wetmule

This year's Draw is going to be a FREE FOR ALL, that is a given. We are on the verge of getting our state back as are all the other states as it relates to the distribution of res and non-res permits for next year and in the future. Come July when this site is littered with whining and complaining CW Members about how few tags we got here and how many permits Georges brainless clueless clients got that YOU could have drawn, maybe that will put it in perspective. The time is NOW to be heard, make the calls and send your e-mails to the Reps. It just takes a couple minutes. Do it.

Great pics and great Wyoming buck AZ4Life. You are wrong as usual CHD, lol, that buck is way cool, I'd take him in a second over a typical heart shaped clone, plus those kind are easier to sneak up on, on account of their vision impairments. I've seen a few similar to that, but not quite that radical. The few I've seen, the horns have gone down forward and way out past the nose following the bridge of the nose. They haven't curled back down like the above buck. Thanks for posting.

Forgot to mention, Reid's bill is S.339 for your reference. The squeaky wheel gets the grease, start squeaking.

Can't believe anyone would kill a Striped horse. I have a mule you can shoot, we can take a sharpie and mark him up to where you can't tell the difference and it'll be alot cheaper. Nice pics and a great experience I'm sure, congratulations, I'd love to go to the Dark Continent someday.

Love that Alt buck, but I really like the freaks, that buck is cool. Az seems to have it's fair share of odly configured horns on pronghorn. I've seen a couple different four horned antelope in 5-B. I also had a hunter that passed on a buck, same unit, that had horns that spiraled or cork screwed like an Impala. The buck was later killed and ended up scoring 84. We ended up taking a buck that had a 23 inch spread that scored in the high seventies. Love those freaky pronghorns. Thanks for the pics.

Chris, Better taper off to the 80 proof, and get off that Wild Turkey 101. (Just Kidding) Take er easy on ol' Josh there, pretty sure you two really are on the same side, he ain't no 270 if you know what I mean. I like seing your stuff and I like seing Josh's stuff, glad you both post. I personally don't think it takes as much skill to find sheds as live bucks, but huntin for sheds and findin them sure gives you a leg up come huntin season and for some it is a valuable scouting tool and it sure is fun finding bones and being out there trampling around the hills. Yea I got your back, but I don't know nuthin bout the King buck so I doubt I'd be much help. Now if you post Darners crap I'm there bro. Now I'm gonna go have a shot of Wild Turkey. Take er easy.

CHD, Nice buck, maybe next time you will hold out for a 24 or 25 inch buck(just kiddin) Haven't seen the king video of his big buck but it is not the world record. There is a 196 2/8 net non typ. that was taken on the SanCarlos in the sixties and recently entered and recognized as the W.R. The King buck had alot of controversy and fishy stuff that apparantly could never be proven but I guess the guy has it back fom the G&F and he is again the proud owner of the giant, however the circumstances shaked out. CHD you prolly know more about that than I do. Never understood the SCI thing and wish people would quit referencing it.

One thing that is NOT a hoax, we just learned; is that if you draw a Kaibab deer tag this year you will have the option of also purchasing a elk tag and a buffalo tag. G & F wants to rid Kiabab of Elk and they want to reduce the buffalo herd by 50%. As many people know the Tatankas live mostly in the park up there and are a real problem. You can also buy a lion tag and hunt (4) species of big game. Deer, Elk, Lion and Buff. The Buff tag will be offered @ a reduced price yet to be determined but probably somewhere in the 25% of normal value.

I'd have to agree more with Josh's view than against it. They sure seem to be managing their wildlife managers, their personnel and people more than they manage the wildlife of this state. It starts right at the top, from the commissioners to the director, assistant director and on down the line. Very sad indeed.

Thanks Muskrat (Marshall) for getting involved. Also thanks Allen for all you have done, also thanks AT for the kind words although not necessary, it has been fun and I've met some great people and made some great friends along the way and I think we've made some great inroads. It's only been about six years for me although it seems like 29 at times, just kiddin, I ain't that old. Very dissapointing........ seing the response (so far) to your initial post for help. There are alot of intelligent well spoken, outspoken and concerned sportsmen that are CW members that post on here on a variety of subjects, sad that more of them don't put their money where their mouths are to help this states wildlife.

