What started out with Bear Down viewtopic.php?t=142315 turned into a slam dunk season banner year. The struggle bus has been parked for 2023.

Starting out with not being able to acquire a surplus multiseason deer tag because I was preoccupied with flying home and all tags allegedly sold out in eight hours, that got me heated and motivated. The remainder of big game season was to start with a trip to Montana for guided antlerless whitetail. The guided part didn’t happen due to scheduling issues, namely, the outfitter could not provide a guide on opening weekend because the guide had a wedding to attend. Who has a wedding on opening weekend in Montana??? Must have been an out of state wedding.

My wife and I made it our destination that we had never been to after 16 hours of driving with an overnight stay half way. Opening day we promptly got busted upon stepping out of the truck on BLM land. That’s a good sign right? After glassing that area we moved on and promptly got busted again. Now, I had spent much time gathering information about where to hunt but, no one told me that whitetail spook easily and run off to the next time zone. Recent and historical intel lead us to me many areas via truck and foot. We covered over two hundred miles that day in the truck. We saw lots of mule deer and antelope and pretty country but, we didn’t see any more whitetail that day. Oh well..day one in a new area. I didn’t expect to have a full ice chest in day one but, I came with five tags and blood in my eyes. The best part that day was she learned that the passenger is responsible for gate duty.




Day two I’m out solo and decided to drive all over a piece of BLM because it was huge and had terrain for good glassing. I found some spots to shoot praire dogs.




Many prairie dogs lost their life and I finally understood why people enjoy those shoots. Suppressed whack-a-mole at moving target is F-U-N.
I didn’t see any deer driving all over that parcel. It’s getting near the end of the day and I’m looking over the map again and hoping to apply the information I’ve been given about finding deer there. I see there’s another parcel across the road that part of the BLM land I’m on and decided that all the signs I’m told to look for are there on paper. So I drive down and across the road, park, gear up, and start walking.

Eventually I get across a creek and start to glass, more prairie dogs. OK….leave them alone for now. A bit more glassing and I see deer about a mile away. Great! I get to moving and eventually get busted by deer I had not seen. Ugh..let’s try to be more slow and stealthy. I get to another spot to glass and see deer are passing through unaware. IT’S GO TIME! Sneak in to a reasonable shooting distance for a tired hunter who’s heart rate is jacked. Setup, range, aim, PEW! Missed. WHAT THE HECK. Deer are really moving now! Time to start running after them. The terrain is rolling hills and before I crest the next hill I low crawl into a shooting position hidden by sage. Prone, aim, let out of breath. PEW! Missed again at less than 100yds WHAT THE HECK! Looking at the rifle like YOU PIECE OF TRASH!! Grab it by the scope…ring bases are loose. WHAT. THE. HECK. Apparently all the bouncing around in the truck caused them to come loose. Never have I ever had bases some loose on hunt. This .308 bolt gun had served me well over the years but, that day, I should have brought the 20” 5.56 out for deer because I checked it after I got back to the truck and everything was still tight after having been shoot numerous times that day and the same bouncing in the truck.

Back in the hotel I torque the bases back in. The next morning I’m up early and the weather has turned to less than desireable. It’s day three, the last day, and I’m still without fresh meat. I’m going back to where all the deer were passing through except now it’s raining and you’re not supposed to drive on BLM roads when they are wet. My walk will be even farther now, with rain gear on. Parked, gear up, walk. Get to about where I want to start glassing…get busted. Keep going..get to good spot to setup and glass with a backdrop to breakup my appearance. It’s raining…and I forgot to pack food. I’m settled and setup and not walking a mile back for snacks.

Some deer appear and dissapear. No phone signal. Nothing but terrain, rain, and sitting. About three hours in I see some deer 300+ yards away. Range, settle in, aim, PEW! Flop! Other deer run and coyote pops up on my kill. PEW. Missed. WHAT THE HECK. Time to get my deer.



Boned her out in the field to keep from potentially spreading CWD.


