Hunting Washington Forum
Big Game Hunting => Deer Hunting => Topic started by: stickbuck on November 22, 2012, 10:28:11 PM
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Well, I was going to wait until tomorrow to start my Alta late muzzy thread, but I just couldn’t wait any longer. Here you go BoomWhop. I know you were looking forward to this. After drawing this tag, I was very excited for the upcoming hunt. As I began my research, I quickly found out what the wolves and other predators have done to the deer numbers in the Alta. :bash: Trying to stay positive, I continued my research and scouted the unit in September after killing my first bull elk with a spike. It was right after all the massive fires started burning in Central WA so I was somewhat limited on the areas I could go due to all of the fire crew activity. I never saw a deer in my time scouting, but I was able to learn the road systems throughout the unit. I knew I was not scouting deer, but instead just trying to learn the area and to figure out where I wanted to camp. The scouting trip seemed to rejuvenate my mental state regarding the hunt. It also helped with all the great info I received from multiple members of HuntWA and I am sure you guys know who you are. You guys have helped me immensely and I greatly appreciate everything you guys have done with helping me learn the area. So now, the scouting is done. I have scoured map after map after map trying to figure out every south facing hill that these deer might be on. I am leaving on Saturday morning at 3am and heading east. I am hoping to be in the vicinity of my camp by daylight depending on the road conditions over Stevens. If I can get camp setup pretty early, it will definitely leave me some quality time to scout and determine what the deer activity is like. Attached are a few pics of this beautiful unit. I will definitely be keeping this thread updated over the week that I am there with details of the hunt. Good luck to all of you who have this tag!!
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Beautiful country! Good luck! :tup:
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Good luck, I drew the tag last year and had a blast, had lots of snow up high so the deer were down low, not as much snow this year so you should be able to cover more country :tup:
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Good luck and kill a good one!
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Can see the smoke on your pics from the fire up the Gold Cr. You should do well with that permit. Hope for some snow to get them down to the winter range not that there down there now. Shoot straight and keep the wind in your face!!
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Good luck Stickbuck, that looks like some familiar country there, you just have to picture it with snow and fog now.
http://www.methownet.com/methowwebcam.html (http://www.methownet.com/methowwebcam.html)
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Good luck Matt! Let me know if you need any help when you are up there as I would gladly take a day off work. :tup:
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:tup:
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Good luck Matt! Knock one down the first day and come hunt with me. :hello:
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Thanks Mike! Can you believe our separate muzzy adventures are upon us?!? I will do my best to get it done so I can come help you on your hunt at least for a few days. I will keep you updated Adam. It's going to be a wild solo hunt. Is it bad that my wife up'd my life insurance policy this week? Haha!!
Wea300mag, Thanks for the link on that website. I hope that fog lays down next week. Seeing that camera isn't very reassuring for the time being.
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Was up there Wednesday for work, saw lots of deer from the roads. Should be a good time.
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When does the hunt start? good luck
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Good luck :tup:
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I hope you get on a toad! can't wait for the story and pic :drool:
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Any update??????
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Fog Fog and fog is my guess :chuckle: Come on boys hit it hard.
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Took me long enough to post an update, but I figured I'd head into town and fill you guys in. Saturday before the opener I got camp all set up and started scouting and tried to figure out where the deer were at. I drove around quite a bit of the area and only saw a few does. I decided to check out a different area and on my way there I drove along the Twisp Carlton Road. I saw at least 50 deer, but the majority of them were does. I saw one two-point and one 2x3 that was about 22 inches wide. As it turns out, I've seen that 2x3 every day since Saturday. I'm going to meet the landowner tomorrow afternoon to find out if he will give me permission or not. He says he is pretty reluctant due to the fact that three deer were poached off his property over the weekend. At least it would be a last day option. The opener was pretty slow. I hiked my tail off into several large drainages that I figured held a decent amount of deer. To my surprise, I did not see a single deer on the opener on public land. My legs told me that I walked forever that day. During my hike that day, I found less than 20 sets of tracks. On day two, I decided to move further south into the unit. This definitely seemed to pay off as I spotted five does and a half rack four-point right off the bat. With only one horn, I chose to let him go. The rest of the day was somewhat uneventful. The only deer that I saw was a half rack two point. So at the end of day two, I was getting pretty frustrated on the lack of deer activity in the area that I was hunting. It made for a tired body walking in all that snow, but at least it was quiet for the most part. Today I decided to start the day by walking up behind camp. I walked a great deal and about halfway towards my destination the snow became really crunchy. It wasn't so bad in the open but when I got into the timber it started to really get crunchy. After about three hours of hiking, I decided to head back to the truck. I hadn't seen a deer and the few tracks that I did see were not fresh. This afternoon I headed back to the south part of the unit. Right off the bat, I saw another half rack buck that would've tempted me had he had his other side. After letting him walk off, I continued on. About 20 minutes before shooting hours are over, I had five does feed up to about 15 yards away. The lead doe seemed super curious as to what I was. The wind was directly at my back and it didn't seem to bother her one bit. After they fed off, a small little three point meandered into my shooting lane. At only about 35 yards away, he just continued to feed and didn't really care that I was sitting there. Since he was nit very wide, I decided that it wouldn't be wise to punch my tag on such a young buck with still three days the hunt. It definitely seems like some weather is moving in and it looks like we might be getting some moisture starting Thursday morning if not by the afternoon. I really hope some weather helps get these deer moving. I have talked to some landowners and they're really surprised the deer haven't come down yet. My feeling is that there is just not many deer. I'm still motivated and I will continue to press on in hopes of making it happen. My legs still feel fresh and I'm looking forward to getting back at it tomorrow at daybreak. Hopefully I have a better report in the next couple days. I will try to post up some of the pictures that i have taken here in the next day or so. Big thanks to Keith for all his advice on my hunt thus far.
