Well it's been too slow in the NM forum lately so I'll start things back up!
I hunted pretty hard in unit 31 this last week and although I saw a few pretty decent bucks it just wouldn't come together for me. I finally had it come together just before sundown last night. This guy was pushing a doe with another smaller buck trying to get into the game. They were in a bunch of rolling dunes which gave me ample cover to close the distance. He finally gave me the shot but semi-jumped the string. Shot was a little far back but he took off on a death run. I figured the thing to do would be wait till the morning and go find him. On the way home I thought better of this plan as the coyotes would have him picked clean by morning so with the help of my dad headed back out there. Bloodtrails in the red sand can be difficult to say the least! It took a little over an hour and a half of following a blood trail that was faint to say the least at times, tracks that were not going in any reasonable direction, and broken branches in mesquite bushes that he had turn through, but we finally found him piled up about 500 yards from where I had shot him. He never stopped running through all this. Never seen anything like it in over 20 years of bowhunting. I was quite proud of myself being able to track him down and recover him before the coyotes got to him!
Sorry for the crappy pics but we were wore out and just wanted to get him loaded up and home!
I hunted pretty hard in unit 31 this last week and although I saw a few pretty decent bucks it just wouldn't come together for me. I finally had it come together just before sundown last night. This guy was pushing a doe with another smaller buck trying to get into the game. They were in a bunch of rolling dunes which gave me ample cover to close the distance. He finally gave me the shot but semi-jumped the string. Shot was a little far back but he took off on a death run. I figured the thing to do would be wait till the morning and go find him. On the way home I thought better of this plan as the coyotes would have him picked clean by morning so with the help of my dad headed back out there. Bloodtrails in the red sand can be difficult to say the least! It took a little over an hour and a half of following a blood trail that was faint to say the least at times, tracks that were not going in any reasonable direction, and broken branches in mesquite bushes that he had turn through, but we finally found him piled up about 500 yards from where I had shot him. He never stopped running through all this. Never seen anything like it in over 20 years of bowhunting. I was quite proud of myself being able to track him down and recover him before the coyotes got to him!
Sorry for the crappy pics but we were wore out and just wanted to get him loaded up and home!