It’s 12:30pm and few hours left of hunting. It starts raining more and I head back to my glassing spot. Come up a hill and standing tall I get busted again. I try to stay calm since some deer did not see me and get setup but that didn’t happen and I don’t get any more deer down that day. However im quite thankful that I made a run at Montana, a state I never hunted in, in a town and area I’d never been to, and I figured out where the deer were passing through regularly. If it was not for equipment failure due to operator error, I’d have brought home 100lbs of meat. Instead I got 20lbs and a lot of lessons, and good memories with my wife. It’s a win!

Part two coming.


BLACK HAMMER ARMS
07/02 NFA Dealer

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Awesome!

awesome Dana and yes you gotta have a gate duty person it helps. antelope (prairie goats) once they get a whiff of you yep long gone

16 hrs hmm you must have been east of billings. there's really good places up near grass range

Nice

After we get back to the great state of Warshington after waking up to snow in MT, and driving through a snow storm in three states on my birthday I put that .308 on the bench and inspect it. My reticle is quite canted. UGH…that’s what I get for not bringing a simple tool to cradle the rifle and check the reticle level before going out to hunt. I got lucky with that deer. My wife runs out the door as we got home for groceries and comes back with a birthday cake and candles for me. Fabulous!

Prior to MT deer season, Kota and I spent a couple weekends setting up elk camp and now that I’m back from MT, elk season starts in three days. I’ve got a day to clean up gear and repack…and of course make sure my reticles are level and shoot to confirm.

Preseason, Kota and I spent the downtime at camp adventuring around and birding, getting to know each other in a different setting. No birds shot but, we got a few things worked out.










Elk season upon us and I roll into camp right before dark. It’s cold up on top, below freezing. I’m just glad I don’t have anything major to do. Just unload some gear and get settled for a full modern season. I’ve joined some friends this season and we have a first time elk hunter with us in his early 20’s. One of my friend’s step son. He seemed like a solid young man having come out of their tent and shook my hand without being prompted to. I like this guy already. That night everyone talks about where they are going the next morning…they are all planning to hunt in cold places. The next morning it’s 11 degrees at camp and I am definitely not going to hunt near camp. I don’t have the gear for that.

After a hot breakfast I set off in the truck the drive to where I want to hunt because it’s going to be warmer. Much warmer. About half way there I look out the window near a known good killing spot and I see a heard about a mile away and they are moving. No way I’m going down the side, across the bottom and back up to catch them. I glass for a while and spot a spike. Sweet…it’s 8:30am. I study the map and decided to drive to the bottom and walk my way into where I think they are going. 9am ish, park, gear up get to stepping. Oh, the scope is definitely not loose.

It’s been a few years since I walked this bottom and I know the most effceient route to go with the meandering creek so it takes me a good while to get to where I want to be. By 1pm, I’ve stopped for brakes, talked to two hunters not wearing orange but obviously hunting elk, seen a lone beef cow near the creek and gotten quite tired. I look at the map and see I am not where I wanted to be and it’s either turn back get to the truck by dark or keep going and hope for the best. I press on.

An hour later I see a herd going the opposite direction I expected to find them going. Get behind some cover and glass, range, 500+, move forward to more cover, range, 400, glassing…there’s that spike from the morning and he’s grazing my way. Now if I could just calm my heart rate that would be great. Shooting sticks out, range again, dial up, ZOOM in 24x to REALLY confirm it’s a spike, wait for him to clear from cows. It’s definitely a spike, trying to calm down and breathe slowly, aim, 300WM goes PEW, THUMP, reload, he’s still moving, PEW, thump, he turns to walk away…oh HEEEEECK no, PEW in the rump! Tips over…time to go get my elk. Get over to him and he’s just about expired and very soon does.