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One other thing to point out is the fog after I read BoomWhop's reply. Other than Saturday, there has been zero fog each day. I am sure that will change once the moisture moves in Thursday and Friday. That being said, the moon has been super bright every night as I don't even need a flashlight when I get out of the trailer. Does anyone think that this is affecting the deer movement during this late season?
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I've been monitoring the Methow Webcams hoping for the best on the fog situation. :tup:
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Keep after it I took both bucks late in the hunt. One one the last day and the one last year on the eve of the last day. I saw more deer in the south end of the unit.
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Stay with it Stick you are doing well!! Hopefully the weather will cooperate and some of those spots I told you about will have some bucks move down. I know that with the back off in the weather some have headed back up. Keep at it
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It's a tuff hunt and hard to find a quality buck. Stick with it. Nail a big one :tup:
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R :dunno: how did the hunt end?
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Just got home and getting everything unloaded and put away and then onto butchering my buck. I will download pics and the details of the hunt a little later. Missed an opportunity at a true giant on Thursday right before dark at 132 yards. On Friday, ended up shooting a decent 2x2 right off the bat in the morning. The fog rolled in so bad we couldn't see more than 100 yards in front of us and it was only getting worse as the morning went on. I will post all the pics from the hunt in a few hours. It was a great hunt once the clouds rolled in Wednesday and kept the deer moving.
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Sounds like you had a great hunt, can't wait to see the pics.
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Pic?
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Well, I finally have gotten things squared away and spent some time with the family. Time for some of the hunt’s stories and pics. A big thanks goes out to Keith. Without your tips and advice, I don’t know what I would have done. It was very frustrating for me at times with the lack of deer and your PM’s helped me stay focused and motivated. This was going to be my third solo-hunting trip of the year. As many of you know, I ended up killing my first spike bull on a solo hunt in September. Just a week later, I had filled my second deer tag on a big muley doe. This was going to prove as my hardest solo hunt of the year since I had never hunted this unit. I was determined to make the most of my hunt. My legs were definitely ready for the challenge. I arrived into the Twisp area just before 10am on Saturday and setup camp at approximately 3,000 feet in elevation. Surprisingly, there were only a few inches of snow.
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Down around town, it was completely dry of any snow. After setting up camp, I decided to work on scouting my unit and the areas I wanted to focus on. I was really disappointed at the lack of sign in the areas I was going to hunt. The sign was extremely slim and I didn’t even see a deer up on the public ground during my scouting. It was at this point that I made my most costly mistake of the trip that would cost me a giant buck later in the week. I had wanted to shoot the gun to make sure that it was on and it just somehow slipped my mind on this day before the opener. It had crossed my mind the whole drive over that morning, but somehow it slipped my mind and I figured that it was surely on and kept scouting. I did scope out a really nice 2x3 down on the private. I ended up seeing him for four straight days and when I finally got permission to hunt him, he disappeared further up the ridge and onto a neighbor’s property who has a huge portion of the valley locked up. Down on a private stretch, I would typically see 40-60 deer driving to town everyday. I only saw three mule deer bucks the entire time I was looking at all these does. One was 22-24” 3x3, one was a 2x2, and the other was the really nice 2x3. Essentially, the lack of snow was really keeping the big boys from entering the picture.
