My 09 Hunting season.

[buckmaster_wa]

Well to begin the 2009 season I found out that I had successfully drawn a great Muzzleloader Bull tag. That was a surprise since I only had Two points. I then drew a good late buck tag in Idaho, and to top it off I drew a multi-season deer tag. It was looking like it might be a good year.

Well on the Third day of ML deer season I hiked into a new area and took stand. I was hanging out next to a huge pine tree, trying to stay out of the 30 mph winds. When the wind died at about 0800, a couple bucks appeared below me in the canyon. I radioed my hunting partner that I had two legals below me and I was going after them. Rather then go into detail I will just say that I missed the smaller buck and then I missed my opportunity at the bigger buck ( about a 22-24 inch 4x5). Next time I will have a range finder with me. After missing both the bucks. I sat there beating my head on the tree and out came a medium sized black bear. I couldn't believe that 15 minutes after I just shot at two deer, a bear would appear out of the same canyon. He just grazed his way up the hill and my hunting partner missed him at 133 yards (he had a range finder). So that was my most exciting day of ML hunting ever.

Now on to my ML bull hunt. On opening day Two of my hunting partners and myself hiked about Three miles into a roadless area. We were calling every so often and had not got a response yet. Finally at 1100 we got a response. The bull came in to about 90 yards and when I finally got a glimpse of him it was a glimpse of his back side as he ran off. Then we got a couple more responses and nothing came into range. It was now about noon and we were heading back towards the truck to go try another area. We were hiking through some really thick stuff and were making a fair amount of noise. My hunting partner (Wazzuhunter) was letting out a few hoochie mamma calls on our way towards the truck. Then all of a sudden about 150 yards above us a bull lets out a scream. I move forward 10 yards and Wazzuhunter and Ryan stay back and let out some more hoochie mammas. The bull comes running down the hill and stops at 35 yards. I notice that he is just a big 5 point ( just what I didn't want to see). I couldn't hold back and let him have it. Seven hours and two trips later we had the bull packed to the truck.

Then opening weekend of Rifle deer season Wazzuhunter, Ryan and BLRMans 8 month pregnant wife all got there bucks. The second weekend of rifle season. I got my buck and while packing it to the truck my dads buddy drops the front half of my deer off his shoulders and throws up his gun. I look 100 yards to my right and notice a buck staring at us. I confirm that the buck has a legal eyeguard and Tim gives the buck a dirt nap. Tim hadn't shot a buck since he was 18 and he was now 48 years old ( talk about a dry streak). Then on the last day of the deer season I told Clockumelk (Aaron) that there was one other legal buck in the group of deer that I got mine out of. He hiked over a couple of ridges spotted the group of deer and harvested his first buck.      Then during the late season I took a buddy of mine over to the property I hunt and he killed his first buck, a decent three point whitetail. And my two other hunting partners also got there bucks on my property in the late season. We ended up getting 9 bucks this year. Only two hunters didn't kill bucks this year.   

I havent yet got pics of my Idaho buck on the computer so I will do that in the next couple days.  Enjoy the pics.

[buckmaster_wa]

Heres the deer pics. The first pic is Tims buck. Then two pics of my buck, then a picture of BLRMans 8 month pregnant wife with her buck.

[buckmaster_wa]

I will try to get some pics of some of the other bucks harvested. Nothing big but you cant be to picky in Washington.   

[Pathfinder101]

Very cool!  She's a real trooper to be out there 8 months preggers deer hunting!  I am going to go out on a limb and say that she wasn't shooting from the prone position...
Congrats on the rest of your successes this year.  Nothing in the world wrong with that 5x5 bull.

[whacker1]

That should give my wife some motivation when we go down the path of baby # two.
Congrats on a great season

[buckmaster_wa]

We might be able to get Clockumelk to put a pic of his buck on here. And maybe Wazzuhunter will put a pic of his trophy buck on here. 

[Karl Blanchard]

"trophy buck" that's not sarcasm is it?

[fishermanjoe]

"trophy buck" that's not sarcasm is it?

any buck on the ground is a trophy in my book. Good times buckmaster!

[wackmaster]

It is about time you posted pics it is only feb 2010

[PacificNWhunter]

Looks like a great year!

[Bigshooter]

Can't wait to see the Idaho pics.   

[zackmioli]

wow! you had a damn good year!

[Pathfinder101]

Can't wait to see the Idaho pics.   

 

[Deep Forks]

  Your hunting party had a fine year, backstraps for everyone.   Better keep an eye out behind you next year, could be people following   
Awesome elk too, you've got many memories.        

[OneHorn]

looks like you had a great year man

[Bigshooter]

Idaho Pics??

[bighunter]

Nice elk Dan. Get a picture of your idaho buck on here!

[Crunchy]

Nice bull and great story.  Nothing like hearing bulls scream at ya.

[wazzuhunter]

Alright here's the some pics to add to buckmaster_wa's post.  The first pick is the "monster" whitetail that buckmaster_wa was making fun of me for in the first post.  Another buddy (Ryan) and I walked into some property that I shot my buck on last season on opening day and came out of there two hours later with our bucks.  We walked up a ridge and looked down in the first finger and spotted the larger whitetail in the bottom pic and Ryan dumped him about 5 minutes into shooting hours.  While Ryan was gutting his deer I decided to walk over to the next draw and see what was in there.  I glassed the draw and saw nothing, so I decided to turn back and help Ryan with his buck.  As soon as I turned around I heard a ruckus in the tumbleweeds at the bottom of the draw, so I turned around.  Lone behold here was a whitetail buck hauling ass out of there about 115 yards away.  I confirmed that the deer was legal and decided that I would go for a neck shot as I new it was a small buck and was willing to take the chance of missing.  I took a free-handed shot and down went the buck and that was the end of Ryan and my 2009 Washington deer season.  It lasted a whole 20 minutes.  This is the second year in a row that I have tagged my buck in the same area within 20 minutes of opening light.  Hopefully I can get rid of my itchy trigger finger so I can hunt a little longer this season.

