DeerFest 2015!!! year in review

[Whitpirate]

Must be nice to sleep in the backseat with leg room you pack animal midget!  Kill a giant!

[Karl Blanchard]

Little buck soaking up some rays today.

[Karl Blanchard]

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[Karl Blanchard]

Must be nice to sleep in the backseat with leg room you pack animal midget!  Kill a giant!

  Even I'm too tall to fit comfortably in the back seat of the tundra

[Whitpirate]

Must be nice to sleep in the backseat with leg room you pack animal midget!  Kill a giant!

  Even I'm too tall to fit comfortably in the back seat of the tundra

Should have been a man and bought a Chevy!

[buckmaster_wa]

1015 has been pretty busy. Lots of work and limited vacation time has made for less hunting trips than usual for me.

I made a quick 3 day scouting trip to Idaho in August. I saw a few decent bucks, no monsters. But I did find a great area to set up camp. It was 7 miles in from the trail head. Just below the top of the ridge. This allowed Karl, Jeremy and myself to go in 3 different directions on our hunt. Therefore we were able to stretch our legs without running into one another's area. The scouting trip was a bit smokey, but was defiantly worth the trip. I found an area that had all the ingredients to hold big bucks. Great feed, a 3-4 year old burn, steep country, thick timber pockets, and lots of deer.

[buckmaster_wa]

Karl needs to change the name of this thread.

My first hunting trip was a North Idaho Moose hunt with a good friend of mine. I was able to gather some good info from the biologist as well as a few members from this site.

The trip was a blast. We saw 22 moose in 4 days. Saw elk and deer every day,including a great bull elk that was within bow range.and none of us had elk tags . We put eyes on a really nice black bear the first morning, but were unable to close the distance before he made it into the thick timber.

My buddy passed on several bulls and ended up killing a good one a couple days after I left. Here it is.

[buckmaster_wa]

The grouse hunting was awesome. We got 6 grouse in one morning. Here's a photo of them.

[fishngamereaper]

If I hunted that much my wife would find a new provider

Keep em coming, looks like fun.

[buckmaster_wa]

I only had two days to hunt during ML season. My friend Les and I drew ML cow tags. Les also had a ML deer tag.

So, mid day on Saturday as we were at the truck eating lunch. A little 2x3 buck came strolling down the hill. He literally walked within 90 yards of us. I tried talking Les into waiting for a bigger buck, but he has only killed 2 deer and he wasn't willing to let this opportunity go to waste. So he decided to give the buck a dirt nap.

The next day, we saw 3 legal bucks on our way up the ridge. We then watched a spike elk wander into a little draw all alone. We worked our way down towards the spike and I let out a few cow cows, the spike came strolling out and Les let him have it.  Then the work began.

[buckmaster_wa]

The spike. It was the first elk that Les has harvested. He was pretty pumped. A buck deer and spike elk in two days was a pretty awesome weekend.

[buckmaster_wa]

Next up was my Idaho hunt. I passed up 13 bucks opening day. Then hunted some steep, thick north slope timber on the second day. I spotted my buck with a group of 4 other bucks. I mistook my buck for a different one that was in the group. The other buck was a lot narrower but had deeper forks. No complaints from me though, as my buck is a pretty good buck still. 

[buckmaster_wa]

A picture of a couple good Bulls that I saw on opening day.

[buckmaster_wa]

Next up was Washington deer hunt.

As Karl already stated this was our worst opening weekend in ten years. There was a huge loss in the whitetail herd due to blue tongue. And for one reason or another, there were not very many mule deer bucks.

Usually we get 4-6 bucks on opening weekend. This year, I saw two legal bucks. I got the second one I saw. Karlhada tough shot on one buck and chose to pass on a second buck that he saw. That was it for the whole weekend. Pretty slow.

I was able to get before and after photos of my buck. He was hanging out at the. Top of a eyebrow. Then some (truck hunters) pulled up behind him and scared him right towards me. I dropped him at about 75 yards.

[buckmaster_wa]

After.