Bearpaw Season 2009

[Wacenturion]

Nice deer.........let the fun begin.

[bearpaw]

Here's a trailcam of one of the larger bucks on one of the ranches. This deer was missed by one of the hunters the first week of late season and has been in hiding since. Hoping he losses his wariness before season ends.

[bearpaw]

Here's another nice whitetail with a happy hunter. Another hunter also took a forked horn buck and a couple other bucks were missed. Whitetail action is really hot right now, I saw 5 bucks this morning and I'm headed out again for a short evening hunt.

This buck was actually shot last night and they searched 2 hours for it and gave up. Guide Ray asked me last night if he could go look for the buck this morning, he said if it's dead on the ranch he would find it. Knowing Ray is my best tracker, I quickly agreed. In the morning they took Ray to where the deer was hit. Ray noticed that the deer was stepping hard on one rear foot and followed the buck for over 400 yards through heavy cover and hundreds of other deer tracks by following that hard rear foot print. He went pretty much straight to the buck which had been hit in the rear quarters. Looks like we will be able to salvage most of the meat and I caped it to be mounted.

[coop2424]

Another nice one.  How much longer you think we have for the rut?  You think it will be going strong into next week?  Looking to get out Friday through Tuesday and am wondering how things will be during that time...

[Houndhunter]

you guide hound hunts to right?  i wanna see some lion pics!

[bearpaw]

We start Idaho lion hunting on Dec 1, so I should have some cats to post sometime in December if the weather treats us right.

[Houndhunter]

sweet looking forward to them

[bearpaw]

coop2424 I think the rutt is just getting going real good, hunting should be good for a while, you must be going bowhunting, good luck, it should be good.

[bearpaw]

My son just called me, they are taking pictures of his moose he just shot. I will post photos as soon as I get them.

[coop2424]

Can't wait to see pictures of the moose.  Thanks for the update.  I actually got a late permit for GMU 111 with modern firearm.

[Gobble]

Outstanding Dale, can't wait to see the pics 

[bearpaw]

coop2424 there are some really good bucks in that unit, good luck....

[bearpaw]

Yesterday was the last day of WA late buck. We only had 4 untagged hunters who were still hunting. One hunter missed a 4x4 in the morning, passed 3 spikes, saw a whopper he couldn't get a shot at, then nailed a spiker for meat in the last 10 minutes.

Another hunter wanted to get an early start home and left at noon, he was the only hunter to not get a shot. Saw two 4x4's but never had a good shot opportunity.

Another hunter killed a nice 5x5 at 2 PM.

And the fourth hunter missed one of those biggest bucks I have been talking about just before dark. Said it was really a nice buck.

For the season not as many deer were seen as usual, but we still had some great success with all but one guided hunter getting shots at bucks. Our guided hunter shot opportunity was 90% and our unguided hunter shot opportunity was about 50% for the season. All in all we had a good whitetail hunt despite lower deer numbers.

Amazingly, we failed to get the biggest buck on every ranch. Seems the big ones almost always get away.

Today I take care of some paperwork and then this afternoon I am headed to Utah for a Cow Elk & Bird Hunt, then back to Idaho for Cougar Hunting on Dec 1....

[bearpaw]

One of my hunters emailed some photos to me of his Montana deer hunt. I didn't have my camera that day. First thing the first morning of John's hunt we spotted some whitetails and then about 15 mulies, this was the best buck and one that we wanted to take, we stalked as close as we could get for fear of some does breaking and running that had spotted us, then John made an estimated 400 yard shot in heavy snow and wind. My range finder wouldn't work in the heavy snow, he said he was sighted in for 200yds so I had him hold on the top edge of the butt and his bullet drifted right into the lungs. Fantastic shot!

John always wanted to shoot a buffalo so the next day we went buffalo hunting. Buffalo hunting is no big sporting event, they really aren't afraid of anything. However as you can see, on occasion they will decide to take off running if they feel something isn't right. They have been known to also trample a human or ram into a truck on occasion. When hunting buffalo you stay close to the truck so you can jump in for protection.

John wanted a smaller good eating animal so he shot a 2 year old cow. You can see the difference in the animal he shot and a bull in the fuzzy photo (tried to zoom in with a cheap camera). I also included the photo of another hunter with his young medium sized bull hanging (big enough for a great mount, young enough for fairly good eating). The old bull shown in the other photo is huge, he would make an outstanding mount and a lot of buffalo burger, too old for many good steaks. 

Next on the agenda was to fill his antlerless deer tag, which as you might have guessed is no big sporting event either. This was the 6th time John hunted with us and we had a great time again, looking forward to the next hunt, sounds like it will be antelope.

[Pathfinder101]

THat's cool Bearpaw.  I have kicked around the idea of letting Pathfinder Jr shoot a meat buffalo sometime.  Nice Muley too.