Thank God I’m finally in a spot with signal and I’m able to reach my people. Text my wife and a few other people. I starting texts from my people in the area and a couple phone calls so we can talk about where I am and how they are going to get there. Five hours later I have it deboned and ready to bag, right then they show up. We catch up, have some snacks, load up and get to stepping. It’a night, a cloudless, full moon night, no rain, barely a beeeze, perfect weather for a pack out. We stop for a few brakes and get back to the truck just before midnight. I’m glad to have a full size truck for all of us to fit into comfortably with gear and meat, and drive us all out to the top to their vehicles. We get back to camp just after 1am and by 9:30am the gammies are in our camp asking who killed the elk. We don’t have any elk meat hanging or the skull ou, just a bear that was killed the day before. So that was an interesting ask. The officer checked my tag etc etc and all was good.

My second elk ever, and this time on opening day. That was satisfying to know I was able to apply my knowledge of the area and stick with it, and have some luck.

All in we had three spikes and one bear hanging before the season was over.

Stay tuned for part three.


BLACK HAMMER ARMS
07/02 NFA Dealer

http://www.blackhammerarms.com
http://www.facebook.com/blackhammerarms
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Nice recap Dreadi, I enjoy reading about hunters/fishers exploits afield.
Hunting is very frustrating in the beginning unless you are lucky, it’s becomes very rewarding after knowledge of a few seasons are applied and success happens.
Never a trip, always an adventure.

During elk season we made a side quest for pheasant hunting. We hunted over a Lab and a Dobbie. Even the Dobbie put up three birds.



The nice gap between modern elk and late season deer was perfect timing for a personal trip to NYC and quite the contrast from roughing it to big city life.




This year thanks to plenty of apples and a game cam, I knew where on the private property I normally hunt deer on, where I wanted to setup. I had it in my mind that if I tagged out in the morning, I was going back to MT and notch more tags. Opening day came and I was out early in a tree stand and of course it was cold. Cold enough for frost to develop on the suppressor and an eye lash



A whole lot of sitting and waiting, looking at the same cut trying to stay awake and warm. One foot got particularly cold and the sun came so I let it dangle out front of the cover in the stand to get some radiant heat. I got too comfortable and started falling asleep, blinking, blinking, and whoa….was that a buck? Yeah it’s buck. Get yourself together and shoot it, 100yds. Too much shuffling around to get myself together and he looks in my direction…busted. DANG IT! It’s 9:30am and I could have been done! Well, there goes Montana round 2.

More sitting and waiting. Eventually it’s lunch time and time get out the stand for a bit, let Kota out, make some hot lunch and walk off my lower back pains. Eventually it’s time to get back in the stand and sit, and wait. At least the chill broke. More sitting and waiting and looking and glassing and at least I have some signal and can pass some time browsing WAGuns.

When it’s finally the last 30 minutes of lite it’s really time to be on point. I know this property holds deer and they creep through the cut at dusk coming out the tree line normally. Ten minutes till time is over, 200yds away I see a young buck, and glass him with the rifle while getting myself steady on bags. 6.8 SPC said PEW, thump, tips over, gets up, walks a bit, WHAT THE HECK. PEW. Still walking? PEW drops. I wait minutes and keep aim in case he gets up. Seeing nothing for a couple minutes I get down to go find him. Walked right up to wear he went down and there he was.


It got dark real quick and trying to find the path of least resistance…along with my drag didn’t happen. Somehow my drag was in my range bag so I used rope and my rifle. My back was very much not interested in dragging out a whole deer for 200yds. Normally we don’t gut onsite so we leave the spots clean for anyone else hunting the weekend.

Upon inspection…





It appears that third shot in the back anchored him.

This year I made sure to save the neck for a roast. I have a brother in law name Eddie but, I don’t think he’d appreciate it.



As you can imagine with all that wacking and stacking comes much work and everything got done in a timely manner, the freezer has just enough room for some waterfowl and upland birds.


BLACK HAMMER ARMS
07/02 NFA Dealer

http://www.blackhammerarms.com
http://www.facebook.com/blackhammerarms
https://www.instagram.com/blackhammerarms

Congrats, Dana! You really made it happen this year, that's impressive.

And very nice storytelling.

Nice show!

Congrats to you. That looks like a lot of hard work right there. What an adventure and I will tip my hat off to you.