SilentButDeadly

I am a graduate student at the University of Arizona. I'll graduate in December with a master's degree in Watershed Management. My work is using tree-ring fire histories in conifer forests to determine their historic compositions (like how they think ponderosa pine used to be 'open and park-like' but today is clogged with pecker pole trees due to fire suppression). I worked as a wildland firefighter for 4 years at Saguaro National Park, 3 years on their back country crew at Manning Cabin (10 miles from the nearest road - lots of coues and mtn lions up there), and 1 year on their Fire Use Module (basically you live like a gypsy moving from fire to fire watching trees burn and record weather observations). I'm currently working for my professor doing more of what I mentioned before. Most mornings I am out looking for sheds and that big boy I am going to bow hunt in January. I am hoping to get a federal job that will let me continue working in wildland fire stuff, but pay me the big bucks for my education. Cheers, Tyson L. Swetnam

The most appropriate question now is, what did the farmers name the elk, and were their children sad when that man came and shot him?

Here is my Coue's buck that I took this evening. I've had an eye on him since I found his sheds (in the photo) this spring. I got my chance today while I was out trying to fill my Javelina tag. I've been out of state for a couple of weeks and I was going to try and get the pig today and start looking for bucks tomorrow... I spotted him and another buck at 150 yards, took off my shoes, put on my extra pair of wool socks and stalked to within 20 yards of both of them - I hunt in some thick country. I shot him quartering toward me, arrow through the chest and out the gut. He only made it about 50 yards before laying down forever. He measures 104 gross, 96 net, 17inch main beams with a 16 inch inside spread. Thanks to all the posters for their insight on these deer, it really helped me in my first kill. Tyson

I use my t-shirt

He did lose a few inches from last year, his G2's on the sheds are both over 11", his current G2's are only 7.5 inches. Before I had guessed his inside spread to be 12 inches, if he hadn't broken off his G3 I scored him at 110, so add another 4 inches and he would have gone 114. I just used the Boone & Crockett measuring tool online with the measurements we took last night (we only took 3 circumference measurements - so he gains another 5 inches!). He nets 101 6/8, with 3 6/8 in deductions. Subtract again for however much because he is in velvet. Anyway I look at it I am super stoked! I'm on my way to the taxidermist soon - maybe that will cool my fire when I get the bill... Tyson

Arizona Black, Saguaro NP Rincon Mountains.

for those who are a little more computer savy, here is the website I get my weather from: http://gacc.nifc.gov/swcc/predictive/weather/weather.htm This is the Southwest Wildland Fire website. It has links to all of the RAWS (remote weather stations), satelite loops, and forecasts. If you know your way around a map you might be able to find some RAWS stations near where you hunt. Tyson

Awesome stuff, that guy has alot to teach. Also, the man in the video who was the 'don't do what I'm doing' archer is the guy who gave me my first bow!

this is pretty unfortunate note the field tip http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/...S/60711003/1086

I've found several fresh sheds in the last few weeks, and all of them reek of urine. Does the buck urinate on his own antler after he sheds it? Or perhaps is another buck urinating on it to try and mark his territory?

Long story short: I never hunted until January of this year when my future father-in-law took me mule deer hunting with him. Since then I've become an addict of hiking up steep hills to glass from, and in the last two months - shed hunting. Recently I've come to accept that I suffer from a 'sickness' which wakes me at 5 am every other morning and a half hour later find myself in the middle of a hillside walking from palo verde to mesquite to palo verde looking for deer sign. What is wrong with me!? My future wife has accused me of several things: 1.) driving erratically when we are on the way to her parents (who live in prime desert muley country), 2.) abandoning her on Saturday and Sunday mornings to go hiking w/ the dog (that is my cover story for going shed hunting). . and 3.) spending an excessive amount of time watching hunting programs, looking at websites about hunting (she is at work right now - that's how i can get away with this post), and scouring over Google Earth looking for potential coue's habitat. A few weeks ago I overheard her little sister apologizing to her as I came back in from shooting my bow saying "I'm so sorry, I didn't know that you were marrying our dad." The backstory on that is her father is also a freak - he is a devoted bow hunter and has bagged every big game animal in Arizona (including spot and stalk mt. lion and desert bighorn - solo). His children grew up around it and have mostly shunned hunting. I grew up in a house of fishermen, and now find myself addicted to hunting. I would guess that not every beginning hunter gets a pair of 15x60 zeiss binos given to him, or has a grandmaster bowhunter on call to answer any questions whenever the situation arises. Anyway, I am looking for some way to moderate myself, satiate my addiction, and keep my future wife happy. Surely, almost every man who reads this post can relate to my dilemma.

