A big thanks to Kilowatt for helping me get these pics posted. I really appreciate it! Sorry for all you dial-uppers!! They still are a little bit big.
The first two pics are of my dad's buck, and the other three are mine.
It was quite interesting how the whole thing played out. Opening morning of the rifle deer hunt in UT, my dad decided to split up. We usually hit the same canyone together, but I decided to do something a little different due to the weather. Anyway...My dad spotted his buck about 8:00 a.m. He ended up hitting the buck, but wasn't able to see exactly where he had gone, due to the thick fog that rolled in. About an hour later, he radio'd me and told me he had one hit. We made a game plan, and he sent me over to where he "thought" he had last seen it, as he watched from across the canyon. He had me looking a little higher than he should had. I looked around a bit and didn't see anything, so decided to go check out a little side canyon...as maybe he had headed over there.
I got to the canyon and spotted what I thought was his buck. He was standing about 275 yards away. I shot and hit the buck in the front shoulder. He went about 75 yards and laid down. My dad headed over and we watched the buck for about 3 hours, and then the fogged rolled in again, and it was bad enough you couldn't see 60 yards. Told my dad lets go, and we'll come back in the morning.
We split up heading out of the canyon. My dad got me on the radio on our way out...he had stumbled upon his buck. It had only went about 150 yards from where he hit it, and died.
Came back the next morning and the fog hadn't left. We waited about 4 hours for it to break and headed down to where we had last seen my buck bedded. Didn't see him. I had passed up alot of bucks since I shot my first spike with my bow when I was 14, and I was nervous that I wounded an animal and wasn't going to find him. So...we headed down the canyon to where we last saw him. I came around a big oak brush and there he was. I don't think I have ever been so excited about something. It was awesome!
It's a little hard to tell from the pics, but he's a 6x7. He has some extras on both back forks. One of the heaviest bucks I've seen in my 10 years of hunting.
So...it was pretty interesting how the whole thing played out. It was a great hunt!
Hope you enjoy the pictures.
Justin