Well a shortened version of this story was in the NorthWest Sportsman Magazine and I recieved a email from Eastmans a while ago saying they were considering the story but its time to post it up here, enjoy.
Incentive - Noun
1. A positive motivational influence.
2. An additional payment (or other remuneration) to employees as a means of increasing output.
This is Websters definition of incentive, and clearly the motivation behind the Washington Dept. Fish & Wildlife push to have all of us fill out harvest reports on time. For those unfamiliar with the process, every year hunters are asked, by WDFW, to report their success, or lack there of, in an effort to help them better understand and keep track of big game numbers. This information helps them set hunting seasons and allocate special permits, as well as several other important factors.
WDFW realized that although this reporting was important, the hunting community didn’t seem to make it a priority, therefore late reporting or the omission of reporting was becoming the norm. They needed some way for the hunting community to buy into the process. The brainchild was what is now referred to as “The Incentive Tag.”
The Incentive Tag has since become known as one of “The Big Three,” having basically the same freedoms and luxury as the “Raffle Tag” and the big daddy of them all, the “Auction Tag.” What this tag does is allows the lucky individual the opportunity to add an additional deer/elk to their harvest, at the same time expanding their season for that particular animal from September 1st – December 31st, in any GMU that was open for harvesting big game during that year.
The public forums are all abuzz with anticipation when the draws are finally announced and this year was no different. Bummed that I had not drawn any of the permits I had applied for, I got online to check and see how my many internet friends had faired. There were a few happy hunters, but for most of us the depression of knowing it would be yet another year before we would get to hunt our choices had just set in.
I was sitting there checking out some of the threads when I noticed a young man had posted saying he had drawn the incentive tag, His name was Tom and this would be his second season of hunting, he was looking for suggestions on where and when to go to take advantage of this tag. There was no shortage of opinion and soon his head was spinning with information overload.
I kept track of his progress as the season went on and as November came and started to go he still had not filled his tag. I sent him a email and told him that if he found himself in a pinch and needed someone to help or just tag along that I would be up for it, he said he would take me up on it if the time came.
December 6th I received another email from Tom informing me that he could not hunt the rest of the month as he would be heading out of town for the holidays, and wanted to know if I would like to go hit the hit hills with him. With hunting season being over for me and cabin fever beginning to set in, he didn’t have to ask me twice. I let him know I could go but it would have to be the following weekend. He said he was going to go during the week but would let me know if he still had his tag the following weekend. I received another email that next Saturday the 12th, he still had his tag. I said I can go but now had plans for the evening of Monday the 14th but could leave Tuesday morning after dropping the kids off at school. He said great, I will see you on the East side around noon on Tuesday the 15th.
I packed up my truck with a weeks worth of gear and Tuesday morning hit the road. The pass was a winter wonderland, 21*, snowing heavily with compact snow and ice covering the entire highway. I made my way over but ran a little longer than anticipated, so I ended up meeting Tom at 1:00pm in McD’s. We shook hands and chatted while standing in line for a quick lunch. After grabbing a burger and ice-t we were off. With the intention on hitting some areas farther north we decided to stop at an area on the way and hunt the last couple hours of daylight, getting in as much hunt time as we could.
The first area we decided to hit had a good 6”-7” of fresh powder and I could tell that Toms street tires on his Suzuki were not going to cut it. Watching him slide all over the place I motioned for him to pull over. I told him to grab his gear and get in, this would allow us to check out both sides better while heading up into the hills anyway and not have to spend our remaining time digging out of a ditch. This also gave us time to chat and get to know each other better. Tom informed me that this would be his first big game animal and I could tell he was as excited as a kid in a candy store.
We drove up to a ridge, got out and started glassing, spotting deer in almost every draw. Walking from draw to draw we would check them out, get deer in the spotter and discuss them. I pointed out a young 2 ˝ year old three point, Tom gets all excited and asks “should I go after him” smiling I said no, way too small. This happened a couple more times before I spotted a good buck in the timber about 100 yards off. He was very tall, had good mass and looked to be about 26”-27” wide. Long tines and mains but his right g3 was only about 7”. I told Tom I would put him in the 170 class and asked him if he could see it. It took a minute or so before he picked the buck up but thought he looked good enough to go after. It was right at the end of shooting light, between us and the buck were some small branches crossing between the trees. I explained to Tom that although he could probably make the shot, unless he dropped it right where it stood we may run the risk of losing it before dark. We both agreed to pass on the buck and headed back to the truck and down the mountain.