Thanks Allen, Amanda & Stan As they have all said the ADA needs Arizona's Sportsmen and Women to step up and help shoulder the load that (VERY) few of us have been carrying for a while. Which is to help Arizona's Deer herds and their habitat, both Mule and Coues. There are all kinds of ways a person can help. One is to become a member, but more importantly become involved and active. There is a habitat projects committee, that I've been involved with for some time, where you get to decide the who, what, where and the why of habitat, water projects etc., if it's a good project or a crap one and whether or not to fund it. As Amanda said you could help with the Banquet in : 1. Organizing 2. Helping get donations 3. Set up and breakdown the day of banquet. 4. Ticket sales etc., etc. As many of you know there are all kinds of Political battles we are fighting with the USO Crap, Ranching for Wildlife, PREDATORS etc., etc. Commission meetings to attend and other G & F meetings on a variety of topics. There is the Newsletter, the website that I'm sure Amanda wouldn't mind some help with, Public Relations, Ad Sales for the newsletter, etc. The youth committee that Stan heads up does a fantastic job and he could always use help. The ADA has a trailer that goes to every youth hunt and the guys and gals set up the trailer and awnings and cooking stuff. They cook for the kids, feed em hot dogs and hamburgers, hot chocolate, coffee etc. The guys at the youth camp in addition to cooking will help the kids scout, glass, help em skin their deer etc. or just point them in a good direction. I could go on, the point is that we need help and we need a bigger voice and we need people to quit being consumers of wildlife and for them to give back to try and help. I can assure you, you can and will make a difference. Arizona's deer herds are getting smaller not larger and we need all the help we can get to improve that trend. Thanks Very Much ! Thanks again Allen for starting this thread. Kevin

Packhorse, sorry about your truck hope you get it back. Been there done that. Had my new superduty stolen about a month after I got it. Got it back in good shape 3 days later with about 800 miles added. It had been to Mexico and back carrying a load of Illegals. The Tolleson police dept. almost caught the guys but they scattered (a bunch of em) on foot and they got away. I was lucky to get it back. Superduty is a bad vehicle to own if you want to keep it, alot of people I know have had theirs ripped at some point. My neighbor, insurance agent, was telling me that one of his insurance investigators went down to Nogales with his laptop, on the Mexican side, and started running VIN numbers on all these nice trucks and cars, he told me almost every single one of them was stolen. Also I would be pretty cautious as to claiming stuff on your homeowners policy, I've been hearing that once you make a claim on it they can and will drop you and you may have a really hard time getting insurance again even from other companies. You might think about reserving your homeowners for a really big disaster. I hate insurance companies !!!

I realize license fees and other $$ sources pay for the bulk of G & F operations. I guess I'd like to see the hunts and the revenues raised from them be used to at least pay for itself and have some of the money raised go towards managing this states wildlife, which IMO, in some units they are doing a very poor job to put it nicely.

AZ4life, People are not or have not been excluded from hunting in AZ because of the high costs of the permits - at least not deer & elk. For the last 50 years we've been paying for Hot Dogs & Strawberry Soda Pop and getting Filet Mignon & Dom Perrignon. You don't need Swarovski or Zeiss optics, 3 K custom rifles or 40 K trucks and 5 K + quads in order to go hunting. I have a 74 F-250 that costs me over $100 to fill it up, yet a deer permit in the finest mule deer habitat on the PLANET (AZ Strip) costs me $17.50. Does'nt wash with me. No I've never been drawn but not for a lack of trying. With around around 100 deer permits annually in the two 13 units by my calculations if 90 of those permits went to residents and 10 went to non-residents they make a grand total of approx. $ 3400.00 on those two hunts. I would imagine that amount would'nt even cover 1 months salary for one of the two WM's and a field supervisor that work in those areas. Permit fees need to go up and Way up IMO.

This subject has been hit pretty hard lately. Arizona residents and non-residents wanting to hunt here have got off so easy in the past, it's a joke IMO. A resident deer permit goes for $17.50 plus app. fee, I can buy a case of dogstyle beer for that amount, maybe even some good stuff, not sure I'm not a big drinker. A non-resident deer permit goes for $ 108.50 plus app. fee, that's 5-6 cases of dogstyle. The point is place a little more value on these beautiful deer that we love to pursue, more than a few cases of beer. I think they deserve it. No, I'm not in favor of pricing the average joe out of the market and if the extra cash goes to help the wildlife managers better manage the wildlife, and allows them to spend more time out in the field, catch more poachers etc., etc. I'm all for it. If however the extra cash goes to line the pockets of the director his assistant director and their co-conspirator beaurocrat cronies, I say screw them.

