My favorite animal of all time is the mule deer. I love where they live, I love their striking appearance, I love their behavior especially when they get some age on them. I love going into their summer hang-out and finding individual bucks and then targeting them in the fall. This year was no different.
Last year, I hunted a buck that I had found the year prior (2017) and failed to get an arrow into, then last year I found him again in the summer, and then again in the fall where I was able to make harvest him. I killed him within 50 yards from where I had seen him various times for the past year.
This summer, I made one trip into the summer range and the first buck I'd seen on the trip was a wide buck (video above). I was blown away with his width and the fact that he also had good forks that were still growing, he was way up there on my hit list come fall. The area he called home is fairly popular with not only other hunters, but outfitters as well. Knowing I would be gone on another hunt for the first few days of the rifle hunt, I expected him to fall to another hunter before I got there. The fourth day of rifle season I packed my back-country gear and headed on in for a few days. I hunted my way into where I would set-up camp, after putting camp together and dumping off most of my gear, there was plenty of daylight left so I grabbed my pack and rifle and headed to where this wide buck called home.
My legs were burning and my heart was screaming for a rest when I broke summit. I sat down with my tripod and binoculars and started scanning the fishbowl basin. Quickly, I noticed an abnormally large amount of ravens in the canyon which means a gut pile from a harvested deer. I narrowed down the audible bird calls to a specific spot where I found the large blackbirds feasting on the remaining carcass of a buck, it was in the exact spot where I had first seen the wide buck this summer I was after. Being a true realist with a hint of pessimism, I jumped to the obvious conclusion that my buck was dead. All of a sudden, the canyon seemed empty… Lifeless… I started thinking about other bucks I had scouted this summer. After an hour or two of intense glassing, I finally caught a glance of a small buck that stood from it’s afternoon bed to feed momentarily before disappearing back into the pines once again. I made the decision to continue on the hunt by hiking on to the other side of the divide where I had killed my buck the year prior. It was going to be a several mile climb and a steep one at that. Already tired from my ascension into the high country that morning, I took my time glassing my way up.
The evening sun seemed to fall out of the sky rather quickly and I felt the rush to get to my glassing spot. My heart sank when I noticed two horses tied up within 100 yards from where I wanted to glass. I thought I would get to my point and trip over a guide and his client but thankfully they were nowhere in sight . I pulled the tripod from my pack and locked my binoculars in. I had seen three deer that day up to that point, any deer would be a welcome sight as I scanned the landscape below. Memories of past bucks in this spot rushed through my head as I pick apart every potential spot.
Often, we tend to focus on "the good old days", even if those days were just last year. For whatever reason I felt like the area was dead and the bucks could not handle the hunting pressure and have moved on. Just as I was feeling sorry for myself and the deer, I caught a flash of a buck on the edge of the timber where I had already glassed 20 times. I could tell the deer was a good buck and rather than focusing more with binoculars I knew light was fading, and there was a guide somewhere near! I immediately set the rifle on the bipod and cranked the power up to 32X on my Nightforce scope.
The buck noticeably had deep forks and good width but I didn’t quite recognize him at the moment. I did know that he was plenty big enough for me to take action, so I ranged him with my ragefinder at 515 yards and quietly loaded a cartridge in the chamber. Although I would like to say I stayed calm, I’m sure the fly on the rock would tell you differently. I lost the buck as it disappeared between a small clump of pines and when I found it again, he was quartering away feeding through the opening fairly quickly another 20 yards further. I felt a sense of rush as I re-ranged him at around 535. I made my come ups on my scope and took one final breath before pressing the trigger. The buck crumbled.
I came up out of my rifle astonished that my luck has changed so quickly, and now I couldn’t wait to go down and see my 2019 Wyoming buck. I couldn’t believe my eyes as I closed the distance and saw the buck's antler width and deep forks. I quickly recognized him as my number one buck. I felt like that evening I was really leaning heavy on sheer luck mixed with a little hard work. I quickly gutted the deer knowing there was no way in hell I was going to pack the entire deer back up the mountain and back down the other side 3 miles to my tent in my worn condition. With that, I almost dreaded leaving the buck behind only to have to make the effort to climb back up the mountain to the buck the following morning to butcher and pack out the entire buck.
It was Wednesday night and my girls were planning on meeting me Friday afternoon at the trailhead to head back into the back country with their own deer tags, so I had plenty of time to take care of the buck. What an experience, and what a beautiful buck. In my lamp light heading off the mountain that night, I couldn’t help but dread every steep step down the mountain meant a reverse step back up the following morning; something you shouldn't dwell on when in the situation, but my mind had plenty of time to wander.
Sleep came easy and morning came quickly. I crawled my way back up the mountain and took care of my deer and left most of my camp belongings back in the tent at base camp. I limped the meat all the way back down to the pickup at the trailhead and got there that evening just before dark. That night, I slept in the back of my pick up but not before putting each chunk of meat in a Ziploc gallon bag on top of ice in the cooler.
Friday came with a big rain/snow storm. It didn’t seem like a good day to take the girls back into the high country, so I rented a small cabin in Star valley. Bob, his dad Bud, and his girl Olivia, we’re also coming down to hunt with a train of pack stock. The stock we’re going to carry all of the girls supplies up to camp. I convinced Bob to stay in a cabin as well Friday night rather than push it up the trail in the storm with the girls. Saturday morning was still a bit cloudy and foggy but we started from the trailhead an hour or two after light.