On the way back down to Toms car I asked him where he had planned on staying for the night. He looked at me with a confused look and said he really hadn’t thought about it, although we were both prepared to sleep in our rigs in sleeping bags. He looked a little down and I told him not to worry about finding a good buck, I knew the areas well and was sure we would get him one before the weekend so he could catch his flight. That’s when the “pucker factor” came into play. Tom then informed me he had to get up at 4:00am Thursday morning to catch his flight, he could only hunt through tomorrow and would have to leave, with or without having filled his tag.
As you can imagine the pressure multiplied ten fold, but having been in the same situation with my own tag the year before, I knew it wasn’t over until the fat lady was singing, and she wasn’t warming up yet.
The next morning Tom was pounding on my window at 5:30am, clearing off his windows and warming up his car. I got out of my bag and got dressed, noticing the temp was 18*. I dressed for the bitter cold temps, got out to discuss the plans for the day. The snow had stopped and the clouds looked to have lifted a little bit. Trying to stay positive about the whole situation I told Tom “wouldn’t it be great if we dropped your buck and the sky was bright blue with big fluffy white clouds for the pictures.” he smiled and skeptically said “yeah, that would be awesome”.
I suggested taking our time since it wouldn’t be light out until after 7:00am and we didn’t want to be driving past a good buck in the dark. Tom ordered breakfast and I grabbed a couple ice-t’s for the road and we were off. Shortly after we hit our turn and headed up into the hills. I flashed Tom with my headlights to get him to pull over.
About ˝ mile up the road we pulled over and waited, it was light enough to see the snowy road but still not light enough to be able to pick out deer without the use of optics. We got out of the cars and I pointed up one of the hills to make my point. Although the hills were covered with snow we still were likely to drive by any deer that were not out in the open. I could tell Tom was excited and itching to get going so we took off.
We stopped a couple miles in and dropped off Toms car, he grabbed his gear and jumped in. Only a couple miles up the road my worst fear was becoming reality, the fog was getting thicker and thicker the higher we climbed. We headed for the area we had seen the tall buck the night before, and saw a few does and a couple small bucks. The first buck we spotted was a old mature buck. I put the scope on him and noticed he was one of those “Super Forkies,” mature buck with heavy dark antlers but lacking the genes to make him anything but a 2 point. He was about 2” outside his right ear but his left side main was broke right in half.
We continued up to the ridge when Tom spotted a buck out the passenger side of the car. I stopped and we both put up our binos. I saw a 3 ˝ year old 3 point and thats all I could see besides the back of Toms head. I was just about to drive off when Tom said “there’s a bigger one” I got my binos up just in time to see the big buck from the night before, bounding off into the fog. We parked, grabbed our gear and went in after him. We followed in the snow but with visibility of about 50 yards it was evident there was little chance of getting on him. We headed back for the truck and hit some other spots. We hunted in the fog until about noon and realized it was unlikely to lift before dark so we decided to drop down in elevation and hunt the lower draws.
The next couple hours were pretty uneventful, small 130-140 class bucks but nothing with any real size or character. At about 2:00pm I told Tom we had about 2 hours of light left and should go hit a different area I knew. I had been given a report by a friend that had seen a couple decent bucks a couple days before in the area and he said it might be worth a look.
We headed down out of the hills but I really wanted to check the last draw before hitting the road. We stopped where we had pulled over on the way in in the morning, remember it had still been dark. I pulled up my binos and spotted a buck right away. Grabbing the scope, I set it up and could tell right away Tom would like him. He had a nice typical frame with long mains and an outside spread of about 27”. He had average mass and had a small kicker out each side. I estimated upper 170’s gross on the conservative side and got out to talk with Tom. I walked back to his car where he was glassing and asked him if he saw him. He said he saw the two does but didn’t see the buck. I told him to come check him out through the spotter and let me know what he thought. He took a look and the two of us decided that with not much light left, we should make a stalk.
