about a few more cents per round this season. Bullets being chosen It was time to settle on a powder. My rifle likes IMR 4831, a lot. Shooting the 140 grain Accubonds I have gotten groups just a touch under a half inch at 100 yards. They weren’t particularly speedy compared to the Hornady Light Magnum stuff but they shot pretty well. I chose Remington cases because they have always been the most consistent brass in my collection. Barnes says their TTSX bullets like to be set .030-.070 inches off the rifling so I loaded a few groups of increasing grains of 4831 with the TTSX set .050 off the rifling. The next week Derek and I were able to get out and do a little shooting. Derek sighted in the Hornady Superformance loads first and, after a little trouble with the Bi-pod affecting his zero, was eventually able to get a satisfactory group shooting off my sand bag. The first group I shot had 58 grains of powder and was pretty respectable at barely over one minute of angle. The next group was a little tighter just under an inch with 59 grains. The third group was the winner though. At 60 grains the case was completely filled with powder and one grain under maximum. It shot like a dream ¾ of an inch including one that I knew I had pulled. I loaded up a box worth of this load in the next few days and headed off to the range with my chronograph to see just what I had exactly. The results of the range work? Three hole group in 0.323 inches with an average velocity of 3240 feet per second. If that isn’t an antelope load I don’t know what is. Happy with my load and optimistic with the info I had gotten from several fine gentleman it was time to scout the country and see what a Pronghorn looked like in person.
Since we are both working men with families we didn’t have much time to scout so we had to do it in a single day, no overnight, and two young sons in tow. Now since my boys were coming along we also couldn’t go in the truck and actually went scouting in a Dodge Neon. I know, I know, we must be crazy. That may be true but it was go in the car or don’t go at all. From the conversation I had with David I was expecting to see quite a few Antelope and a good portion of bucks. This didn’t happen for us because we couldn’t cover very much ground in the car. Going was slow and careful. The only Antelope we saw in the interior of the unit were so far off they were barely discernible. We did see some wild horses though and eventually saw an antelope buck on the way out. I hoofed it to a waterhole David had suggested and found it rather full of water but unfortunately it also had a rotting cow lying out in the middle of it. It was disappointing not to see very many Pronghorns but we weren’t discouraged. We saw plenty of tracks and got a good idea of what the country was like and most importantly we now knew just what a Speed Goat in the wild looks like.
When it came time to head east for the hunt we would be going in my brothers Ford Ranger and we would be packing light and camping wherever we found a spot in the unit. That little Ranger was stuffed to the gills. We brought a couple of Coleman extreme coolers for our victuals and to bring Antelope back in once successful. Derek devised a handy rack to hold the coolers off the bed of the truck giving us more room for camping essentials. We used a 5 gallon beverage cooler in the truck for our drinking water and occasionally refilled it with ice to keep it cool. We would get our fuel at the Chewaucan garage while we were there and the friendly folks there would allow us use of their hose to re-up our supply off drinking water. While refueling there during the scouting trip we learned of a local resident who operates a walk-in during the season and hangs your meat for a reasonable fee. That took care of the question of what to do once we had one killed.
Friday evening before the opener my wife was competing in a local pageant to “rain” as the Slug Queen of our home town. Obviously getting to our camp a day early was out of the question so we left early Saturday morning though not too early. We opted to sacrifice a few hours of the season to get a healthy amount of sleep before kicking things off. We met up with David in Paisley and fueled up before heading in country. He had been able to do some scouting for us Friday night and he had some bad news for us. There wasn’t any water anywhere that he had found so it would be difficult to pattern the Antelopes. We were determined to keep our thoughts positive though so we just started trucking in to see what we could come up with. It wasn’t long before we saw Prairie Goats in the numbers we had expected. They were all on private ranch land on that first day but seeing nearly 70 animals was definitely a boon to lift our spirits. We spent the rest of the day trying to spot Lopes while looking for water.
Sunday we decided to head east deeper into the interior checking every spot on the map that looked like a depression that may hold water. We weren’t having much luck when on the way to a potential waterhole we spotted some wild horses in what looked like a very small depression that we couldn’t believe would hold water with everything so dry. We watched the horses for a while then continued up the road suggesting checking for water where the horses were on the way back out. Once we had determined our original destination was as dry as the Sahara we headed back to the little waterhole the horses were at when I spotted Antelope on the slope right by the water hole. We glassed them and determined there was one buck in the band of ten and he looked like a shooter. As we were glassing and racking our brains on how to get close to these animals a small plane flew over very low and spooked the Antelope away. I don’t know who was in that plane but they were definitely not friends of ours. When we checked the hole we found water. Not much of it but it was apparently enough.
