Coach

Nicely Done!!! What a stud of a buck. And Toby, you're the MAN!!! Great hunt, pix and write up! Cherish the moment. Great work by dad to to help get you on him.

Awesome job!!! Congrats on one heck of buck. I love those double eyeguards! Way to work hard and make it happen!

Great looking buck! Man he's a toad. Nicely done!

Yes coocoo, that's exactly what I was saying. And you should board every international flight in a burka chanting "Allah Akbar". Your perception borders super-hero magnitude. How I've survived this long in the woods without a stobe-light duct-taped to my head and a loud speaker proclaiming "Hunter - Do Not Shoot Me", is a total mystery. I guess I'll just have to keep taking my chances wearing camo, with all the drunk and hungover masses shooting at every sound and movement in sight. Maybe I should just "up" my life insurance policy. I'm pretty sure you've got this one nailed.

Looks like you have one gorgeous buck all lined up. Don't you just love the genetics of bucks in that area? IMO, some of the prettiest racks in the state. I sure hope you connect on him tomorrow morning. Looking forward to the updates. Sending a PM.

Here’s an interesting anecdote to the blaze-orange portion of this discussion. The closest I’ve personally come to being shot (as far as I know) was *because* of blaze orange. I was glassing from the top of a little knob that was close to a seldom used two-track on opening morning of a deer hunt several years back. I watched a group of yahoos walk right up the two track with Grandpa in the truck 100 yards behind approach my position. Knowing they were yahoos by the way they conducted themselves, I took a blaze orange vest out of my pack and hung it on a Manzanita limb next to me. As the group reached a spot below me they started looking in all directions through their binoculars, except for the one person in the group with a gun. This was probably a 12 year old kid and he immediately “glassed me up” through his rifle scope and said, “Dad, what’s that?” I only saw the first half-second of the beating that ensued, as I was busy hitting the deck. Suffice it to say, when I did return to the upright position I could see a very frustrated dad, and a very disarmed 12 year old. I’m not saying blaze orange is bad by any means. I sure as heck never wear it, but don’t have anything against those that do. I just thought this was a funny story to tie into the topic.

Holy cow, those deer aren't going to know what hit them! Good luck to all of you with tags. I'm looking forward to the pictures and stories.

Man - that is an AWESOME looking buck! Congrats Wes, and good shooting! Way to hold out for a biggun too!

I'm pretty sure that this is also ILLEGAL you can not permanently attach anything to a tree sure ya want to try to keep your camera safe but its still notthe right thing to do! Hmmm - never thought about that. I figured people are screwing treestand steps by the dozens into trees and didn't see this as much different. I can tell you I'm not leaving it out there with nothing but a cable or chain that can be snipped with bolt cutters.

He looks really nice! Can't wait to see the pix after you ventilate him.

Just cut up the backstrap about 3/8 inch, salt, pepper, cavenders, then dipped in flour and fried in the skillet. Dang that was good.

That's hunting the rez - it all depends on who you talk to and on what day. I know the used to issue a lion tag with whitetail tags - maybe that's changed. My understanding is that while you are on your deer hunt, you don't have to pay the $10 per day for lions, but if you go up scouting and plan to lion hunt as well, then you'll need to pay the $10 ($6 trespass fee if you are just scouting and not hunting). This is how it was a few years ago.

That is so awesome! Great job.

Wow - I can't believe they defeated the box like that! When I put my covert in a spot it *might* be found, I do the exact same thing - lag bolt it to a tree, lock the bottom and hope for the best. I always figured they'd have to haul out a chunk of the tree to get the camera. Looks like I'll be firing up the welder and finding new ways to protect the upper seams. I really feel for you - sorry you lost your camera. We need to start putting a bounty on these camera theives or something. They are scum of the earth.

Nice recipes! I'm looking forward to trying some of these out. Tomorrow I'm going to take a piece of elk backstrap that has not been frozen and coat it in olive oil and pack on a dry rub of montreal steak seasoning and cook it slow on the grill. I'll let you know how it comes out.