This is what the sickness brought me to this morning. I found the one on the left first, it is at least 1 year old, and while looking for the other half found the one on the right... maybe the same buck from the year before (at least 2 years old - starting to get chalky). I found a skeleton of a buck a few minutes later next to a horse trail, but it looked like the skull had already been picked up (may have been this old boy?). Briggs dog and I had walked for about an hour without seeing ANY deer sign, and then bam, there was that monster with his kicker laying in the grass under a palo verde (sorry, I haven't been carrying my camera with me to take any action shots). Where ever that buck has gone he isn't in the same area as he was a year ago... hopefully he is still out there. Tyson

I should clarify that the binos are more of an extended loan... but here is a link to a pic I posted of them! http://www.coueswhitetail.com/forums/index...?showtopic=3310

Excellent find. My good luck shed hunting spree has come to an end... For a while I was finding new sheds almost every time I went out (fresh sheds from 9 different bucks, old sheds from 3 more). Seeing those sheds makes me realize that 1.) other people are out there looking for MY sheds right now! How dare they! and 2.) Some rat or squirrel or fox or coyote might be chewing on MY sheds right now! How dare they!?

Just to make sure we are only spreading the 'truth' around here: Parvo is a canine virus, meaning it can affect dogs, coyotes, wolves and foxes, but will not affect cats or humans. (Wikipedia) Citation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parvovirus As far as wolves and dogs being cross bred, "analysis of seven dog breeds and 26 gray wolf populations from different locations around the world has shown that the genotypes of dogs and wolves are either identical or differ by the loss or gain of only one or two restriction sites" (Wayne) there is less than a .2% difference in wolf and dog DNA (that means a chihuaha and a wolf are 99.9% the same beast). Citation: 1. Wayne RK "Molecular evolution of the dog family" available at: http://www.idir.net/~wolf2dog/wayne2.htm 2. Wayne, R.K., Lehman, N., Allard, M.W. an Honeycutt, R.L. (1992) Conserv. Biol. 6, 559 -- 56923 Templeton, A.R. (1989) in Speciation and its Consequences (Otte, D. and Endler, J.A., eds), pp. 3-27, Sinauer Associates As far as I am concerned, wolves having some dog DNA is semantic. Why not allow hunting of wolves, a year round bow season, etc? Proper management begins with control of your predator populations. I don't believe the hype that wolves wipe out all the game. But, as a scientist I'm trained to only accept empirical data. That means that I can't (or shouldn't ) believe what I hear when people only state things without giving evidence. Science that has been peer reviewed (read by other people who don't give a s%$# what your results are) is the best way of gaining knowledge of the universe that humanity has ever come up with.

Drawing a line in the sand and refusing to compromise with any of those groups on any effort only stalemates management decisions that need to be made. Given, those groups are probably most guilty for causing such stalemates. I've seen this sort of thing first hand, having worked for a Federal Agency. I've been a wildland firefighter for five years, and am finishing a master's degree in fire ecology. In my experience with resource managment I have found that everyone has their own agenda, and they use whatever methods that can to pull off their own skeazy underhanded needs. Example: In the Rincon Mountain District of Saguaro National Park (a wilderness area) natural fire (lightning ignition) has been put out for 6 years because of the legalities of a spotted owl being burned and killed by fire. It is illegal for the park to allow an owl to die under the Endangered Species Act. What bothers me most is that the wildlife resource people actually think that keeping fire out of the forest is better for the owls than allowing natural events to take place (as if the owls haven't evolved around a frequent fire regime). And that is from a federal agency without any outside input from the groups you are talking about. The problem is not that these groups are making stupid decisions thinking they are doing the greatest good. Those groups are no different than the wolves they want to protect, they will rabidly and blindly do what they are programmed to do without introspection to who they may be hurting. The USDA Forest Service has been trying to decide what the 'Greatest Good' is for over a century, and along the way they have caused perhaps more damage than help in managing our public lands. Maybe, by allowing this roadless act to pass we will be helping nature more than hurting by simply allowing it to be. Any time human hands touch this land they affect it in unintended ways. My feelings are that there needs to be serious change in government at all levels, and that all of these conflicts we see are simply symptoms of the larger, more gangrenous problem. PS. Here is a nice shed i found in Saguaro - still in the same spot I left it.