Use to shoot yotes with them long time ago, back when the hides were worth something and worth the trouble of skinning and stretching for sale. Silvertips went right through the dogs without ruining the fur. I wouldn't use them on deer, not sure about bear as they have bigger bones etc., they may work ok but I would choose something else. My $000.2

Dang, I tawt I taw a Sasquatch, I knew they were'nt real. I agree people should'nt post pics of their sig. others no matter what they look like.

WOW ! My mule is waaaay purtyer than that and I don't have to cook for it. I'm sure my molly is easier to shoe as well, doubt if John Henry could drive a nail into her (pardon me - It's) hoofs.

I'll cross my fingers too, but I won't be holding my breath. At least he's not a tree hugger or should I say from the surface he doesn't appear to be a hugger, time will tell. Commissioner Golightly is an avid hunter use to do some guiding and outfitting etc. and he consistently votes against hunters and consistently votes to not do the right thing for AZ Sportsmen & women, IMO.

Hafta agree with CHD, nothing in the world as pretty as a truly big monster toad muley buck. For me coues is second, and that ain't bad. If you got the money you can pretty much guarantee yourself a big elk, bear, ram, cat,East. WT, Pronghorn and even coues to some extent with some of the Mexico hunts that are out there. You can't buy a big Muley. You can draw the best areas for muleys - Kaibab, strip etc. and still your chances of taking a great buck are pretty poor. You can venture into any coues country or sky island mtn. range and find B&C bucks. I know lots and lots of people with monster B & C coues bucks on their walls, none of them have ever taken a big muley. Don't get me wrong I love everything about coues and hunting them they sure are fun to hunt, just not as tough to get a B & C class animal as it is for muleys.

Good Luck AT, Glass hard, shoot straight, take lots of pics, have a few coronas for us all. Most of all be safe & have fun.

Sorry, not sure how Newbees post got doubled. I'm kinda wonderin who's runnin the AZ G&F Dept. is it Shroufe or Taulman and his Attorney. I'm leanin towards Beavis and Butthead (Taulman & Scumbagtino). I guess we should'nt be too surprised to see that a lawyer wrote a letter threatening to file suit if it things did'nt go his way -- duh! afterall that is what attorneys do. I'm also thinkin that these threats may work on our spineless Commission, I'm very disgusted with the whole lot of them. Don't know why they won't just do away with the sale of antlers and their parts etc., give the non-res a percentage of the total number of tags and just end this stinkin Fiasco.

D.B., You don't have to be a public speaker to be involved in the ADA or to attend a board metting, I'm evidence of that for sure. Also, I believe Mr. Bedlion has tagholders with him. CHD, Glad to see you're still alive & kickin. I saw a couple pics from that 13A hunt including the monster that Kip found for the doc., but I have'nt seen them all yet. I know Brady's hunter took a monster as well as Alvey's hunter and there may be one I left out. So send them on. I still owe you a pic of the Strip buck that we killed after Kip poisoned me and I owe you a few polar bear pics, but as you know I'm a film guy so you have to wait for the mail to arrive. As far as the ADA website having a link to MM don't know nuthin bout it, you'll have to take that up with Amanda, she is our website creator, administrator guru mistress. I do agree with you though, this site and forum and it's members is beyond compare and certainly not with MM. Thanks for your support, later.

Manamal, The ADA Board meetings are always the third wednesday of every month here in the PHX area. Sometimes the location changes but they are usually @ 6:30 P.M. The next one is on the 19th I believe. Amanda is a board member and Allen is a past board member that is very active and involved, possibly a few others that post on here as well. Any help would be much appreciated, it would probably be a good idea to go to a meeting to see how things work and determine where your interests lie etc. Anyone is welcome you just need to let someone know you are coming. To do that contact Mark or Tracey. Mark's e-mail is markbool@qwest.net and Tracey's e-mail is assnmgmt1@cox.net they would both be able to direct you to the upcoming meeting info. with time, location etc. Thanks for your interest, hope to see you there.

DB, Just wanted to point out that these resources we concentrated up there were a small fraction of total money spent by ADA and money well spent. CHD, hope you're over your life hatin pertussssisisis bacterial viral fungal life threatening disease (jock itch) just kidin. Sorry you missed out on yer coues hunt, with your luck in the draw you'll pull a strip tag again this year and won't have to worry about coues in 05, if you do, I'm there. Give me a shout. Later