Recently, I had the awesome chance to spend 5 days with my pops in the beautiful southern Arizona mountains. Sounds warm, eh? It wasn't. The night temperatures dropped into the low 20's while the highs reached a scorching 45 degrees; not quite the temperatures I expected in the sonora desert.
Our excuse for breaking away and exploring new country was that I had a Coues whitetail tag in my pocket. The Coues whitetail, for those of you that don't know, is a sub-species of the eastern whitetail. Their appearance and flighty behavior are similar to their eastern cousins except that they are 3/4 the size and I dare say much more difficult to hunt. Day after day, I hiked into remote areas where a mature buck might reside and picked apart the landscape with my binoculars. I spotted several nice bucks including one that possibly reached the 100' mark; a large sheer cliff and a massive canyon seperated me from this whopper buck and I couldn't make an approach before he dissapeared into an oak forest.
My mind was determined to harvest a good buck, however, the desert elements and my body had different ideas: strong cold winds, zero-rutting activity, lots and lots of cactus spines, and sore joints all interfered with my undertaking. The day before planning to head home to bring in the New Year with our loved ones, I headed into the morning darkness once again to find a buck. This was the day it had to happen. As the desert lightened, I was perched on a rough volcanic outcrop surrounded by prime deer country. I studied the hills turning over every rock and peeking behind every bush with my binoculars.
A small group of javelina kept warm by digging prickly pear roots and eating the rock-hard morsels with their strong jaws. I could hear their social grunts all the way across the canyon. A flock of mearn's quail huddled on a nearby rock fighting the morning frost. When the sunlight hit the mountain peaks, I spied two good bucks cutting across a ridge heading for cover. They were a long ways away up the canyon, so I cut the distance as quick as possible. I finally got into position 5 hours later (12:30 pm). I ranged the bigger buck at just over 300 yards. 'Hopefully my prior long-range practicing will pay off now', I whispered subliminally. I squeezed the trigger as the buck stood broadside in the shadow of a large oak tree. The buck died instantly. 
I wonder if a cougar experiences similar feelings of delight and admiration when it kills a deer? I spent some time stroking the buck's cape, pulling a few spines from my backside, and eating lunch. I marched back to the truck packed with meat and horns. Nothing can ruin that moment, not even cacti or body pain. My dad and I sat close to the fire and enjoyed our last night in that sonoran canyon. We ate good, venison steaks over charcoal and mesquite. Spending good quality time with dad and harvesting a beautiful buck were definitely the major highlights on this trip.
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