I think putting wolves out there is great, regardless of the game that they kill. It isn't a hunter's right to be able to go out into the woods and find a monster buck or bull and kill it, it is a privilege and it should be a challenge. Aldo Leopold knew that wolves are part of the land, I think that most men have forgotten that today. Sure, the last few years have been hard on the deer and elk, and their numbers are down. Hunting is more difficult and those who make their livelihood on taking rich men out into the woods are bound to complain. But in time the conditions will change, there will be more elk, and more deer - and there will be less voices being raised. The aesthetic of hearing a wolf howl or seeing a large predator in the wild can be just as rewarding as hearing an elk bugle, bighorns spar, or seeing a big buck in his prime. And when those wolves do get released, you can bet there will be one happy hunter who finds a big old bull or buck that they took down, leaving a nice 'pick up' rack for him to take home and tell his children and grandchildren about.

I would agree about the finding sign in the flats. They seem to spend alot of time tearing around in the flat areas between ridges (or even on top of wide flat ridges). But, I think - and maybe I only think this because somebody else has already walked through the flats picking up sheds- that the biggest bucks prefer beds along the flat edge of ridges that have open views onto those open flat areas down below. I am attaching a photo of this year's shed collection. I would like to say that the dog helped, however he's worthless at finding sheds (I'm working with him, he is only 9 months). I do admit that he is the reason I get out so often - i got sick of going to the dog park; and he is good company on all those long morning walks.

This is my first year looking for Coue's sheds. I started in late April and was skunked for a whole month. I found my first one in late May, since then I have averaged about 2 sheds every morning that I go out to a new area (10 fresh sheds, 6 old ones so far). My best reccomendation is that when you get into an area and you start finding alot of scat, look under every single bush that you possibly think a deer could fit beneath. I find 90% of my sheds under or near large mesquite or palo verde. It is like watching a puzzle fall together, you start seeing scat, you see bushes or trees that have been rubbed on or have broken branches, you start seeing beds under trees, and BAM there they are. As far as having trouble finding sheds during the hunting season, I would wager that it is because someone else has already been there and picked them up. I had a terrible experience the other day when I was noticing all of the aformentioned clues come together and BAM! instead of a shed there was some toilet paper and a deuce right in the middle of a big deer bed, disgusting and disheartening...

Here is a better pic of the 11" G2's, the main beam is 17.5 with a base circumference of 4.5... I'd estimate him scoring around 105 (maybe 110 if he didn't have a broken G3 on his left side). It was one of those 'holy crap' moments when I saw the first one on the ground. I wonder what it would have felt like not to have not found the other one... I'd probably still be out there wandering around looking for it.

The bottom pair have 11 inch G2s. The two in the upper left appear to be from the same buck, different years. The rest are all singles, couple of them old - 6 are fresh and stink. As far as the stink goes, I haven't smelled fox urine before. I would say that the smell doesn't quite resemble that 'fresh band-aid' smell that I attribute to buck urine (maybe you think it smells like something else, but to me it is band-aids)... Thanks for the help.

He is still a pup, but he helped me find this old guy... The buck died in velvet, I think an archer took him early season and lost him... Unfortunately the coyotes got to him first. The G2 is 7 inches, and the eye guard is 2... Would have been a great buck...