My 2009 Whitetail. 13" Inside Spread 4x4


A picture of the shot placement


My deer, BLRman's wife's buck, and Ryan's buck all shot opening morning.

[Pathfinder101]

That's a whole lotta "happy" on the tailgate of that truck...

[buckmaster_wa]

Well I couldnt get my scanner to work so I just took pictures of pictures. Not the best quality but they will work. The first picture is of Ryans buck. It was his first time hunting out of state and he made the mistake of shooting the first decent buck he saw. I was happy he did though because we ate backstrap at our spike camp the whole time we were there.

The next picture is of our spike camp.

[buckmaster_wa]

The next picture is of my buck as he lay. The only thing that kept him from rolling all the way down the mountian was his antlers. Followed by me holding the buck and me packing him out of the hell hole.

[buckmaster_wa]

I owe a big thanks to one of the members on this site. He pointed me in the right direction and I cant thank him enough for it. I passed up a really big 3x4 on the second day of the hunt but I was still happy with what I got. We seen about 5-10 bucks a day with 2-3 of them being nice bucks. On day 5 of a 6 day hunt the big Three stepped out at 350 yards. I checked him out with the spotter for about 5 minutes and finally decided I wanted to take him. I have always liked big three points with back forks and now I got one on my wall.  

[buckmaster_wa]

Then when Ryan and I were heading down the trail to base with our spike camp on our backs, I spotted a little four point bedded down in a little draw. I met a woman at base camp the day before and she told me she was after her first buck. I dropped my pack in the trail and boogied the rest of the way down to the base camp. Luckily the lady was at her tent and I got her and hurried back up the trail. When we got the the draw the buck was still bedded. We got within 75 yards of the buck and the lady got her first buck.  Heres some pics.

[C-Money]

What a great year you folks had! Sounds like your skinning knives stayed very busy! Good to see Gal's getting out and getting deer too! That was nice to help a person you just met get her first deer. Bet she was excited.

[buckmaster_wa]

Oh yeah she was excited. She actually missed the first shot at the buck at 75 yards. Then the buck stood up and looked around and she dropped him.

[buckmaster_wa]

Clockemelk. Go ahead and post pics of the buck you got. Post pics of Dans buck if you got em as well.

[Bigshooter]

Thanks for posting the Idaho pics.  That's a great 3pt.

[Karl Blanchard]

Aaron's buck last day of the season 380 yards.  300 yard belly crawl through an open  winter wheat Field.  Luckily he had a steel bench rest to shoot off of, a.k.a my butt cheak.  He was really wishing we hadn't dropped our packs! One shot dropped him in his tracks.

[Pathfinder101]

Nice work guys!

[Magnum_Willys]

Hunting with four friends when they all got their first ever bulls in the Toutle was a blast, only topped by hunting with my 14 yr. old son and my brother in Iowa - what a kick !  

[buckmaster_wa]

Thats a nice Willys pickup.

[fishunt247]

Jesus Dan, work must be a little boring if you had time to post all of this. We know you aren't that educated, so it must have taken about three hours to type that four paragraph essay.  You should coax the game dept. into jailing some poachers so you will have something to do.

[Pathfinder101]

OK, now I understand your screen name (I think...).

Seriously, that's an awesome truck!  Congratulations on the great year

[Magnum_Willys]

Ha Ha - Did you think "Magnum Willys" was a name my wife gave me ?     

[Pathfinder101]

Ha Ha - Did you think "Magnum Willys" was a name my wife gave me ?     

 

[colockumelk]

Okay Dan I finally found those pics of your buddies buck.  To make a long story short.  This guy missed three bucks before he killed this one.   He used two different guns and missed a total of 20+ shots.  I'll let Dan tell the amazing kill story that is this buck.   Trust me its a pretty funny story. 

[buckmaster_wa]

Yeah that was an interesting day hunting with that fellow. The first buck I spotted he went up and over the hill and ended up shooting at him 4 times. All misses. Then I spotted a nice 5 pt buck with a doe at the edge of an eyebrow. We snuck up to the eyebrow and got 75 yards from the buck and he had no clue we were there. He got into position and shot before the cross-hairs were on the deer. He said he forgot about the hair trigger. He then went after the buck over a few hills and came back and told me he had shot 5 more times at the buck without hitting it. We then sat in a spot overlooking the river bottom in the evening. There were some guys shooting clay pigeons up fiver about a half mile, so I didn't really expect anything to come out that evening. Well about fifteen minutes after they quit shooting, this buck stepped out from the brush at 230 yards and just stood there. It took about ten minutes of me pointing out the buck before Dan finally saw it. Then he shot four times, clean misses. The deer just stood there. I couldn't believe it. I think it was because of the guys shooting earlier, the deer didn't realize the shots were now aimed at him. Then Dan shot Four more times without hitting the deer. Then on his last Three shots he hit the deer Three times, and that was it. He finally got his first buck after 22 shots.

[fishunt247]

Dan, the crowd you run with singlehandedly may keep the ammo companies in business. Between muzzleloading and rifle hunting you guys must have put ten pounds of lead into the air. 

[hoosier85]

awesome man. hope to get my future wife into hunting, well actually shooting  while hunting