It was on the way out of the area that we experienced a flat. I strongly urge airing down out there. Some of the roads leave a lot to be desired; seemingly paved with large rocks and boulders. Passenger tires will not cut it. At least we got a chance to refill our water cooler as the able young gents at the Chewaucan Garage fixed the flat.
Monday morning started in makeshift hides within shooting distance of the little waterhole. Confession time, sitting and waiting for game is not for me. I found it excruciating trying to sit still and stay awake. Then when the coyotes came in I wanted nothing more than to let ‘em have it but I couldn’t risk firing my rifle and spooking any thirsty lopes within hearing distance. After four hours more sitting than we could stand we were off to see if we could find any more water. We encountered thirteen antelope the rest of the day in groups of 1-4 but no bucks.
Tuesday morning was a repeat of Monday morning. Another excruciating wait for nothing, I wondered how long we could keep doing this? For the afternoon we decided to head to a super secret spot Frank had been keeping in his back pocket. It was way further north than the area we were hunting in thus far. We also found that maps can’t be trusted in this country. They suggest roads exist where they don’t, or at least don’t any longer. Considering what passes for a road around there anyway, it sure adds a lot of frustration when it becomes clear the road you were headed for has been returned to boulders and sage. The super secret spot was just one of these places we couldn’t get to because “the road don’t go there no more.”
We weren’t half way to the secret waterhole when appearing out of nowhere two nice bucks that I’d say were 15 inchers are laying tracks in the draw just as fast as you could imagine. They were much too far out and moving too quick to even dream of getting a shot so we watched them to see what they’d do and they slowed down and started to browse about half a mile away. We thought since they stopped we ought to be able to make a stalk so we grabbed the essentials and headed up the back side of the ridge. We got up to where we last saw them and the terrain there was just perfect for one of us to sneak up to the edge and have a shot. It was going to be perfect. One problem though. Those speedy little buggers had gone further up the draw while we were slipping up the back side. I was really starting to get excited so wasn’t about to give up on the opportunity but Derek wasn’t feeling too well so he waited while I went ahead. I went further up the ridge in the direction they’d originally headed to see if they were over the next rise. They were there alright, but they had me pegged. I could only see their heads looking straight at me from about three hundred yards. A three hundred yard headshot on the top of a ridge in 97° heat and a swirling breeze isn’t exactly a slam dunk for me so I backed out a little and set up a flagging decoy I had made to see if it would coax them closer. It didn’t have the magnetic pull I had hoped for. They were only mildly curios until they became nervous enough to vacate the premises completely.
A rifle shot in the distance called me back to where my brother was resting. I made haste back and found my brother with a little story to tell. He had been feeling a little light headed and actually blacked out for a few seconds. Let this be a warning to those who attempt this country. It is hot here, hotter than it seems. My brother’s problem wasn’t dehydration as you may suspect, he had plenty of water, but rather nutrition. We found we had little appetite in the peaceful comfort of the desert. Luckily that was the only safety concern we had the whole trip because we recognized the problem and remedied it by tucking in the groceries.
Wednesday morning the dread of returning to the hide at the waterhole was of course mixed with the hope of returning Antelope. After three hours of trying to stay awake in the blind, the cold coffee from breakfast was wearing off and I nodded off for a while. When I opened my eyes two does were on the edge or the waterhole. I nudge Derek and whisper “They’re here.”
“They’re here?” he returns.
“They’re here.” I say.
“Who’s here?” asks Derek.
“The antelope.”
“The antelope?”
“The antelope!” I nod.
I got into firing position and waited in hopes more would come out of the sage to join these two adventurous does but none ever did. They started coming out of the waterhole. One here, one there. Eight of the ten had slipped in and down to the waterhole without alerting us, the alpha predators that we are. The old pump was really starting to bang when number six walked out sporting headgear. I was steady enough over the bi-pod I’d borrowed from David but that buck wouldn’t stand clear of his ladies. What was I to do? He went back in for another drink. Where will he come up? Will I have a shot? He came back up on the opposite side of the waterhole. Sauntered slowly broadside and took a Barnes bullet like a champ. The whole band ran a few steps at the shot and the buck circled a few yards to the near side of the waterhole and looked back where he had been standing. He apparently didn’t know he’d been shot. Then he started to falter, leaned back, and bicycled his front hooves before settling down for his last rest.
