Well we are back home from our week in Wyoming. We had a blast hunting antelope and scouting for possible deer and elk hunts in the coming years. We saw so many antelope it was silly. We obviously spent a lot of time in our unit but we also spent some time in neighboring units that require half the points to draw and frankly the difference in numbers and to some degree quality was hardly noticeable. Of course one significant difference was the amount of accessible public land but we saw plenty of goats and some nice ones on the accessible public land. So my first piece of advice would be to hunt more often and not accumulate lots of points. I would say once you have 4-6 points use them.
We arrived in Cheyenne on Sunday morning early and met up with my niece who is a teacher in Cheyenne. She is getting married next weekend in Omaha and it was really nice to visit with her and we are looking forward to her wedding this weekend. We left there and arrived in our unit about 1:00 p.m. Sunday.
The first photo is of my brother and his antelope. It is a really nice goat except for I did not notice that one of his cutters was broken off before I told him I thought it was a shooter. Still a really pretty goat and we snuck within 90 yards.
Mine was not the biggest antelope but it was a fun stalk and fun shooting situation. The antelope had been feeding on a bench and once they dumped off the side we climbed up to the top and peaked over to find them feeding about 160 yards out. Watched them for a while before I decided I liked the set up and was happy enough with his size. We only hunted two days but covered a lot of ground in the area and saw so many antelope. One thing I love about antelope hunting is that you can hunt them from sunrise to sunset.
We then spent a day looking over the local mule deer and I simply would not burn my 10 points in Unit 90 for mule deer. We saw plenty of mule deer but the size was far from impressive. I am sure there are some good ones running around but it just is not an area I will hunt.
Then we were off to Yellowstone for what we thought would be a few days. I will keep this short too. I did not realize how crowded and commercial Yellowstone was. We did enjoy hiking and finding some of the geysers that were off the beaten path a little. Even though they are almost tame I enjoyed watching the bison too.
So we then headed out to scout the Big Horns for a possible elk hunt in 2020. We spent most of our time in Unit 45 but also spent a little time in Unit 38. I really liked both of them. We saw more elk in 45 but saw a really nice bull in 38. I personally liked the terrain in 45 better than 38. We talked to some hunters, cowboys, and campers and everyone was so nice and helpful. We did not see anyone with a harvested elk. We found some really good glassing spots and just planted ourselves. We saw a total of 15 bulls in three days. The biggest was in 38 - 330" and most were under 300". We now at least know the lay of the land a little and have three or four starting places in both units. We also talked to a nice young man at Irma's in Cody and he was pleading with us to hunt unit 54 so we will research that a little. He offered some information to get us started. I am a point short of being able to draw 54 Type 1.
We covered a lot of ground and saw lots of area. I was pleased with how well I did hiking. The only challenge I had was that due to my health issues recently I was not able to carry more than about 20 lbs for day long hikes because it made my shoulders hurt - my legs were fine (although I did carry my boned out antelope about one mile). I lost so much weight that I was struggling to get my pack tight enough around my waist to get my weight on my hips rather than my shoulders.
All in all we had a lot of fun, talked to many nice people, and are looking forward to returning next year to hunt elk.
I have also been able to hunt whitetails during the youth season here with my 13 year old daughter and we saw what I believe to be the biggest deer I have ever seen Saturday evening. It was at last light and he stayed over a little rise at 90 yards so in a seated position my daughter could only see his head and back. I saw this deer in velvet and knew he was really good but I did not know how good until we saw him Saturday. Hopefully in the coming weeks I will be able to post a photo with her and this buck.
Thanks for the advice and guidance many of you provided.
Russ
