Coach

Not a whole lot new here to add, but I met a couple really nice guys from Montana this year who had finally drawn a quality AZ archery bull tag after years of applying. At first, I wasn't real clear why they were so exited to be hunting elk in AZ, when as I thought, Montana was full of elk. After some conversations around the campfire, I came to realize that those expansive herds of elk in Montana had been all but decimated by the re-introduction of wolves. These guys were super exited to drive all the way down here to hunt elk where the herds are still healthy, even growing, as their own herds were disappearing year after year. Kind of opened my eyes a little more to devastation wolves can have. Of course, we're talking Mexican Greys with some "dog" mixed in compared to those huge Canadian wolves. But still, our elk population is something special and unique - and given that it is here primarily due to the efforts of hunters and hunting-oriented management, I'm against anything that jeapordizes our elk and deer herds.

I just want to wish all of you a Merry Christmas. Here's our family card for everyone not on our current mailing list. Kind of a collage from this year. Best wishes to you all this Chirstmas season!

Nice! Great job.

Truely awesome!!! Congrats on a trophy of a lifetime! Thanks for sharing.

I'm thinking full body mount all the way. Tag'em and Bag'em, even if they're from another planet.

Wanna bet they have more lawyers than you do? LOL, just kiddin. I've used Mr. Buddy heaters, and they seem to do just fine. Not sure I'd run one all night in an enclosed space, but that's just me. I'd rather bundle up than trust anything that heats with flame and claims not to give of carbon monoxide. I've slept cold enough not to trust my life to some gizmo, no matter how convenient it is.

Man, I would be all for shooting the buck. The problem is, lately these guys aren't just packing, they've got scouts around them. You don't know how those guys would take shooting around their "cargo". I'm all about saying to heck with smugglers and illegals, this is OUR STATE, and we'll hunt it by God. On the other hand, I'm nearing 40, and don't want to leave my wife widowed and my sons without a father because I chose to chase a deer. I sure wish the Gov't would do their job so we didn't have to make these kind of life-and-death situations, just to hunt the land we have every right to hunt.

That's AWWESOMMMME! Great buck!!!!

As much as I'd like to be in the UofA, ASU rivalry, I find myself cheering for ASU, so long as they aren't playing UofA. I don't see that much from ASU fans, but whatever. I like my state colleges, and will support all of them. I'm way more into the high school end of it. Our Blue Ridge Yellow Jackets had another run at the State Championship, but didn't quite take it this year. Last year, in the dome at Flagstaff, the BR boys won it against Show Low, our small town rivals. This year, same face-off in the dome, Show Low won, and they deserved to. Great bunch of kids from both teams, some amazing young atheletes, and very humble, grounded, and make me proud to be a part of watching these kids go from little kids in big pads to some amazing young men. Rivalries are great, in that they bring out competitiveness and the desire to push harder. As hard core as the parents and fans get when Blue Ridge faces Show Low (lots of bad blood) I'm always humbled by the respect these teams show eachother on the field. And that's why my handle is "Coach". I'll be (have been) coaching my 3 boys from first grade through their Senior year in football and baseball, and doing my best to cheer them on in basketball. I think sports, hunting and family time are key to staying close to my boys, and I'll do as much as I can to guide them as they transition from kids to young men. Sometimes I fail, sometimes I succeed. I just want to provide the biggest open path to the future I can for my three sons, acedemically, socially and competitively. Godspeed to all, Jason

As a UofA alum, I have to admit, I have a hard time watching them play football...I have for years. I don't know what it is with them and their program, but they just never really seem to live up to their potential. They may be winning when I find the game while flipping channels, but always seem to find a way to choke. Anyway, congrats to ASU for coming out with the win as the underdogs (at least according to ranking). I'm not a rabid U of A person. My wife and I both got our degrees there, but neither have a strong desire to see our boys go there. OK school, was a pretty nice city back then, haven't been back there much since graduating. We'll see what their options and interests are when that time comes, and decide from there.