I have gone to the exact same bullet for my .300 WSM for everything except coues. For coues, I like the Nosler/Winchester CT ballistic silver tip. It opens up better on light, thin skinned game IMO. As others have stated, the accubond will perform more like a partition, and I witnessed a very close call on a Nosler partition on coues. The buck was trotting over a hill and the hunter hit it perfectly at it topped the hill. We both saw it hunch up but keep going. When we got to the spot of the hit, there was nothing. The back side of this hill was crazy thick, and without a blood trail we would have a heck of a time finding the deer. We got lucky and the buck only made it 40 or so yards past the hit and didn't make it to the thick stuff. When we found it, there was one tiny drop of blood under its nose, and we couldn't find either an entry or exit wound. Once we skinned it, there was a tiny .270" hole going in the ribs on one side and another .270" going out the the opposite shoulder, just short of the scapula. Luckily, it did enough damage on its way through to keep the deer from making it any further, but if it had, we had no blood trail to go on, and could have spent days looking for it. Bottom line, if that's the bullet that flies best for you, go for it - it will kill deer dead as a hammer. But you might try the CT silver tip. In all the guns I reload for, these bullets will fly very similar, but the expansion will be better on coues with the silver tip.

This is a follow-up to the youth cow hunt in 3A/3C. Sunday, my oldest son, Matt got his first elk (http://forums.coueswhitetail.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=21584), and today we got Nick into them on one of the most exiting hunts I've ever been on. You'ld think with Halloween right around the corner the rut action would be pretty much over. We got out to our spot about a half-hour before daylight, and both myself and Forest Ninja Eric had *promised* Nick we would get him his chance. As daylight drew closer we had 3 bulls bugling their heads off, so we knew it was going to be a good morning. We sat tight until we were confident which way they were moving, then we made a plan and kicked it into high gear. We moved down the ridge into position where we knew they would be heading at first light and picked up the herd at the top edge of a burn moving our way. We really took our time making sure not to get in too close too fast, and got Nick set up with the bipod out ready for the shot. Sure enough, the cows start filtering in and we told him to just settle on one, wait for her to stop and take the shot. It was still a fairly long shot for an 11 yr old at 306 yards initially, and the first shot rang out but missed cleanly. All of a sudden, it was like the flood gates had opened up. Elk started pouring out of the trees like ants off an anthill. They had no idea where the shot had come from and actually ran toward us. A group settled into the trees just 200 yards below, and Nick repositioned and fired once more. This time it was a perfect hit and the cow dropped like sack of potatoes. All this time, the elk were still pouring out of the trees, and you could hear bulls clashing horns and bugling all over. The cows had split into a few groups but the bulls rounded up the entire herd and pushed them straight at us. All we could hear were hooves and rocks as the entire herd was barrelling right up the hill toward us and we were actually starting to think we might be right in the middle of a stampede! Luckily, they veered off at the last second and the entire herd of at least 7 bulls and 50+ cows ran past at 70 to 80 yards - it was like a sea of elk pouring past. Eric and I just stared at eachother in amazement. We had no idea the herd was that big. When the dust settled, we put our binocs up and saw Nick's cow on the ground. This is what makes hunting with kids so much fun. Nick was SOOO pumped, he jumped up in the air, hollered a little bit, man he was so happy to have his first elk down. Once again, a huge thanks to Eric. He really was awesome coming out to help us, and making sure it was exactly what a youth hunt should be - FUN. The boys had a blast - I learned a LOT by watching him, both about how elk move, and about what makes hunting fun instead of work and stress. I can't say enough about how he made this such a positive experience.

Awesome job! Way to get it done Cyr! Sounds like an exiting hunt to say the least. Thanks for sharing the story and pix.