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Late Saturday afternoon, I headed to another spot that I had permission to hunt and decided to go for a nice long walk. To my amazement, I walked in several miles and didn’t cut one fresh set of tracks in the snow or see a single deer. It was the night before the opener and I was puzzled as to where I would go hunt on the opener since all of my spots were barren of deer at the time. I needed more snow, but the forecast was for highs in the 20’s, lows in the upper teens, and clear skies into Wednesday morning. However, I did see a young spike whitetail that was rut crazed and didn’t quite know what to do with himself. I was also pleasantly surprised at the amount of turkeys I saw.
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Pics from the days leading up to Thursday. This unit definitely has some beautiful area that is for sure.
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This was one of three half rack bucks that I saw during the hunt. Looks like they definitely had been ruttin hard the previous week before I got into camp.
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Very Cool, love the pictures. My hunts did have more snow up there. I am glad you sealed the deal, this is no gimme hunt. I am surprised this is a quality buck tag. Good job and thanks for the posts. :tup:
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Tat country just looks like there should be lots of deer. Great pictures
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Since, I had already posted a mid-week update, I will fast forward to Thursday. Thursday started off with a bang. As I walked up some very open public ground early in the morning, I quickly jumped a nice 24” 3x4. He ran to the west across the field and I stood there and watched as he entered an aspen patch on the other side. Shortly thereafter, I instantly began to hear this buck wheezing. I was in complete shock as I have never heard this sound being made by a deer before. It didn’t sound like a snort wheeze made by a whitetail. This buck was making this nasally wheezing sound that was extremely long and drawn out. As this continued for several minutes, I decided to head in his direction and use the aspens as cover. Halfway across this wide-open field, I walked past a tiny pond and jumped six mallards out of it. As they flushed, so did the muley buck. As he ran up the hill, he was accompanied by a smaller 3x3. Apparently, they must have been facing off on the other side of the aspens that was out of my line of vision. I took off on a dead run for the aspens and I as I cleared the other side, they were broadside at approximately 175 yards. Too long for a shot, I decided to let them go and then start tracking them once they were out of sight. I tracked them uphill and down another finger until they crossed onto private ground. At that point, I had to retreat and let them go. I made it back to a spot that overlooks the huge field I had just crossed and instantly glassed up a nice 3x3 and 10 does. Within a few minutes, I was blanketed with a dense fog and could not see more than forty yards. Since the deer I glassed were more than 7-800 yards away, I decided to close the distance since it appeared that the fog had set in for the day. To my amazement, I was able to close the distance to about 100 yards. The does however were all alone on this huge hillside. The buck had somehow vanished before I had snuck into range. After they fed over the hill, I decided to hike towards the north boundary. After several hours of hiking, I decided to head back to the truck and regroup and figure out a different approach for the afternoon portion of the hunt. I decided I would try a forest service road towards the north end of the unit. During my drive towards the top, I had not even reached the top and the wet snow was becoming too much to manage so I found a place to turn around and head back towards town. I was somewhat discouraged that driving up through 10-12” of snow there were very few sets of fresh tracks. However, as I was heading down the hill, I glanced up into the clearcut and there stood the second largest mule deer I had ever seen. With extremely deep forks and a set of horns that were 3+ inches outside his ears on both sides, I slowly got out of the truck and tried to get in a position to shoot. At only 132 yards, I felt I could make this happen. As I pulled the hammer back and rested the smoke pole on a Doug Fir branch, he quickly turned and started bounding straight to the top of this cut. I ran back to the truck, parked it and proceeded up the hill after him. I skirted the edge of the cut and proceeded to the top trying to stay out of sight. Due to the deep snow and how steep it was, it took me almost twenty minutes to reach the top where he entered the timber. Once on his track, I followed them for at least 400 yards and he was still bounding. I continued straight uphill and his track began to slow from a bound to prancing at a pretty good clip. As I looked ahead, I could tell that his track was leading slowly up onto a small rise and prepared myself to be standing there watching his back trail. When I crested this small bench, I could tell that he had been standing there for quite some time before I spooked him back to bounding. At this point, I realized it was probably a lost cause, but I continued slowly after him. I had now been tracking for almost forty-five minutes and had yet to see him since he left the clearcut. The track slowed again as it entered some dark east facing slope timber and continued uphill. At an hour and ten minutes, the track crested the ridge and proceeded down some of the most rugged terrain. At that point, I sat down in the nearly 14 inches of snow and waved the white towel. This buck had tested my resolve and determination and as darkness was merely two hours away, I elected to move on and find another deer. It just wasn’t in the cards on this day. This was by far the largest mule deer I had seen on the trip and the second largest mule deer I have ever seen while hunting. With the mass, deep forks, and extremely long main beams, there was no doubt that this buck would easily have netted in the 170’s. I know a lot of guys don’t believe it, but he was a true giant. To me, a score in the 170’s easily would have been extremely conservative. It just wasn’t meant to be on this day, so I forged on to try and locate another buck.
