rockymtnhunter
Active Member
- Messages
- 198
First, congrats to all who drew Kaibab deer tags this year. Alas, no Kaibab deer tags for me ? guess my odds as a NR will be hard to overcome ?til I get a few more PP. Oh well. But I did draw a Kaibab fall turkey tag; that will be fun and a good time for me to do some pre-season scouting for the early rifle hunt.
Just returned from a 5-day Kaibab camping/scouting trip with my queen ? celebrated our 20th anniversary. Had a great time at one of my favorite places. I suppose I'd summarize our trip as the ?Bad?, the ?Ugly? and the ?Good? (my apologies to Sergio Leone & Clint Eastwood).
The ?Bad? ? Last summer?s weak monsoon combined with a super dry fall and winter have resulted in the driest conditions I've seen in the past 47 years. The attached photo pretty well tells the story. Half of the water holes I checked had no water, the other half had little water, probably less than 25% of what they normally have. As of today, it's only 7 weeks ?til the archery start. Weather forecast for next 7-10 days suggest that monsoons may start, but it's going to be tough to collect enough water to get water in most the ponds & tanks.
The ?Ugly? ? Wildfire danger is extreme and will remain so ?til rain comes ? major risk of a big fire like 2006. Some have expressed concern about whether the forest will be closed during the archery season or that bucks will be hard to find or antler development will be stunted. IMO not likely (read the ?Good? below). Aspen is showing heat/moisture stress (e.g. small leaves); annual plants (grass, forbs, shrubs) are dormant or poorly developed, range condition is poor, but will likely improve if and when rain comes. Lupine growth is spotty but should improve with moisture.
The ?Good? ? despite drought conditions, I saw almost 250 bucks during 5 days of wide ranging windshield surveys and some walkabouts. Attached photo shows typical 4 pt I saw (sorry for the poor quality but my camera is POS). Antler development appeared average or even average, racks looked about 50-75% developed, numerous 3-4 pts and plenty of young age class spikes/forkhorns. Saw a few big 4x4s (likely to be 28?-30?, 180-190 class bucks when fully developed). Deer are subsisting on moisture in their browse, but I did see lots of deer in the vicinity of water where it's still available. Salt licks were getting hit hard by deer. Also saw numerous does w/2 fawns so looks like good fawn crop.
Hope this info is helpful. And good luck everyone with Kaibab tags!
Just returned from a 5-day Kaibab camping/scouting trip with my queen ? celebrated our 20th anniversary. Had a great time at one of my favorite places. I suppose I'd summarize our trip as the ?Bad?, the ?Ugly? and the ?Good? (my apologies to Sergio Leone & Clint Eastwood).
The ?Bad? ? Last summer?s weak monsoon combined with a super dry fall and winter have resulted in the driest conditions I've seen in the past 47 years. The attached photo pretty well tells the story. Half of the water holes I checked had no water, the other half had little water, probably less than 25% of what they normally have. As of today, it's only 7 weeks ?til the archery start. Weather forecast for next 7-10 days suggest that monsoons may start, but it's going to be tough to collect enough water to get water in most the ponds & tanks.
The ?Ugly? ? Wildfire danger is extreme and will remain so ?til rain comes ? major risk of a big fire like 2006. Some have expressed concern about whether the forest will be closed during the archery season or that bucks will be hard to find or antler development will be stunted. IMO not likely (read the ?Good? below). Aspen is showing heat/moisture stress (e.g. small leaves); annual plants (grass, forbs, shrubs) are dormant or poorly developed, range condition is poor, but will likely improve if and when rain comes. Lupine growth is spotty but should improve with moisture.
The ?Good? ? despite drought conditions, I saw almost 250 bucks during 5 days of wide ranging windshield surveys and some walkabouts. Attached photo shows typical 4 pt I saw (sorry for the poor quality but my camera is POS). Antler development appeared average or even average, racks looked about 50-75% developed, numerous 3-4 pts and plenty of young age class spikes/forkhorns. Saw a few big 4x4s (likely to be 28?-30?, 180-190 class bucks when fully developed). Deer are subsisting on moisture in their browse, but I did see lots of deer in the vicinity of water where it's still available. Salt licks were getting hit hard by deer. Also saw numerous does w/2 fawns so looks like good fawn crop.
Hope this info is helpful. And good luck everyone with Kaibab tags!