That was really cool. I can see how you might hesitate when you are looking so closely at certain aspects of his rack like his fronts, but man, when you see royals and thirds like that, along with that width, I can't imagine too many people passing. Great video too - it really captured the hunt. Since you asked to be "very critical" and "don't hold back"... the only thing I wasn't really into was the intro with the big white balloons or clouds with the hunter and camera man's names. It was good narration for sure, and good music, but some of the effects were, IMO, too stock, like, look what nifty thing I can make my software do. Maybe I'm just an old cremudgeon, but the fading in and out of website links and graphics and balloons detracted a little bit for me of what was a really nice sequence from the opening shots of that super nice, wide bull to the harvest. I thought the narration was great, the overall experience was captured, but the opening sequence just seemed a little "cheezey" for lack of a better term, as if your aspiring cousin was experimenting with video effects. Fine for youtube or posting on local sites, but I wouldn't really want to be printing DVDs of that portion. Overall, it was a very cool and fun video to watch, but you made it clear that you wanted honest feedback about what is good, and not so good. I'd love to have video like that of some of my hunts, but I think it could be improved by less software effects, and more focus on the hunt itself. That's where the video shined, IMO.

Both of my boys shoot this bow. I can't say enough good things about it. If you are looking for a bow that will grow with you, this thing is awesome. I'm not sure if you're looking at it as a youth bow, but it's amazing that it can go from 15-60 pounds and cover draw lengths from 19" to 29". I've never seen a more versatile bow for growing archers.

Thanks! I couldn't be more proud of both of them. They held their composure, kept their spirits high, worked their tails off and never complained - I pushed them pretty hard - I could go on all night. I'm so happy for both of them to have had such an exiting hunt. Proud papa for sure.

That's probably one of the hardest to score coues I've ever seen. It's huge, and really neat, but I can't help but think that from a pure "net score" perspective, it's not going to do as well as it probably should. I'd really like to see how it breaks down. Scoring aside, it is an amazing buck, and I'd love to have the chance to take a buck like that!

That picture sure looks like the foot is missing, or at least missing digits, but who knows for sure without seeing it up close. The lion does look a bit skinny, so maybe it does have a handicap. I'm sure he can get on more deer with 3 feet than I can with 2 Cool picture regardless, and man long-ears, you've got more pix of lions in one post than I've seen in a lifetime of tromping around in the desert/forest. Super cool thread for sure.

Man, today Nick got it done big time. Rather than append his story to this thread, I started a new one called Nick's Turn - here's the link: http://forums.coueswhitetail.com/forums/in...showtopic=21627 Thanks for all the positive responses. It was a great youth hunt for sure!

My two oldest sons drew their first elk tags this year in the 3A/3C Jr hunt. They also had the Jr. deer hunt in the same unit, but we weren't quite able to get it done. Pretty much every day we were seeing elk, but just couldn't find the deer. Once the elk hunt started we were pretty sure it would be a slam dunk, as we had been in perfect position for elk almost each outing for deer, but it turned out to be harder than we expected when the pressure hit Friday morning. With help from friends, Eric (AKA Forest Ninja) and Skyler, we were on elk pretty much every morning and evening and opening day both boys got to shoot, but the shots were longer than I had practiced with them so we ended up with no hits. Saturday, we were on them again in the morning, and almost closed the deal with bulls screaming and fighting right in front of us, but still no clear shot as the cows were in and out of trees at 235 yards. We had to bust tail to Holbrook for a couple youth football games, and by the time we got back out, it was a little late and all of our spots already had hunters in them. This morning (Sunday), Eric came out to help seal the deal. We were on elk starting at daylight, but had quite a bit of pressure from other "hunters" (this is a whole story in itself - friggin idiots out there with no ethics - I'll vent more about this later) so the herd was constantly moving giving us only glimpses here and there. Finally, around 8 AM, we moved into the area we figured they would go to bed, and sure enough, as we topped a ridge, 4 or 5 bedded elk stood up right in front of us. It was actually my middle son, Nick's turn to shoot, but he didn't have quite the right angle and when he did get into position and tried to shoot, realized he still had the safety on - that's youth hunting . From where Matt and I were, we had a clean shot and I knew they were about to bolt, so I told him to take it. He made a perfect double lung shot off hand on this really nice cow in the heat-of-the moment. Of course, he was really happy to get his first elk on the ground. Now it's time to get Nick back out there and hopefully get him into position for his first cow. Special thanks to Forest Ninja and Skyler for all their help, taking time off from work and family to help the boys on this hunt.