hunter4life

The way the whole skull is deformed like that I would also think it is some kind of birth defect rather than an injury. An injury that extensive would likely have resulted in a dead kitty. A few years ago my brother, a friend and I caught a lion in Colorado that had a hole right through his skull that looked to be from a tooth of another lion. That cat had been fighting and had abscesses on his front legs, shoulders, and head. It is amazing that the cat didn't end up dying from meningitis from the injury he had.

Congratulations, that is a great buck!! It is great to have good friends and family to help out when the going gets tough.

I find that the colors are often washed out somewhat when digiscoping. If you have Photoshop, you can auto adjust the levels and the pictures look a lot better. If you don't have photoshop then you can download a freeware program called The GIMP which is probably every bit as good as photoshop for image manipulations.

Here is a NM whitetail that is still roaming the hills as far as I know. Pic was taken in October this year.

Congratulations those are both very nice deer. That is a big bodied muley for the Gila.

Congrats Tommy, looks like you all had an awesome time.

My first big game animal was a feral pig that I killed while on a backpack deer hunt in NM unit 36 when I was 8 years old.

Nice bull Scott!! It sounds like you had an exciting hunt.

A Southeastern NM sunset from my parent's back porch.

Congratulations, very nice antelope!!

Congratulations, that is an amazing story!! It looks like a pretty big lion to me. As far as taxidermists go, I have heard many good things about Phil Soucy(I think he is in Montana). I have a Mt. Lion done by Woodbury Taxidermy in Ingram Texas that I think is one of the best ones I have seen. I was very happy with their work and would not hesitate to recommend him.

A few weeks ago I went hunting for antelope on a muzzleloader hunt in Northern NM. I shot this one at about 30 yards as I was working my way along a grassy ridge. He and a smaller buddy were on the side of the hill right below me and we saw each other at about the same time. I was able to throw up the gun and take a snap shot before he started running off. It sure was fun and challenging hunting them with a muzzleloader.

Congratulations, it looks like you had a good trip. That area looks like Hamilton Mesa up above Iron Gate.

Mine is sighted 3" high at 100 and 6" low at 200 yards.

I have run into grouse most often in the Pecos on Hamilton Mesa and that general area. I have also seen them in Unit 52, the Sargent, and around Taos and Red River

Interesting post Dogman68. I think lions get blamed far too often when they are not the real problem. I have hunted lions a bit over the past 6 years and what I have found is that they are in the same spots that are good for deer hunting and those spots tend to be good for both deer and lions year after year.

My brothers and I have killed a lot of game with a .243 shooting the Hornady 100gr. BTSP's, including game up to the size of blue wildebeest and oryx with single shot kills. My grandpa is up to 7 black bears all killed with single shots with this combination.

Congratulations, it looks like you all had an awesome trip!! That is a monster bushbuck, it looks to me like he is probably a bit over 15". Whereabouts in the eastern cape were you. I worked with an outfitter over there in the Port Elizabeth, East London and Grahamstown areas one summer and had a blast.

I shoot a .45 cal Knight and use a 200 grain Hornady SST sabot in front of 100grains of 777. This combo dropped my bull last year at 153 yards and I recovered the bullet (good mushroom shape) on the offside shoulder just under the skin. He only took 2 steps and then fell down and rolled down the hillside.

I hunted DOC land for Tahr and chamois when I hunted in New Zealand. We flew in and got dropped off by helicopter and then hunted from there. I really enjoyed hunting New Zealand and most of the people seemed very friendly. However, the feeling I got was that there were probably even more radical environmentalist whackos in New Zealand than we have here in the US. I think you should have a fun time living over there, and get in shape because their mountains are steep and rugged.

Awesome story, congratulations!!

Very cool pictures!! I once saw a cow that looked very similar to that in Unit 4 in northern NM. She was in the aspens and her color blended right in with the tree trunks.

Cognratulations, that is a real nice gobbler!!

Congratulations on some nice birds!! I've wanted to hunt the Jemez for a few years since living in Albuquerque, but I always end up going to the Southern half of the state to places I know hold turkeys. I headed down to the Lincoln NF and managed to connect with a gobbler and find a few sheds. I found the 2 on the right and my brother found the two on the left.

Starting at Willow Creek would put you closer to the headwaters. It would be a pretty long hike to the headwaters starting from the cliff dwellings. I don't think it could be done as a roundtrip in a 2-3 night trip if you also wanted to get in some fishing. Just for an example of distance on the ground vs. what it looks like on the map; if I remember correctly it is 14 miles from the cliff dwellings to He!!s Hole if you hike up the West fork on trail 151. I have had good fishing in both the middle and the west forks of the river, but it seems pretty variable from year to year. Some years are great and others have been pretty marginal. I have only caught rainbows and browns on the West fork, but on the middle fork there are smallmouth bass as well. Last year up pretty high on the middle fork my dad caught a gila trout. You could also look into fishing for them in some of the small side creeks up at the headwaters if you get a gila trout permit. Through my high school and college years my family would take a backpacking trip starting at the Cliff Dwellings every summer, and we always had great trips.