As it turned out the bullet entered between ribs and exited between ribs and left virtually no bloodshot behind. The fact that the bullet passed through so cleanly was probably what kept him from knowing he’d been shot. After a quick field dress we loaded the buck into my brother’s Ranger and made our way straight into town. We had him skinned and in the cooler little more than an hour after loading him up. The gentleman who operates the cooler has a nice electric hoist that makes skinning a breeze. He even let us use some of his tools later when we packed the Lope on ice for the trip back home. I must really stress here that the geniality Paisley showed me and my brother in our short time in their town has never been paralleled.
With my tag filled early enough in the day, we spent the afternoon trying to locate a buck for Derek. We decided it was time to check out the seeding west of Abert. We were lucky enough to run into another small band. Derek tried to make his way closer to them but the lay of the terrain in their vicinity didn’t give him much of a chance. I was able to see them make a very large circle and head down toward the lake and way off to the east.
Having seen a decent group the night before we headed to the Abert seeding again to see if we could make a go of our final day on Thursday. We eventually spotted a couple bucks as they ran away from us at a distance I estimate was in the neighborhood of a mile and a half.
We met a local guide while hunting out there and he told us this was the toughest season he had seen in forty years guiding in that country. That makes me feel good that we were able to make it happen on a nice buck this year. We will come back again when we have the points and try for a trophy. Hunting the desert of Oregon for Pronghorn was a totally new experience for us and for me was some of the most fun I’ve ever had in the field. I am going to make as many trips out there as I can to enjoy it. Coyote hunting, maybe some jackrabbits and squeaks, and I hear the fishing can be great in the local rivers. I’m hooked on desert Antelope.
Brandon B. 2012
This article will be more of requested of receiving comments from the readers. I have been watching a great deal of programs on the Outdoor Channel with both rifle hunters and archery hunters when I have the time to do so in recent years.
I have to say there are some great hunters out there both female and male that get the job done and make the shows real.
The following words, which I write in this story, represent my views on subject of recovery of big game at night.
Hunters choose various times to hunt which range from dawn to dusk, hunt the morning only, and hunt the evening only.
Today, I am going to talk about the evening hunt from around 1300 to dusk! So much game is spotted just before short minutes of ending legal shooting times. Shots are made during that time frame and there is what should be the recovery time. Recovery time includes time for the animal to exhaust from the shot and then we are into the actual recovery time which is darkness.
I am amazed at the technology of the knowing the animals whereabouts and their movements at any given time with the aid of trail cameras, boundary systems and GPS systems. This will tie into my words with the recovery of big game without saying anymore…
In my young adult years, my Dad (Bill) and Uncle Dave, taught me when you harvest an animal in the hours before dusk, that you make every attempt to recover the game before leaving the field. I continue to live by that code to his day. Only one time I have not been able to locate an animal at dark, though my partner and I spent more than 4 hours trying to do so, plus my son turned around some 60 miles away to help locate the deer (the deer is alive today). This just happened to be in 2012 during the general archery season and I have been bow hunting since 1970.
On one particular program there was hunt in a Western State during an archery season for Antelope – Pronghorn. The hunter was hunting the afternoon prior to dusk and makes what appears to be a great and solid shot. On the video we all see the Lope go lay down and this was prior to darkness, it appeared to be about a ¼ mile away from the hunter and his crew. It almost broke my heart when the next part of the video showed the hunters going on recovery in the morning. Considering the light of the day, one would think they ate breakfast first before attempting recovery. What they found at the sight was just a skeleton of the Pronghorn that had been stripped of all meat and hide by coyotes. I was amazed it still had it horns as coyotes love the horn. This was a trophy Pronghorn that the meat went to waste, but fed the predators. I did not finish watching the program, as I could not believe the guide did not know or tell them a Pronghorn left overnight will be stripped. It is very hard for me understand why they did not go after the Pronghorn a bit later. Plus are we to assume that they continue to keep hunting and the horns went to the barn?
Years ago I lined up a hunter in the Silvies Unit of Oregon with waypoints for harvesting a Boone & Crockett Pronghorn. He found “thee buck” in the evening, shot the buck. It was not the best shot and he watched the buck head out into the sage brush and lay down outside of Riley, Oregon. It was getting dark and he decided waited until the next morning to find the buck, what he found was nothing but hair! It had been stripped by coyotes also. My comment to him later was “what were you thinking?”
This is not the first time on these programs that the hunters waited until the next morning to find their kill! Ok! We all can have a bad shot, but leaving an animal over night with the bad shot, the meat is not going to be premium quality. The animal was alive and the fluids of a bad shot still affect the overall meat quality even though it might freeze. Then again during general bow season it should swell right up from the heat. So was it just about the trophy, the kill or the amount of footage on the video? There could be the other side of the coin that they are showing what can happen with a bad shot and what to expect. I am one that doesn’t want to know or see that type of footage; it leaves a bad taste in everyone’s mouth.