Figured those wouldn't last long, although every time I mention that I should "take up golf" my wife gently reminds me that I don't need any more expensive hobbies.

I drew the 27 HAM hunt, along with a buddy. The plan is to go "way hard core" with traditional equipment. No inlines, no scopes, no fiber optics, just traditional black powder piggies. I'm torn, I've got a Hawkins .50 cal flintlock that needs a new barrel (totally unrelated crappy story), my grandfather's Hawkins .50 cal improved percussion, and a Remington 1858 "Old Navy" .44 cal stainless revolver - old cap and ball six shooter. Part of me wants to restore my .50 cal Hawkins flintlock and use that - I've always dreamed of taking a critter with it...on the other hand, Grandpa is way past his hunting years and has taken many a deer and turkey with his trusty old percussion Hawkins. So do I go for a new barrell on my flintlock as a primary, or use granddad's old Hawkins? I'm leaning more toward grandpa's gun. It's way more reliable than my flint lock, and has taken its share of game. On the other hand, if we are going super traditional, what better than a flint gun? It's gonna be fun and interesting...on a side note, using straight traditional weapons, I don't see donning head-to-toe camo, but I don't exactly have any Davy Crockett outfits laying around...If I do shoot a piggie with Grandpa's old Hawkins or the 1858 or my flint, I just don't seeing it being quite right if we're not trying to be high tech to go all-out camo. Maybe dressing a little more "old west" will make it more fun. Just looking for info and opinions...

That is one heck of a bull, especially for the late hunt. Congrats! Great job.

Nicely done!

Yeah, you caught me being optomistic. I won't bet on a 28 point win, but I do think the cats will take it.

Nice pics and story. Waiting for the rest of the story! I hope you find that big one.

I'm no expert when it comes to scents, but depending on where you live, I'd suggest setting it up outdoors for as long as you can. Scent killers are probably OK, but I'm not sure about the earth-scent and pine-scent wafers...they might do more harm than good. If you are brushing it in, the natural smells from pinion or cedar limbs cut locally might do a better job of masking scent than any artificial cover scents. Let us know what you find.

The only time I get checked is when I flag one down. Forest Service on the other hand was all over me during my ML hunt. First they found ashes in my campfire and dumped about 5 gallons of water on it, and wrote me a warning for leaving an "unattended fire". The pit was useless for the rest of the next several days except for a steam bath. Then when I moved, the first day out I came back to find a note reminding me of the 14 day limit...I had been there 4 hours, and one of the spots I was hoping to camp had an unattended toy hauler in it for 3 weeks. Back to the topic, I haven't seen the show but have heard others say that it really paints hunters in a bad light - like we're all either law breakers, or right on the edge. Just what others who saw it said. Personally, I'd like to see WAY more G&F officers in the field - but not doing things the way the currently have to. Seems like they are restricted to setting up checkpoints here and there during the hunting season when just about everyone they encounter will be legal. I'd like to see more of them patrolling at night looking for spot-lighters, or focusing on areas that are getting hit hard by poachers. Overall, I think G&F officers have a tough, thankless job. Most of them are very dedicated, and do the best they can with the resources they have available. Every once in a while you find the guy with something to prove who makes it tough for the guys following the rules, but after hearing horror stories from other states, I'd say ours are very well intentioned, polite and professional. Just spread way too thin.

Great Bull! Congrats!

Bear Down! 38-10 Cats

I've been throught that way a few times, usually going from the bridge and coming out at Cherry Creek. The road is usually in decent to good shape, although I don't know if I'd start it with weather moving in - there are a couple of steep spots I can see being a little bad if wet, or espeically snowy.

He's holding up a photoshop glaussian blur face blocker with his third hand. You can buy them from Cabela's I hear.

