Well, finished up another successful hunting season yesterday. It was just myself, Greg and John on our annual hunt out west the first week of Nov. Greg filled his special draw calf moose tag and bagged a nice whitetail doe. John didn't fill his antlered mule deer tag. I probably could have for him as the one he did take a poke at was 450 yards away but it was his tag and it would be illegal for me to shoot it for him. I only got drawn for cow elk and had my 'general whitetail' tag (good for either sex from Nov 1 to the 7th) but didn't see any I wanted and prefer to hunt them around home as we have an abundance of whitetail's around home. We didn't see any elk so no joy there :(
Got a nice 9 point whitetail buck Friday morning about 10 min's after sunrise (legal is 30 min's before sunrise to 30 min's after sunset) He was definitely rutting as he followed a doe in from around 600 yards to 354 where I put one through his heart. Went back to the same field the next morning and filled my doe tag (we can get two supplemental doe tags for this area - like I said, we're overrun with them locally) about 15 minutes after sunrise on a beautiful clear morning with perfect light. Had I been able to hunt my cow elk tag (only good in that zone I got drawn for it out west) I could have filled it that morning as there were 5 cow's (well, 4 adult cows and one baby) in the field when I first got there. I took the doe at 358 yards with a heart shot.
Since I have a high-end scope with a ballistic turret, I bought a Leupold laser range finder so I can be accurate on the long shots. That's how I know the exact ranges on those shots. The combination of my Remington 700 VTR with a Timney trigger (set to 3 lb's) with my Swarovski scope is proving to be a wonderful setup. I added a Kwik Klip to it as well as I much prefer a removable magazine to that lousy trap door setup so many bolt actions come with from the factory!
I'm already looking forward to next year when hopefully my younger brother will join us and have a bull moose, cow elk, antlered mule and a general whitetail tag. It'll be his first ever hunting trip and we'll get to see how he does in the field with his high-end sniper rifle. He's a cop and was in tactical and took the sniper training. His rifle with the $2500.00 Nightforce scope is the reason I ended up buying the Swarovski. Once you look through quality glass it's hard to go back to a $100 Bushnell...........LOL He recently made Sergeant and is now in charge of his own squad but got to keep his sniper rifle as he's a backup sniper in case of need. I was really hoping he could make it this year but he had other commitments that precluded him from joining us this year.
So, how was hunting for those of you that hunt??
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
***William Ernest Henley***
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Originally Posted by Mizicke5273
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