With only several hours of darkness, I moved on and quickly found a group of deer out on an open ridge. With the permission from the landowner, I attempted to close the three hundred yards between this tall 22-inch wide 3x3. As I closed within 150 yards, I quickly realized the three does he was with had grown to at least 15 does and 1 spike. When I closed to 130 yards, I put the gun on the shooting sticks and pulled the trigger. To my dismay, I missed. I quickly reloaded and now had the attention of the entire herd. The 3x3 remained alert for several minutes before going back to his rutting behavior and chasing several of the hot does in the group. The closest I was able to get to him was 106 yards and proceeded to watch as I missed shots two, three, and four. After the fourth shot, I sat there with an unloaded gun and was trying to contemplate what had just happened. How could I have just missed four times with a gun that was dead on prior to the trip? This will probably haunt me for quite some time. I believed in the gun, but I should have fired at least a couple of rounds down range once I set up camp on Saturday. After retreating back to the truck severely defeated, I knew I had to head back to camp and shoot the gun before going into the field for the last day. What a day this had been, I had seen several beautiful bucks and squandered every opportunity that had come to me. It was a great lesson learned and something I will never let happen again. On the way back to camp, I touched base with another hunter in my unit that had connected on a beautiful 24” 4x4 earlier in the day. After hearing about my hunt, he offered me his gun for the last and final day of the permit season. After sharing stories and laughs over dinner, I was somewhat rejuvenated for the last day. As I returned to camp and turned out the lights, I struggled mightily to fall asleep. Over and over again, I kicked myself as I relived every second of the day that seemed not to go in my favor. Every year in the woods, I learn a lot and this year was no different, but this day was just too hard to swallow. Here are a few pics from Thursday's hunt.
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This is a pic that was taken just minutes after I was glassing a nice buck and ten does and then the damn fog rolled in.
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Wow there was really not much snow. Did you hunt booth canyon?
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Boom, I worked over towards Booth and that is where I saw the majority of the animals. I came in from the low public side. It was barren until Wednesday's snow and then all of a sudden the deer were there Thursday and Friday.
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Yeah its a long walk up from the bottom. When I pull this tag again I think I am going to back pack in from there and just stay up high on those open ridges.
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we saw a few bucks in that are last year too. The lower portion.
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The last and final day. As I approached the area we would hunt on the final day, my heart quickly sank at the amount of fog that had rolled up the valley. I proceeded to check my weather app for the area and saw that dense fog would blanket the region for the entire day. As daylight approached, you could see just over 100 yards and that was it. If the fog remained as forecasted, I would definitely not get a chance to go after that 3x3 or any of the other nice bucks on the hill. Once out of the truck, we started glassing doe after doe. There definitely was not a shortage of does in the area. We just couldn’t come up with anything bigger than a spike. On our way out, I glanced up on a finger and spotted a decent 2x2 at just over 50 yards. As the fog worsened, I elected to pursue this rut crazed young buck. At just under 20 yards, this buck turned broadside and I slowly squeezed the trigger. As my shot rang home, I watched this buck go about 20 yards before falling dead to a well placed shot behind the shoulder. Wouldn't you know that while I was gutting out my deer, more bucks passed through the same spot with another larger buck.
A lot of people will look at this buck and just see a small racked, two year old buck. To me, this is one of the hardest earned bucks I have ever killed. Obviously it is not the biggest buck I have ever killed, but it is one of the most special ones. I endured a lot on this trip and I learned a lot as well. When hunting alone, there is no one to blame when things go awry and when plans fall through but yourself. I learned that even though I may think I am prepared and ready, it never hurts to test the most important part of the hunt once you arrive in camp; THE GUN. I am truly blessed at the opportunity I had with this tag. Thanks to BoomWhop and PacificNWhunter for your knowledge of the area. Especially, thank you Keith for all your tips and ideas regarding my hunt. A big thanks goes out to Trevin for letting me shoot your gun on the final day. I hope I can repay the favor to you all someday.
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Nice job great adventure.
