Winthrop:the dagger buck and book bear. pic heavy

[mkcj]

The boys and i had high hopes for this season as we had spent a lot of time in the area we were going to be hunting. We planned on hunting the first four days and the last weekend of the season. Opening morning found us up high watching over a couple big canyons. About thirty minutes into it my oldest boy radioed and said he was watching a buck at 450 yards. He could see deep forks but couldn't put a third point on it. by the time the sun came up the buck had disappeared over the ridge. that was it for day one except for helping a couple guys hang a small three point in there camp. Day two we decided to hunt a little lower in an area where we had seen a deer in July with odd antlers. I drove the boys up to the top of the ridge and dropped them off. I drove back down to the bottom and started up the hill towards them. i had made it about 50 yards when i realized i had forgot my radio so i went back to the truck and got it. i started back up the hill walking slowly checking my feet and looking ahead at the same time. all of a sudden i looked up and realized there was a deer standing at the top of the ridge in front of me on the skyline. i dropped to one knee and looked at it through my binoculars and immediately realized it was the buck i had seen in July. he was only 200 yards from where i had seen him over the summer. when i found him in the crosshairs he was standing broadside, i pulled the trigger and realized that the safety was still on $%&#. i turned the safety off, pulled the trigger and dropped him in his tracks. within seconds i got a call on the radio from the boys asking if that was me. i said of course and he's down. the next two days resulted in nothing but a bunch of does. drove back to the cabin Friday night. Saturday morning we decided to try a different area a couple miles away. we saw nothing all morning. that afternoon we walked a trail and got rained and snowed on pretty hard but saw nothing again. the final morning found us back on the same skid road we had hunted opening morning. after about an hour i stayed to watch the clearings and sent the boys farther down the road into an area we had never been before. i told them to go down the road and drop into the ravine and follow the bottom back up. i will let my son tell the rest of the story. my name is CJ, my brother Justin and i started down the old skid road which was very overgrown, trying to be as quiet as possible. the ravine we were supposed to drop down into started getting very steep and thick so we decided to keep going down the road which was starting to turn into nothing but a trail. we rounded a corner and the ravine opened up offering some great views to the other side. we stopped and glassed at a few different spots along the hillside. we had almost reached the top of the ravine when i noticed something that i originally thought to be a stump but seemed to be too round. at this point i start thinking BEAR! we both got down and got ready to shoot but still couldn't decide if it was really a bear. i looked up at Justin one more time to ask what he thought and he looked up and said IT MOVED! I immediately put my head back down to my rifle and saw that it had sat up and BOOM he was down. i radioed dad right away and old him I got a bear and to start heading this way. meanwhile Justin was looking at the bear through the binoculars and realized that there was an antler beside the bear. upon further inspection we realized that the rock the bear was sleeping next to was actually a dead two point. we had been told the day before that someone had shot a two point earlier in the week and left it but we didn't know where it was. by the time we got down to it dad showed up on the ridge above us. after getting to it we realized that it looked like a pretty good bear having never shot one before. we left and went back to the cabin to get all the rope we had and a piece of plywood to drag it out on so we wouldn't ruin the hide. we also  brought mom back with us to take pictures. it ended up taking about 2+ hours to get it up out of the hole it was in. today we brought it to our taxidermist outside of portland. Darwin said the bear would easily go 300 pounds and measured the skull at 20 inches even. after skinning the bear we trimmed off 55 pounds of fat off the hind quarters and back only. we then brought it to the butcher, it weighed 165 pounds on the hook. we plan on going back next weekend as we heard there were three more bears seen in the area. the season turned out to be everything we were hoping for.

The Dagger buck (Butcher in Twisp named him)



Cj's bear

[Ridgerunner]

heck of a nice bear, too bad about the 2pt being shot and left, happens way more than it should.

[jamesjett]

Congrats! Good write up! Thanks for sharing!

[smdave]

I count 3 points on one side, I guess thats the dagger deer, Nice bear.

[TommyH]

Nice job and congrats! way to take care of and save that hide from the drag out with the board! Great story and pics!

[1buckdown]

Great story.  We were in winthrop for 5days seen 50 doe and 1 spike.  But it was great camping!

[Ellensburg]

Huge bear and a really sweet looking deer. Successsssss

[CountryslickR]

Cool dagger buck, and great looking bear!

[saylean]

Gorgeous bear! Freakish buck! Looks like quite the time.

[longashes]

Sounds like an awesome hunt! The bear down next two the dead two point is bizarre .

[h20hunter]

If that is the same two point mentioned in a previous thread I guess we know the answer. The kid feared his dad and the repurcussions of what he had done. To bad you can't report your find and take home the head and horns. Mount it up with the bear skull or something for a nice story. Cool deer and bear.

[250savage]

congrats. nice colored bear should make a cool rug.

[mkcj]

It's going to be a 3/4 wall mount with a rock base 1 paw up and the other resting on the skull of "a" deer. I did not see the post about the 2 point that was shot and left? I was told the hanging weight at the butcher is around 55% of it's total weight is that true?

[CountryslickR]

It's going to be a 3/4 wall mount with a rock base 1 paw up and the other resting on the skull of "a" deer. I did not see the post about the 2 point that was shot and left? I was told the hanging weight at the butcher is around 55% of it's total weight is that true?

I didnt see the thread about the 2 point either...

[h20hunter]

Sorry...I've looked and can't find it. It was a post in a current thread just in the last day or two. A member posted that they were hunting in the same area, glassed a two point, passed, then had a young guy cross his path. They exchanged hello and continued on. Soon after a shot rang out and the guy went back to find the young guy/kid standing over a dead two point. He described the young man as being as shaken up about his mistake as what would happen when he got back to camp and his dad found out. He gave out a bit of lecture, told the kid to make the right decision and left. He said he wondered what the decision was.