Not that long ago, it seems every year there would be a few high 90's bucks killed, and a couple over 100 inches. Some even into the teens. I would hear stories about that elusive 117" buck that got away. In the last couple years, there are multiple bucks in the high 120's, even 130's and beyond. Just this year alone, there are threads about a young guy who killed a 138 buck, pix floating around of one in the high 140's to 150's, San Carlos bucks over 140, not to mention the monster taken last year on the Ft. Apache rez that if memory serves was in the 160 class. Normal guys and gals are killing bucks over 120 inches on what seems like a regular basis. I've never seen a legitimate 120" buck on the hoof after hunting AZ and NM for 20+ years. 5 years ago, a single buck over 120", anywhere in the state, would have seemed amazing. So, I'm wondering, are there really more huge bucks being taken in recent years, or is it just because the internet makes it so accessible to see all these deer, have they always been here? Or is there some kind of trend of "super bucks" that we're seeing right now?

Hey HOSS, thanks for posting. I also have some questions about San Carlos bucks. A while back I was fortunate enough to hunt the San Carlos 2 out of 3 years. Both times I was in a group of really hard-core coues guys, and while we saw a few good bucks scouting, almost everyone went home empty, with the exception of one guy taking an OK buck late in the hunt. Don't get me wrong, we were looking for strictly 100+ bucks at a minimum, and saw a few in that range but we thought we'd see multiple 115+ type bucks. I missed a really nice buck that I'm guessing was around 110, but that's a whole story in itself. Let's just say I was broken down and living in the Taco Bell parking lot over Thanksgiving waiting for Checker or AutoZone to open. LOL. I met an old rancher who told me exactly where to go, and exactly where to look, and viola, there he was, I just tanked the shot. Two years later, I met up one night with an old trapper, probably 80+ years old, driving a beat up white VW beetle. It was obvious, this man has spent many a night on a bedroll on the Rez. We BS'd a bit by the fire but eventually he started talking about how few big bucks he had seen in the past few years, compared to the "old days" as he described. Not trying to stir anything up, but he implied that poaching big whitetail was a major factor over the past few years. His premise was, that more woodcutters on the reservation were killing more and more WT bucks over the years, whereas in the past they were killing more does (out of convenience) strictly for meat. Well, no one on the San Carlos gets deeper into the woods than the local woodcutters, so what he told me made a lot of sense - not to mention he was old enough to forget more about hunting big bucks than I'm likely to ever know. I just thought I'd see what your take was on this. I love the San Carlos, and I'd hunt it every year if I could afford it. I would just like to understand it a little better. Shoot me a PM if you get the chance. There's some areas I'd like to talk about. If you are into picking up sheds, I found a honey hole a couple years back. I couldn't take any, so I'm sure there are still a lot on the ground.

I've got an older Nikon that constantly amazes me. The thing has been battered, torn, lost and found...Even with dirty lenses, etc, it still does a great job, and I have to force myself to replace the batteries. It can go literally years of hard use and never show a low battery indicator. That said, I've heard nothing but good things about the Leica, very little about the Zeiss - I'm sure either of those, or the Swaro, will be hard to beat. On the other hand, Nikon, Bushnell and Leupold have made strides in lazer rangefinders as well. I like the idea of angle compensating rangefinders that Leica and Zeiss have not fully embraced yet, but I don't know how they perform in the field. I was told a couple years back at SHOT show by a Leica rep that Leica was the only brand that does everything "in-house" and they hadn't found a way to truly incorporate angle calculations - inferring that the other brands were not as accurate as they claimed. For what it's worth, if you go with either of the brands you are considering, you'll end up with a quality piece of equipment. But IMO, if it's not built into a set of binocs, it just seems like a lot of money to drop for a stand-alone range finder. I'm still hoping Vortex will partner with the companies behind the other Asian manufactured range finders and come up with an affordable binocular/range-finder combo that has the optics of a Vortex and the range-finding abilities of a Nikon/Leupold for under a grand. Sorry, didn't mean to derail the thread. If you want the best range finder on the market today, buy the Leica. You won't be disappointed.