Lastly there is the shot on an animal that should have never been taken, such a Mountain Goat on a pinnacle at 1000 yards cross canyon and the goat is not anchored in his tracks with the shot and free falls 6000 or so feet to the creek bottom and no recovery can be done. Heck of a shot, but the judgment of recovery was not there no matter what time it was shot!
We all have lost game over the years and the more time you spend in the field it can happen via a bad shot, miss or a non-fatal shot. In Oregon during the general seasons of rifle a bad shot can be opportunity for the next person in the canyon… Archery hunting that is not the case, which is why most of us will bow hunt for solitude!
Maybe some hunters are afraid to be in the woods after dark as they might fear a predator or even the “boogie man.” Just maybe they can’t handle darkness and lack the ability to walk in the dark. A large number of hunters have never had the opportunity to run a night mission out of country (combat). Plus in many states it is legal to carry a sidearm during archery and rifle season for protection. Hunters will pack a sidearm for protection against the 2 legged predators, so why not four legged predators? Ok! Sometimes it just feels great to carry a 1911!
In most states which, doesn’t include my home state of Oregon, bow hunters can use lighted nocks which can help a great deal with recovery of a hit the animal, you can tell if the animal was hit, direction of the animal’s travel if it sticks in the animal for a while and if the arrow passes through the animal you can check the blood content.
There are number of the seasoned hunters on these programs that will seek until they find the game at night and I applaud them. We all know these hunters and those are the one’s I am going to tune into the future!
Bwana Bubba
John’s hunt started sometime in January of 2012, when he asked me about hunting for Mule Deer in Central Oregon. John works with me at the dealership and is from Grants Pass, Oregon. He comes from a long line of hunters and this year along the family has had to harvest 3 Black Bears and 3 Cougars that were threatening their farm. I should say I have seen in the later months of 2012 the Blacktails that his family have taken. I think I would like to retire down there to hunt Blacktails, Cougars and Bears.
John and his group decided they would put in for the Grizzly Unit Rifle Deer Tag for 2012 after John told his group that I would give him an area or two to hunt in the Grizzly Unit. They were successful as they had a few preference points between them. The hunt was now set and I would come up the with waypoints and mapping.
John bought a Garmin Oregon 300 from me with the mapping program that would show the BLM that they would have access too! I am a firm believer in the use of GPS and the correct mapping. In that area of the country where the ranchers and organizations that have property next to the BLM, have said that hunters with trespass given the opportunity from not knowing the boundaries. I wanted John if ever stopped to be able to prove with time stamped tracks and waypoints where he and his group have been! You will find fact with this later in the story!
I was giving John two different areas to hunt in the Grizzly Unit both being in the northern sector about 8 miles line of sight from each other. John had decide to camp down on the John Day River during the hunt.
Opening day he found himself in the walk-in only area that was bordered on three sides by private. I felt if he was in the couple of miles from the bottom of the creek to the interior they might be able to find a big mulie. It has always been a great sp0t in the past for opening day of rifle or even to archery hunt. In the old days before Young Life and the BLM made an agreement to keep ATV’s out of this area, it was easy to get the 3 miles in and then work the canyons and draws on foot after spotting deer, elk or antelope.
The morning proved to be a bust for the group and they decided to hunt the area a bit further south which had more land to cover and they could drive into key access and observation points to find game. John told me when he got back after the hunt, that the hunt into the opening day area was a big tough on him, since he has had two (2) hip replacements. You would think that John would have let me know about this when I explained the terrain!
During there trip into the BLM of H.H., they ran into the resident Oregon State Police Game Officer M.P., who knows that country like he knows his truck and struck up a conversation. M.P. told him when he came out of the northern sector of H.H. Area he had not seen a hunter or any deer. Now John and his group are a bit down on all of this great news from the man himself.
The Grizzly Unit has taken a toll with poaching in recent years and the fact that the Cougars in the sage brush, juniper and rimrock thrive. I have found many a good bull and buck that have been ambushed in a timbered draw in this area. The Grizzly Unit harbours some great bucks, but you really have to work for them. A number of Boone and Crockett’s bucks have come from the Grizzly Unit!
The next thing the group does is go to Madras, Oregon and have dinner and setup the next days hunt. John had given me a call while in Madras and asked what to do next. I still believed in the northern sector hunt and that they should maybe work within a mile of the access road, as there was a creek that ran next to it.