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Excellent story and great hunt. Congrats on the buck. :tup: :tup:
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Very cool buck. Even cooler story, thanks for sharing. You took us all on a memorable hunt with ya. :tup:
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You definitely made a lifetime of memories and in the end that is the most important thing.
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Matt,
Again congrats on a fine deer. While it might not have been what you had dreamed of it's good to know that you earned this buck. The Alta unit has been going thru alot of changes the past 8-10 years. It was a pleasure to help you out. Some good meat in the freezer and the best part a load of memories.
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Congrats!
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Congrats :tup:
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Congrats, nice deer. And it is yours so as long as you are happy with it is all that matters.
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I am glad you had a successful great adventure. I wasn't trying to be bleak when we chatted. The reallity is, its a lot harder than one might think it should be. Good job working for your hunt.
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:tup: :tup: Way cool!
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Bone, I'm glad you were realistic. I would've been extremely disappointed if I had gone into the hunt thinking I would see 40-50 deer a day and shoot a 170" buck. It turned out to be much more of a positive experience with a lot lower standards and expectations. Now I know better for what I will encounter in the future when I draw this again.
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Great write up stickbuck and nice buck!
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Congrats on your buck. It is a tough hunt. I had the tag two years ago and hunted hard the whole trip to shoot a buck that is almost identical to the one you shot. Way to stick with it. He will eat great. :cue:
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Bone, I'm glad you were realistic. I would've been extremely disappointed if I had gone into the hunt thinking I would see 40-50 deer a day and shoot a 170" buck. It turned out to be much more of a positive experience with a lot lower standards and expectations. Now I know better for what I will encounter in the future when I draw this again.
People don't get what the wolves have done. Its not propaganda. Its not Fitkin story time. They have decimated that unit and continue to do so. I literally grew up in everyone of those photos you posted. Imagine me without kids or a wife. Where do you think I was? its really sad as you can't imagine how it was back in the day. Sky knows.
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Bone, I'm glad you were realistic. I would've been extremely disappointed if I had gone into the hunt thinking I would see 40-50 deer a day and shoot a 170" buck. It turned out to be much more of a positive experience with a lot lower standards and expectations. Now I know better for what I will encounter in the future when I draw this again.
People don't get what the wolves have done. Its not propaganda. Its not Fitkin story time. They have decimated that unit and continue to do so. I literally grew up in everyone of those photos you posted. Imagine me without kids or a wife. Where do you think I was? its really sad as you can't imagine how it was back in the day. Sky knows.
You are right when you say that people don't understand what the wolves have done. I met a wolf tracker while out hunting one day in that unit. He was spreading poor information thinking I didn't know any different especially when he told me how the wolves in the area I was in only kill one deer every 10-14 days and that the wolves are not the reason for the deer decline. What a joke it was to here his so called facts spewing from his mouth.
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Just like Bone says it's ridiculous how the deer numbers have changed over the years. I have hunted this unit since I was a kid. There was a time when it was nothing to go out and see 30 deer in the evening and that was just in September while glassing a hillside. It really is a shame to see how far downhill it has gone. Fitkin has his own agenda and telling the true story isn't one of them.
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Nice buck you really earned that buck! I laugh at the game people when you ask about deer number's and they say the unit's are at there "carrying capacity" yet like said when I was a kid we would go for drives and see 50 or 60 a night now if when I go for a drive I'm really excited to see 10 or 12 :bash: but that's all the land can handle as far as they're concerned. :dunno:
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Bone, I'm glad you were realistic. I would've been extremely disappointed if I had gone into the hunt thinking I would see 40-50 deer a day and shoot a 170" buck. It turned out to be much more of a positive experience with a lot lower standards and expectations. Now I know better for what I will encounter in the future when I draw this again.
People don't get what the wolves have done. Its not propaganda. Its not Fitkin story time. They have decimated that unit and continue to do so. I literally grew up in everyone of those photos you posted. Imagine me without kids or a wife. Where do you think I was? its really sad as you can't imagine how it was back in the day. Sky knows.
You are right when you say that people don't understand what the wolves have done. I met a wolf tracker while out hunting one day in that unit. He was spreading poor information thinking I didn't know any different especially when he told me how the wolves in the area I was in only kill one deer every 10-14 days and that the wolves are not the reason for the deer decline. What a joke it was to here his so called facts spewing from his mouth.
You saw those guys too...I never stopped and talked to them but passed their truck in the dark the 1st 2 mornings. Saw them the weekend before while scouting too. Congrats again on a hard earned buck.