Roo, Laynee, and I went on foot ahead and beat the stock train up to camp but we were fairly exhausted and quickly lit a fire in our titanium woodstove in the teepee and relaxed some. We decided to do a small hunt that evening, but exhaustion was catching up to me and before getting into good deer country, I turned the girls around and headed back to camp. Dizzy and shaking, I downplayed my symptoms some but was a bit concerned that the next day might be spent close to the tent where buck sightings were rare if my health didn't turn around .
The wood stoves in both of our teepees cut the chill from the cold outside air. There was an inch of snow at camp, but Sunday weather was supposed to be sunny and nicer. I went to bed that evening dreading the long steep hike up to the fishbowl where I hoped I could get one of my girls on a decent high country muley. I think the girls would’ve slept till nine if I let them, but I gently woke them at the first light of dawn, the wood-burning stove made preparation for the mountain hunt much more comfortable. I was feeling 80 % better so we left camp and started our ascension slowly going a few hundred yards at a time before stopping, glassing the opposite canyon wall, before hiking a little more. We had seen several does as well as a nice black bear, but no buck sightings yet which didn’t surprise me as we hadn’t ascended to their haunts yet.
Laynee’s feet were cold from the snow, and Roo was not very appreciative of the slippery steep slope, but they did great as we inched our way up till finally we reached the fishbowl basin. This was the same basin I had found the ravens and gut pile in but I truly thought this was our one and only chance for a buck as the rest of the buck country was another 1,000’up and further yet. When we got to the basin, the girls we’re just happy to be there and done with our steep ascension. I took Laynee‘s boots off and put her frozen feet into my puffy coat and then slid her whole body into my Stone Glacier pack for insulation, the sun peaked in and out of the fog layer and immediately warmed our bodies and our enthusiasm. I was already locked in my binoculars glassing every square foot of the basin, it was around noon so I knew that any deer sighting would come when they would stand from their tangled-pine beds to feed momentarily before finding another afternoon bed.
After an hour of glassing, I spied a few coyotes on the opposite basin wall. Surely, they were also taking advantage of the deer gut pile. We enjoyed watching them and listening to them howl as I chimed in as well with my own howls. The day was looking up and with the sun out, attitudes were good and we were enjoying ourselves by this point. I kept scanning the areas I thought a buck would likely bed in, and much to my surprise I picked up a small group of deer feeding out of a thick patch of krummholz. They were all bigger-bodied bucks brandishing different sizes of antlers, including one solid four-point that stood out of the crowd. "I got bucks!" I whispered loudly. The girls jumped from there sunning beds half-leary if dad was pulling their legs or not. The bucks were on the other side of the wide basin and the problem was that they were out there quite a long ways.
They were in a strategic spot that made it difficult to see them from anywhere else in the basin, thus the reason they were there. I pulled out the rangefinder and pick them up at 869 yards. That is a serious poke for any solid shooter. Knowing that we were on a time crunch before these bucks disappeared I asked Laynee if it was OK if Roo shot being that she was a much more experienced hunter and shooter. Laynee was good as she knew it was too far for her shooting experinece, So Roo quickly jumped on the rifle. I ran the come ups and got the rifle on a solid platform for Roo. I questioned the slightly swirling wind and how to adjust as it was an upward thermal but blowing ever so slightly. I made the adjustment for wind and spin and she said she was ready to shoot, I felt confident that the shot would be good. She began a long exhale and I knew it was about to happen! The initial shot was high just an inch over the bucks back and I quickly realized the upward thermal had taken an affect on bullet travel more than I thought, so with the quick adjustment she was back in the scope. At this point another buck had come out with even a larger body stature, he was obviously the oldest buck of the five. She was on him.
Roo does not like to miss, so she was a little flustered but with some steady breathing I could tell she was back in the game quickly, she pressed the trigger and the buck crumbled and then began rolling… And sliding down the mountain quickly. It got to an edge of a cliff and free fell 15 to 20 feet before continuing its accelerating descent quickly towards the bottom of the basin. The girls could not see the buck rolling but could hear the major rockslide as the buck steamed down the mountain before finally hanging up in a patch of fir. What a wonderful shot and sense of accomplishment we all felt working so hard to get to that point and then being successful. Laynee’s feet were now warm and our excitement was high. Instead of questions on "how much further?" and "are we there yet?", it was now "how are we going to get to the buck?" and "how are we going to get the buck back to camp?" Questions I typically don’t ask myself until I’m stuck in such a situation. They knew the answers were going to involve a lot of hard work either way.
It was a little dicey getting to the buck with the melting snow and rockslides, but Roo first found the buck and was immediately wowed by the sheer body and antler size of this animal. Western Wyoming deer are by far the largest-statured mule deer I have ever been around and this one was no exception whatsoever. It was huge. Tooth wear reflected the old age of this monarch buck to be 6-8 years old. We quartered out the front shoulders and hind legs and Roo helped extract the back straps and the loins which made for a 90 pound pack. Once I was done butchering and meat was cooling down, I laid down on a flat rock to soak in the moment along with some suns rays, while the girls grabbed the knives and continued digging and learning about deer anatomy and other great life lessons. It was one of those magical life moments for me.
We packed everything back to our base camp and enjoyed a great evening of good food around a wood stoves and good company. The best part was letting those horses pack out Roo's buck back down to the trailhead. Thanks Roo and Laynee for being a part of such a great hunt. Remember, hard work produces amazing, memorable results. I loved sharing one of my favorite places on earth with some of my favorite people.
Roo's buck from this summer
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