The next day which was Sunday they hunted the creek bottom and the shallow draws (brush laden) that came down into the creek. They started to see some game and had a good feeling that something was going to happen. Remember that private borders this parcel of BLM. John and his brother work the ridge next to the road as they are going to go back to John’s B Van and have lunch. As they are about to get on the access road, John spots a herd of 20 plus deer with 4 bucks in the group. Now the deer have not spotted John yet and John, pulls out his Garmin Oregon to see if the deer are on BLM or Private (there are a number of cross fences in this area). Of course the GPS has to fire up and access satellites. This must take a about minute to do so, my comment to John “What were you thinking not having the GPS on?”. John sees that the spot is BLM and as he does the deer finally spot them and start to move out. John and his brother have to move a bit with deer as they would be coming back their direction a bit to get into the draw of safety. John makes a great 250+ yard shot on buck and his brother targets another buck that broke away from the group.
John’s group of 4 hunters would run 50% on the harvest of bucks in the Grizzly Unit, so each man gets 1/2 a deer to feed the families this year. I feel that John would hunt the Grizzly Unit again though he did not shoot what he was really looking for though. John did a scouting trip about 2 weeks before the opener and did see a couple of the big bucks that the Grizzly Unit is famous for!
I have written as the story was told to me: Frank B.
Legendary “Stickers” Hits The Deck
The great thing about Oregon is that you can sometimes be very lucky enough to have two (2) deer tags. One of those special tags if you have property to hunt is the Willamette Unit 615 tag. You can take a buck or doe during the long time frame of the hunt with rifle or bow. So if you’re a bow hunter and a rifle hunter you can pick and chose your weapon of choice.
In this case Mark who is one of my hunting partners here in the valley had decided to bow hunt the parcel of land we have access to in the valley and harvest his first archery deer and make it a Blacktail buck. He also had enough preference points to be able to draw the 615 tag. Mark drew his 615 Willamette tag and also purchased the archery deer tag.
Prior to the hunt in the early summer months of June, Mark and Jr. were very instrumental in getting all the tree stands up and ground blinds on the property for the archery season and Mark’s 615 Hunt. The ground work had been set for a great 2012 season. The big thing for those of us archery hunting for a buck was to get it done prior to September 1st, as the 615 hunt starts on the 1st with lots of action in the rural valley and it might effect the archery season.
Mark during the archery season had one (1) particular Blacktail buck that he wanted to harvest along with the rest of us and that was “Stickers”. During the first two (2) weeks of the archery season in Oregon “Stickers” never came in to the view of any of us. In just one evening Mark had more than 9 bucks to choose from within 25 yards and past up all of them. It is very interesting to me as there were 2 other shooters for the early part of the archery season. Another buck that never came in during daylight hours has been the Odd 3 X 3, leaving only the Even 3 X 3 doing the daylight hours once in a while, which know all to well.
That is another story within itself and this is about Mark’s great hunt and shot. Mark did not make the opening day of the 615 Willamette hunt, but managed to get enough time to go out the same evening that Jr. was hunting from another tree stand about ½ mile away during the middle of the week. Mark had decided to use his tree stand on the western sector of the farm, plus use his trusty 308 Browning Lever Action that is Grandpa gave him. There was about 20 minutes of legal light left of hunting during the first evening of this great hunt for Mark!
About a week earlier there was a buck that had been hit by an arrow with only a surface wound and the buck was doing very well, which was evident on the trail cams. Mark heard a noise of breaking dead-fall and the 3 X 3 that had taken the arrow hit appears! Mark thought about taking him, but at 8 yards he can tell the buck is doing well and this is a special tag for the chance of getting a very good Blacktail. There was still about 15 minutes of legal light and he decides to wait just a little longer. He hears another twig snap along one of the access trails to the field. Along comes “Stickers” on the trail, but with brush making it difficult to get on him, Mark just waits him out. He is now hidden behind a tree, not giving a shot. Light is fading and Mark is a real sticker of being legal with his hunting.
Great hunting ethics as Mark has been taught from his Grand Dad and Father. Just then “Stickers” moves away from the tree and comes broadside at 10 yards! The rest is history as the 150gr. Remington Core-Lok put the buck down in his tracks. Mark then gets a call from Jr., “is that you who did the shooting”? Jr. and Tamra quickly make their way over to Mark! Mark has Jr. get his truck and they were able to get within, Ah! Maybe 15 yards of the fallen trophy Blacktail! Get Pictures is all I text back to all of them!!!
