PineCountryHunter

Buddy and I caught over 20 nice fat hold over rainbows at Horseshoe yesterday from 9-11:30am. wish we could have fished longer but had to get home.

Ya not been a good year for moisture and going to cause big issues with fire danger and lake levels. Hopefully we get a really good monsoon up there this year or Sunrise is in serious trouble.

I am going to be up in Eagar this weekend doing a side job and am going to bring up some fishing gear and plan to hit sunrise and Horseshoe from shore in the afternoons after we are done working. Just curious how the fishing is and if anyone is having any luck. I am sure i will be able to catch fish but hopefully the holdovers and browns will be biting. Hopefully land a few nice browns to get some pictures of and release. My Buddy and I plan to hit Reservation at the end of April for 4-5 days if it is open. Lack of moisture this year has me a little concerned it will be closed again this spring.

really nice deer!!! Congrats

Nice buck! congrats

Nice deer, congrats on your success!

Awesome, congrats on a nice buck

Nice heavy Buck!

Thank you, wish more people would post on their hunts. Like to read about peoples experiences. Score isnt everything to me. I’ll only draw so many tags and just like to enjoy my time out in the woods with my good friends. I did put a tape on him for fun and he was about what I thought. Good enough for me

That is a nice buck, was a tough hunt for sure. Congrats.

Nice last day 3x….congrats

Thanks….the late hunt should be awesome this year. We saw quite a bit of deer down on the winter range munching on the cliff rose treatments. Good luck

I was fortunate to draw and early 12AW rifle tag with my good friend and hunting buddy Dan. He was guaranteed to draw with all the points he had and I just happened to get lucky. I was not able to get up before the hunt to scout due to work and my sons baseball commitments but was not to worried about that. I have spent quite a bit of time up there in the past and had some good friends provide some great info. My buddy Dan drove up the Sunday before the hunt to get familiar with the unit. He had never been up on the Plateau before so this was a whole new experience for him. I arrived on Wednesday with a couple of my good friends that made the trek up to help. We got camp set up before the rain started and got a good night sleep. Woke up Thursday morning to scout and were greeted with Thunder snow and rain. We ran a lot of roads, glassed lots of fingers and points but did not turn up a mature buck, just lots of younger 4x4's and does. Opening morning we greeted by a parade of guides and helpers cruising the roads at 3am spotlighting trying to find a good one for their clients. this would be a common theme throughout most of the hunt. we hit the areas we wanted to hunt hard and saw several deer but nothing that we wanted to fill or tag on. For the first 3-4 days we hunted everything from the Warm Fire (a zoo opening weekend) at 8800ft down to Sowats in the winter range. We saw and passed may deer in all the areas we hunted. By Tuesday of the hunt I made the decision to stay in the area i felt gave me the best chance a mature deer. I really didn't have a number in my head of how big it had to be, I just knew i would know when I laid eyes on a good one. We continued to run and gun, glassing every point in the burn we could and picking the country apart. It was starting to become a little frustrating to be this far in the hunt and yet to lay eyes on a good mature deer. I just kept tell my buddy Dan and myself that we just needed to be in the right place at the right time and good things would happen. Friday the 31st comes and neither of us had laid eyes on a decent buck. I told my Buddy Dennis that this would be the day and we would finally get lucky and tag out on a Halloween buck. We hit several good looking glassing spots and picked them apart but nothing. Dennis decided to take a two track that looked like would get us out into some smaller cuts in the burn to glass. As he parked and got out to glass I saw a deer bedded about 100yds from the vehicle on the edge of a cut. I through up the binos and immediately knew that it was a decent buck and by far the biggest one we had seen thus far. I grabbed the Seekins 7mmPRC and chambered a round, got settle in on him and let a round fly. The buck jumped out of his bed and started to run, he made it about 30 yards before he piled up and expired. It all happened so fast that my buddy an I were in shock and could only laugh at what just happened. All the work, time behind glass, miles on the boots and to have it happen just like that off a two track road was unreal. We got the buck taken care of and checked in pretty quickly. My buddy Dennis and I decided to stay Friday night and Saturday morning to help my friend Dan try to fill his tag before heading to flag to drop the meat. Unfortunately we were unable to turn up a good one for him. We headed home and as I was cleaning up and putting stuff away I got a text from the guys and Dan was able to fill his tag on a cooler older buck. When you think of the Kaibab you instantly think about the land of giants. I was never fortunate enough to lay eyes on one of them, neither did my buddy Dan. We did have a heck of a hunt with great friends that we will remember for many years to come. Hopefully in a few years luck will strike again and we will get a second chance! only time will tell.

Awesome! look a great time had by all! looking forward to heading up there next Wednesday

That’s good to hear. Know that area pretty well from archery hunting that area for years