Fun hunt in the mountains!
- Thread starter Kellendv
- Start date
Thank you Drew. Fun place to hunt, hoping to carry another one out for my buddy Daryl this weekend.
Oh my goodness Daryl found a certified giant tonight. Every year a few big bucks come out of Southern California D zones but I have not seen anything like this before. Daryl lost him in the scope and he slipped over the ridge at about 200 yards. Heartbreaking. Wish him luck, we will be tearing this place apart with the glass tomorrow trying to find that thing. Good lord. What a deer.
Snake Charmer
Happiness is a warm gut pile
Haha ugghhhhh. I told Daryl on Friday that we would most likely never see that buck again. He was soft-spooked when he slipped over the ridge. I was setting up camp after we packed in and I sent Daryl down to the glassing knob for the last 90 minutes of light and told him I’d slip down there when I finished. When I was creeping down the hill he looked at me and mouthed “big buck” and pointed down below the knob. Daryl told me later that he heard and watched the buck walk over the ridge clopping like a horse on the loose shale. The buck heard him moving his pack around making a shooting rest and when I got him in the glass (just standing free-handing my 10’s about 10 yards behind Daryl) he was staring uphill looking right at us. If you have seen, in person or on a show, the look a big buck gives when it knows something isn’t right, you know what I was seeing. I ranged him real quick, he was at 269 but the angle adjusted distance was 198, which gives you an idea how steep it is. I hand signaled Daryl to shoot for 200. When he got back in the scope he had lost the buck. All I could do was give Daryl general directions as the buck fast-walked back over the ridge. He never ran but just slipped out of view the way big bucks do when they don’t want to draw attention to themselves. Sad as this whole scenario is, the cool thing is that buck proves what I knew this area was capable of. The buck I shot is just a “good” buck compared what we saw Friday.
Daryl is going to be reliving those moments for years to come. Buck fever is a real thing people! We talked about the scenario a lot over the last two days. Hunting alone without having someone feeding you information forces you to learn some things and he got a few lessons on Friday. I gave him some constructive criticism that might help others also. He knows I’m not beating up on him… 1. Angle compensating range finders are pretty important in the mountains. You need that data to have confidence. Daryl was using my old basic Leupold and the range was around 30% off. 2. Your gun and some sort of rest for whatever possible shooting scenario might present from your location need to be in arms-reach. He had to get up to get his rifle and pack. 3. If you don’t have a yardage turret, you need your dial data on your gun somewhere (not in your phone). I’m a big believer of the 200 yard zero for a hunting rifle (obviously this is personal preference). Daryl’s rifle is zeroed at 100 and his range finder was giving him and uncompensated range of 265 and he was trying to figure out what he needed to dial for. These things all added up to a missed opportunity that could have ended with a truly incredible buck! A once in a lifetime SoCal buck.
Saturday we found a couple of decent bucks trailing some does but they never settled in a good position for a stalk. Later in the afternoon I was glassing some beetle-killed timber about 800 feet below us and saw some deer running through it. They popped out coming generally toward us. They fed and bedded on the slope below us. There was one big bodied mature deer, a big fork. The other legal buck was a young fork. The big deer bedded and watched his back trail while the younger bucks fed around him. It got dark and there was no opportunity to make a play so we went to camp and hoped they would be there in the morning. Sure enough as we crept down to the glassing knob early this morning I glassed a deer feeding right where they were the night before. It was the small fork. We watched him feed for over an hour but couldn’t turn up the other deer. Eventually Daryl had to make a decision. This was the last day we had to hunt this zone. We both have to work tomorrow and won’t be able to get back before the season ends. He decided to give it a try. We knew the other bucks could be down there somewhere and there was potential for an unseen deer to blow the stalk. He took off down the ridge and I sat on our knob watching. The hill was so steep he was right on top of them when the bigger buck spooked from a spot we couldn’t see. They both blew out and he never got a shot. As he made his way back up the ridge I broke down camp and got ready to pack out. We didn’t have time to find another deer and repeat the whole process. But we had a great season, we found shooter bucks on every trip up there, I got a nice buck, and we found a buck that proves the quality of that area. I Can’t wait to have that tag in hand again!
On to glorious D16!
Daryl is going to be reliving those moments for years to come. Buck fever is a real thing people! We talked about the scenario a lot over the last two days. Hunting alone without having someone feeding you information forces you to learn some things and he got a few lessons on Friday. I gave him some constructive criticism that might help others also. He knows I’m not beating up on him… 1. Angle compensating range finders are pretty important in the mountains. You need that data to have confidence. Daryl was using my old basic Leupold and the range was around 30% off. 2. Your gun and some sort of rest for whatever possible shooting scenario might present from your location need to be in arms-reach. He had to get up to get his rifle and pack. 3. If you don’t have a yardage turret, you need your dial data on your gun somewhere (not in your phone). I’m a big believer of the 200 yard zero for a hunting rifle (obviously this is personal preference). Daryl’s rifle is zeroed at 100 and his range finder was giving him and uncompensated range of 265 and he was trying to figure out what he needed to dial for. These things all added up to a missed opportunity that could have ended with a truly incredible buck! A once in a lifetime SoCal buck.
Saturday we found a couple of decent bucks trailing some does but they never settled in a good position for a stalk. Later in the afternoon I was glassing some beetle-killed timber about 800 feet below us and saw some deer running through it. They popped out coming generally toward us. They fed and bedded on the slope below us. There was one big bodied mature deer, a big fork. The other legal buck was a young fork. The big deer bedded and watched his back trail while the younger bucks fed around him. It got dark and there was no opportunity to make a play so we went to camp and hoped they would be there in the morning. Sure enough as we crept down to the glassing knob early this morning I glassed a deer feeding right where they were the night before. It was the small fork. We watched him feed for over an hour but couldn’t turn up the other deer. Eventually Daryl had to make a decision. This was the last day we had to hunt this zone. We both have to work tomorrow and won’t be able to get back before the season ends. He decided to give it a try. We knew the other bucks could be down there somewhere and there was potential for an unseen deer to blow the stalk. He took off down the ridge and I sat on our knob watching. The hill was so steep he was right on top of them when the bigger buck spooked from a spot we couldn’t see. They both blew out and he never got a shot. As he made his way back up the ridge I broke down camp and got ready to pack out. We didn’t have time to find another deer and repeat the whole process. But we had a great season, we found shooter bucks on every trip up there, I got a nice buck, and we found a buck that proves the quality of that area. I Can’t wait to have that tag in hand again!
On to glorious D16!
Jake,
Thanks for the great write-ups, pix, and buck....Outdoor Life quality....
ps....I'm not in you guys class when it comes to big game hunting, but I did do something one time that got me a buck that I knew was there, but couldn't see him...I blew a varmint call and he (+ a doe) stood up....Back in those days, we didn't have range finders either....Guesstimate, and keep it in the fur at that distance.
Thanks for the great write-ups, pix, and buck....Outdoor Life quality....
ps....I'm not in you guys class when it comes to big game hunting, but I did do something one time that got me a buck that I knew was there, but couldn't see him...I blew a varmint call and he (+ a doe) stood up....Back in those days, we didn't have range finders either....Guesstimate, and keep it in the fur at that distance.
Thank you for the kind words Steve! I forgive you for calling me Jake lolJake,
Thanks for the great write-ups, pix, and buck....Outdoor Life quality....
ps....I'm not in you guys class when it comes to big game hunting, but I did do something one time that got me a buck that I knew was there, but couldn't see him...I blew a varmint call and he (+ a doe) stood up....Back in those days, we didn't have range finders either....Guesstimate, and keep it in the fur at that distance.