“Czar”
The Best Hunting Horse
When it comes to hunting and phases (cowboy-mid life) that we all go through in our lifetime of hunting is sometimes very interesting. I have always had wonderment about horses, having worked on getting my Merit Badge in the Boy Scouts at Camp Baldwin up near Dufer, Oregon when I was a kid. On that outing of two (2) weeks, it was all about having the horses jump over logs and riding a Palomino. The idea was to lay back on the trail so the wranglers wouldn’t see us doing so! By the way, the Palominos’ weren’t the best horses on the trail. It only took me some 20 years later to get worked up on horses again!
I would like to say that Czar was the wonder horse of all! He was in the aspect of his hunting skills, which included the ability to climb and never wanting to stop. I would have to turn him downhill so he would take a rest! Lower the ramp on the horse trailer and he would come running and load up! He was not a fast horse by any means, but he did get there always! Czar had the ability not to be distracted by the blood of game, or anything else that might be on the trail as a distraction. When I first had Czar I took him up to Pilot Rock on an elk hunt up Little Pearson Creek. We came upon a fresh Cougar kill of a deer on Government 80, the snow was about a foot and half deep, Czar walked up to the kill and smelled it, then moved on!
Czar came into my life after renting horses to hunt the Steens Mtns., in Southeast Oregon in the mid eighties for deer. It was a real mess on that hunt with the rented valley horses, with there inability to work the east slope with mountain trails, or load up on the trailer. The horses would want to work you up against the fences with one mounted on them. It had to be the worst time on a hunting trip in my life. The hunt, which should have been a great harvesting hunt, turned into nightmares. This included having to chase a loose horse around in the sage brush at Hampton Station at 1AM! The man that rented the horses had told me they were hunting horses of the best quality as was the horse trailer made out of an old Rambler axle. It was all crap, but than there would have been nothing to talk about if it had all gone well! I had to go back the following weekend and hunt McCoy and take a buck using the old truck!
Talking about that hunt with my Uncle Dave and that I needed to get my own horse for hunting, Uncle Dave said he would sell me Czar, as he now had a younger horse called Brandy for his hunting. I knew that Czar had hunted Texas Butte and Madison Butte in the Heppner Unit in Oregon for elk. He had packed out many elk from Texas and Madison Butte. A deal was made and I would pull Czar from Uncle Dave’s place in Oregon City and take him to Madras.
I quickly went out and got a two (2) horse trailer, trade a rifle (Colt AR-15) for all the tack that I would need. It was great to be running a sporting goods store and having all the right vendors to work with. Including having a special scabbard made for my left-handed Weatherby Custom 340. I still have that scabbard today some 25 years later. I made arraignment with a rancher in Madras, Oregon to leave Czar. I was told in those days that you got to take the horse out of the valley and turn them into a mountain horse. The great thing about Madras place was there were always rimrock, water and feed for horses.
I did most of hunting for deer and elk in the Pearson Creek area outside of Pilot Rock a great deal, but had drawn my first Snake River Elk. I would be hunting on the South End of the unit and would hunt north of 32 Point and go into Summit Creek. I was fortunate to have a customer that wanted to hunt the Steens and traded information on the Snake with me! The first year I was un-successful in harvesting a bull, but the following year I harvested a good bull that won the pool pot (280 bucks). I had made a very long shot (won’t give you the distance as you won’t believe me) on the bull and he was on a steep hillside in Summit Creek. It took me more than an hour to get to the bull some three ridges over. I had to finish him off in his bed (long range round had hit him in the neck) on the steep hillside with blow down. I tied the rack up so the bull would not slide and get stuck in the blow down, so I could quarter him out. After doing so I ran, yes ran up the hill to the ridge road (marathon runner) to get Czar. I got Czar down close to the elk, I had ground tied Czar which was a great mistake, and he slipped and went down with both front legs over trees that were down. Quickly pull the lead rope knot and got him back up to shack off the experience. I had to move Czar to a flat spot on the trail about 100 yards away. Like I’ve told you all he was a great horse with character! I had gotten new bags for Czar and loaded up the quarters, still having a head & rack with the backstrap and tenderloins to get loaded up. My buddy Ben Olsen came along with my other horse, one that was given to me by an old boss. Ben was always a hunting partner that knew what was going on and could read my mind. It was the first time for mare to be used for hunting and she did pretty good getting down into Summit Creek with Ben leading her down to Czar. The rest of this story in the Snake was not so nice, with the mare balking over a tree limb and flipping over backwards and rolling down the hill. Ben was on her fast and un-cinched the saddle. She got back up on all fours, but in the end I let Czar go and he led the mare out of the canyon with the loads. When Ben and I finally to too the top, Czar and the mare were standing at the trail-head. Many times while hunting in the Snake, I had left Czar on the Ridge Road in the timber and hunted the canyons below. He would always be easy to find, as he seem to know when I would get close and I could hear him neigh.