Tom grabbed his gear, I grabbed mine and off we went. We worked our way up to get as close as we could without spooking him. We soon ran out of cover and decided to set up for a shot. Tom placed the sticks in the snow and got a good rest. He sat down in the snow and dialed in his scope. I set my spotter up to watch and snapped a couple pics of the buck on the hill while he was still on the hoof. Once done with a couple pics I got back behind the spotter to watch and all of a sudden I spotted another buck. I zoomed in on him to compare but it didn’t take but a second to decide which one I would shoot.
Tom saw the new buck about the same time through his scope and held his shot. He asked me which one he should shoot and naturally I said “shoot the biggest one” Laughing, I told him that if it were my tag I would shoot the new buck. Quick field judging I could see he had great backs, well over 18” and long g3’s as well. His g4’s looked to be close to the g3’s and he had huge mass. He had nice brows too but his mains looked to be on the short side. Overall I told Tom I thought he was a solid 170 class buck and even had the potential to be larger.
That was all Tom needed. He hunkered down behind his scope, took a deep breath and let it out, squeezing the trigger the buck humped up and started limping off around the knob, he was hit hard and wouldn’t go far.
We hiked up the rest of the way, to just under the ridgeline and started side hilling until we found blood in the snow. There was a clear line to follow and I knew he wouldn’t be far. We got around the knob and found a spot he had bedded down in but must have heard us coming and got back up. I had Tom jack another cartridge in and slowly lead the way, we knew he was just ahead of us. Just then the buck stood up, about 80 yards out. Tom settled in behind his scope again and finished him off, the buck took a nose dive into the snow. Tom turned to me with a grin even his orthodontist would be proud of. I gave him a quick high five and congratulations, he had just filled his Incentive tag.
Being on a steep slope, when the buck hit the snow, he slid more than 100 yards down the hill, finally piling up next to a tree. His rack had got caught under a boulder on the way down and his momentum had carried his body up and over the rock, leaving him to rest with half his body sticking straight out over the ledge. I took picks as Tom checked to make sure he was done and then wrestle the rack out from under the boulder. Once the rack was free, the weight of the buck propelled him over the rock and onto the snow.
As luck would have it, about that time the sky opened up and was the brightest blue you could imagine. The clouds that remained were like giant cotton balls, we couldn’t have planned it any better, even though that morning we were joking about it. We snapped some pics and let him go, he slid almost the rest of the way to the bottom.
Now the real work begins I told him. I asked him if he brought a knife, I had, so I wasn’t worried. He pulled out a brand new one, this would be his first field dressing, for him and his knife. I talked him through the whole process without a hitch, he did it like a pro, grinning the entire time. It wasn’t until later that he admitted he thought I was hazing him when it came to hollowing out “the hole,” but after he was done he understood why.
We slid the buck to the road and I was just about to walk to retrieve Toms car when the game warden came pulling up. He got out and asked how we were doing, I don’t think he needed to ask, the ear to ear grin on Toms face should have given it away. I explained to the officer that Tom had just taken his first buck and that he was the holder of the Incentive Tag. The officer was clearly overjoyed to hear this, probably thinking that we had just poached the deer. He explained that he really wished that holders of these tags would call and inform them that they would be in the areas, so when they get phone calls they don’t panic, which is understandable.
He checked out Toms credentials and then checked out the buck. He had about as big a grin as Tom did, patting him on the back. “That’s a dandy of a first buck you got there” he said, “going to be hard to top him.” I waited by the buck as the officer gave Tom a ride back to pick up his car. On the way back by, the officer stopped and asked if we would stop at the station in town so his biologist could take a look at him. We stopped at the station and one look at the buck he was grinning like Tom too. He asked if we would send him the lower jaw so he could run some tests but he tentatively thought the buck was about 5 ˝- 6 ˝ years old.
The moral to the story, although Tom has filled out only one report in his life, he did it and he did it on time. Get your reports in and this could be you next season.
A great buck for anyone at any point in their hunting career, let alone their first. Congrats again to my new friend Tom, I’m proud of you for staying positive and sticking with it, well done!