Czar never let me down in the 10 years that I had him! Czar made a number other hunts with me up at Wild Bill’s place up on East Birch Creek. Wild Bill was an old time horseman and rancher, so horses was the way to go. Of course it was required to pack a six shooter side arm also. I once loaned Czar to old Chuck Megeske to use on an elk hunt out of Heppner. He and his party had 8 cow tags. They hunted in the snow and Czar drug all the elk out from what Chuck informed me with pictures! I think he was feeding his Care Home folks with all the elk meat though!
When I started to hunt the Grizzly Unit in Oregon, Czar was not longer needed and I sold him, the Mare and all my tack, including the trailer to an old hunting buddy MJ. He used Czar for guiding for about 4 more years and finally retired Czar to a mutual rancher outside of Ashwood, OR. His daughter needed a 4-H horse during her High School years in Madras, Oregon.
The modes of operations for hunting the Grizzly Unit was either walk in or use a Quad to get from point A and B. Spot the game and go after them in the sage, juniper and rimrock on foot!
Frankie decide he would help out his cousin Zach’s buddy Jeff get a buck off of a small section of land he had access to in the Willamette Valley close to Oregon City, Oregon. It was the second weekend of the of the general Blacktail rifle hunt for western Oregon.
The two young men traipse all over the 100+ acres of land through the blackberry forest, vine maple tangs and thick reprod. Not a deer was spotted during this hunt. As we all know Blacktails aren’t just going to let you walk up them unusually. So both of the boys were a little upset with what daylight was left quickly going to leave them for the walk back to the truck parked on the opposite side of the property.
There is a section where the grapes are trying to make a start on the farm that you can work along and possibly catch a deer along the tree lines. Now there was only one (1) hunter with Frankie working hard to find Jeff a deer, so Jeff and Zach could have some winter meat and plus his first kill!
By now they were walking along the tree line and working their way to the access road out. Frankie, hey he got out his bino’s and scanned the distant tree line along the grass field. “There is a buck just coming out into the grassy area.” There just happen to be a stump and Jeff had the rifle resting on the stump. The distance was about 250 yards, light failing at this point, the buck turns broadside! There was the report from the rifle and Frankie with is glass still on the buck sees it drop in the same tracks it was standing in! “Whoa, outstanding shot Jeff.”
The boys quickly made their way to the buck via the tree line and catching the gravel access road. They were not allowed to shortcut through the grapes. The deer had already taken out a number of them, so having excited hunters running through the grapes was not a good idea. A few pictures with a camera phone were taken. One of these days I will get Frankie to carry a decent camera in the backpack!
When Jeff got back to his house, Zack and his family were home. They gave him a bad time for shooting a small forked horn buck. The question back from Jeff Brodie was “what did you guys get in Heppner?” Zip! Hmm!
Borrowed rifle, Borrowed Ammo, Borrowed Knife, Buddies Truck! Moral of the story, Jeff filled his freeze with nice tasting valley venison!
As told to Bwana Bubba via Jeff and Frankie
This particular hunt came about with wanting to hunt Antelope sooner than later again with a rifle, plus not waiting until we had 12 or more points for hunting old haunts from the past in S.E. Oregon. My son Frank Jr. and I had 9 points saved up each. This would be his first Antelope hunt as a shooter! Getting very impatience with waiting for more points and looking out 4-6 years longer to hunt for Antelope maybe in the Wagontire, we decided since we had a couple of places to hunt in the Grizzly Unit in Oregon, that we would put in for the Grizzly Unit. Past and present I have sent many hunters into the unit with very good success!
Permission to hunt Earl Smith’s Ranch was given to us by Earl for hunting on the properties that laid in the Grizzly Unit, one piece being the “Old Gomes Ranch” and the other land lay south of the Cold Camp of Hwy 218, which included the Maupin and Hasting Buttes.
We had found a great buck on the “Old Gomes Ranch” prior to the season and he would be our first choice to chase. “Chase” Strange word with Pronghorn, as most of the time we like to ambush Lopes at water or crossings. In the Grizzly Unit you will not find the waterholes that one would find in the S.E. part of Oregon, so spotting and working in on them is the normal in the Grizzly Unit. We did not get to hunt the opener of the hunt coming in on Sunday late. Little did we know that Earl forgot about us (this happened a lot) and he let a guide come onto the land and hunt the place with his client. Having talked with the ranch foreman an old friend from the past, that particular hunt was very interesting to say the less. The client had a number of buddies with him at the time. It is hard to say who harvested the buck after all the shots that were taken with multiple rifles. Scuttlebutt was that the guide finally had to finish the buck off as it was leaving the property boundary, but then again it is only scuttlebutt! It did piss me off a lot on this one!
So the hunt had changed for the both us now. This hunt was about Frankie getting his first Pronghorn in Oregon. We would have to work old deer and elk haunts in the Grizzly Unit that carried a population of Antelope and put Earl’s places on the back burner. We would work the area around Hay Creek as I had found a good buck over in B.L.M. area during another earlier scouting trip for deer. There were the areas around Ashwood and the National Grasslands that we could concentrated on for Lopes also. None of this worked out, even with all the glassing from observation points. Water was scarce in these areas; the Lopes were not working the areas as expected. We would work another area of the Grasslands later in the hunt!
A run into the Horse Heaven and Donnybrook area was warranted. We found a couple of decent bucks that would be shooters for Frankie during the first day of the hunt, but light was fading. The 2nd day of the hunt, Frankie got on a pretty good buck near Horse Heaven. The wind was really blowing hard on the hill and the shot was at about 300 yards. That was one lucky Antelope at that particular moment of the hunt in the Horse Heaven area outside of Donnybrook.
Later a number of good herds of Antelope were located in the Grasslands near Hwy 97, but all the bucks were small. No mature bucks were hanging away from the herds that we spotted. A little dishearten for me as I truly wanted to see a Big Buck. The Grizzly Unit had gone through a major poaching epidemic of Antelope, Deer and Elk some years back along the Hay Creek Ranch, Ashwood & Grizzly Mountain area. The culprits (youth) were caught from what I understand (local rancher gossip) and given just punishment.
We finally took a run down into Clarno which is B.L.M., the Northeast boundary of the Grizzly Unit and were about to drop in on quads to get back into the basin about 3 miles were I knew some good bucks would be. Just as we are unloading a lone hunter comes up to the road off of the well warn trail. He told us he had not seen any Antelope and he had been in their whole day. Hmm! Here we have a long hunter that is working hard and walking in, who knows if he was getting into the area of the Lopes. I did not want to just head off down the trail and over the knobs with him there. He then told us he would be hunting back in there once he got some food, new socks and a little rest. Disturbing his hunt was not in my nature!
Finally Mike T., the ranch foreman for Earl Smith is located out in the hay fields on a tractor, see what glassing gets you. Mike says go ahead and hit it hard in the two ranch sections in the Grizzly Unit, I saw a number of bucks earlier in the morning on those sections. The hunts know starts to get pretty exciting for both of us. This hunt was for Frankie and I wanted to make sure he got his Lope. Since I do most of the glassing in the field and Frankie can spot them with the naked eye on the road, I was able to find a buck up on top of a draw along a fence-line at about 1000 yards. Since I could only see the horns of the Lope, I told Frankie he was about to do some hiking to move in on the buck. It was now very hot in the late afternoon, so this hike was a bit laboring!
We are able to close the distance to about 150 yards with little cover at this time. The buck was not a monster or even a big buck, but Frankie said he still wanted to harvest the buck and get one under his belt (youth and the wait). The buck started to move out, but Frankie now had a rest on a fence post on the side of the hill. He made the shot from his Browning BLR 270 loaded with 130gr. Nolser Ballistic Tips. The shot hit the buck in the chest cavity, a bit high in the lung at an angle, I would see later on. The buck staggers and drops, but then all of a sudden he is up and heading out full tilt through the sagebrush and not stopping until he was a more than about 1/2 mile out in the rocks and sage. I forgot to tell Frankie to shot if they move! Now the chase was on for us without actually chasing the buck. Using cover and moving quickly we were able to get within about 275 yards. To my surprise Frankie stands up without any cover or rest and shots offhand at the buck as he starts to run again. The buck drops and never moves a lick after that. I was quite happy that Frankie got a Lope on this hunt and he made the final shot that counted.
I never did see a buck that I would take on the rest of the hunt. The Grizzly Unit is not an easy hunt, as most areas of the Grizzly Unit are walk in area. Now if one can hunt some of the private lands that hold Lopes, it could be a much easier hunt. Would I hunt the Grizzly Unit again, yes I would. Though I want to go back to another haunt with Lopes that is going to take 12 points or better to draw. There is something about hunting the S.E. part of the state, that only one that has hunted it would realize what draws you to it!
