DCMHunter

Briant It sounds like you didn't get a tag. I called on Monday evening and was told the end of the week. I called back on Tuesday evening at 4:45 and the lady I spoke to was very nice and i gave her my sons and my sportsman ID and she looked them up for me. I was drawn along with my brother-in-law from WI for the 30B Whitetail hunt. My son did not get a tag. I my sign my tag over to him but he already has a unit 1 Nov. Bull tag. My in-law grew up in Wilcox but has not been in the area for 20+ years. He said depending on the population and houseing changes he thinks he can find a few places. We are thinking about riding horse back into the dragoons but need to get the scupe on water holes. Horses have a hard time without water. If I can find some good water it will be a pack triplike my 2007 Dec hunt. Does any one have any information on some good water holes back off the beaten bath? Again I can trade information for unit 1 or 27. PM me with some atrea's to start looking at. I have a good Arizona map program that give some spings but the last time I tried to plan a trip with it we could not find the springs and had a horse start cramping on us from no water. I can pack evough for me but not the horses. Thanks DCM

Thanks everyone for the help that was provided, but after nearly two months of swapping and changing shifts everytime the G&F postponed or rescheduled the hunt they the have postponed it one to many times. I was called today and told the the buffalo are not coming off the top and they are postponing the hunt another week. After the last change my boss told me I could not continue to swap shifts every week or every other week. If they call and offer me the tag again I will have to decline the offer unless by chance it is on a weekend I already have off. Thanks again for all the help and hopefully I will be able to put it use someday. DCM

Hunt has been postponed again. Is this common? I try to rearange schedules to fit the hunt in and then have to rearange them again and again, my boss will not keep doing this forever. I hope they do not change it again. Or should I say I hope the Buffalo come down onto the House Rock so the WM will OK the hunt. DCM (AKA Frustrated)

Thanks for all the help. This change in dates should work out for the best if the hunt goes. This weekend is Wapiti weekend with the AES at the Sipes Ranch and I would lose lots of help to that. Now I can help at Wapiti and my help can go on the hunt with me. I will be taking horses to carry the meet out and I will do a gutless quartering when I get one down. I do have a good bone saw that braeks down and is easy to pack and a Battery operated zawsaw that the horses can carry. I just spoke to the lady at rock house and she said few are coming down at this time and are hanging tight to the wilderness and tank one. There are some others in the cocks comb area but hopefully will drop down. There is still one hunter in the area with a govenors tag and she hopes that he will not get to chasing them to bad. She also said that last year there were a lot that never came down but stayed up by the Kaibab Lodge area and the park. This not being a Raymand ranch hunt makes it all the better. But my wife is getting tired of watching the identification video every night. Thanks again for all the help and if you think of anything else please post it here or PM me.

The Game and Fish called yesterday and said that the hunt is being postponed one week, Because the draw hunters had bushed all the buffalo off of house rock this last weekend. They have rescheduled for the 25th, 26th and 27th. I am haveing a hard time shifting schedules again to have time for this hunt. And I will be leaving the 28th for Kerrville Tx so my 4H kids can shoot in the national invitational turnament. The department is trying to work with me to get a tag and is still sending me a box of ammo. It is a bummer to get the call, make all the neccessary change and then have them postpone the hunt. Although I would like some animals be able to hunt. Especially with such a short hunt. DCM

How does the department post or notivy the draw recipients for the second left over permit draw? DM

Does anyone have or know where I can get a windage chart? I have a group of 4H kids going to the 4H national shoot in Kerrville Texas this summer and need some help with their shoting. With the Spring winds we are having a hard time shoting out to 100meters. They are shoting 40gr of FFF at 25 and 50 yards and then bumping up to 60gr of FFF for shooting at 77 and 100 meters. with this they are still getting about 20 inches of drop between the 25 yards and the 100 meters. We can shot this consistantly and adjust the sights for the differance. But the wind has been causing our round balls to drift as much as 25 inches or more. I am needing a chart or a calculating formula to use for differant wind speeds and powder loads. Any help would be appreciated. 60gr of powder is the maximum load they are allowed to use. Thanks DCM

Congrats to those that drew. I was hoping for an early archery elk tag but the department informed me when I called that I was not drawn. Know I can concentrate on deer and New Mexico. Maybe a sheep tag this year!! DCM

I got Lucky opening day and tagged my turkey. I was suppose to be relieved at 0500 from my job and get a late start at best for the opener. I had several spots picked out and knew it would take me around an hour to get there. As luck would have it I got called at 0300 for a flight to the valley and didn't get back until 0800. This but me about three hours behind what I was planning. When I got to the first area I found four camps lined up in the area and no birds. I moved to my second area and all I found where hens. About 1300 hours (thats 1:00 PM for some of you) I was heading to my third spot when I spotted two birds and with glassinfg them I saw they were both toms. I parked the truck and started a stalk keeping trees between us and got to about 40 yards when they saw me and I had to take a flying shot. 20 minutes of stalking and Bang one turkey down. DM

I will be getting something like this for my 4H group. We shoot muzzleloaders with patched round balls and when shooting 100 meters a side wind plays hec with them. If you know the average wind speed it will help you determine drift. I was useing a barrowed one the other day and with a 15 mph side wind we would have about 20 inches of drift at 100 meters. (50cal with 60gr FFF) dm

Still can't get to Big Lake. The highest I could go was almost to Pat Knoll. You can go in about 12 miles from the Alpine side. Greens peak is still blocked but you can get to Connero Lake and almost to SawMill Springs. The birds were talking very little in the mornings and would then shut up for the rest of the day. DM

I will send mine back in on Monday for the left over tags. DM

You can make the time in between tags as long or as short as you want it. I now have 16 BP for elk and 17 for antilope. I put in for the preferred hunts and then a few years ago I started sharing my points with my brother-in-law from Wisconson. With that being said I have hunted elk for three of the last five years by picking up left over tags for cows. This next year should put me and my brother-in-law in the bonus pass for the hunt that we want. I will be applying for left over tags again this year and I am very excited that I can apply for some good hunts not just cow hunts. I DO NOT FEEL THAT THERE IS A MAJOR PROBLEM WITH THE DRAW SYSTEM. It could be worse and be a prefrence point system. DCM

All of the hunts starting with 2800 or 3800 are for the Hopi reservation land in those units. If you look at the bottum of the page these hunts are listed but have dashes in place of the hunt number and permit number. The hunt number 3801 is for general bull hunt in November on the Hopi tribel land. These hunts are available to Arizona residents as well as Hopi tribel members (tribel members have first pick). Look at foot note 36 for more detail. Does anyone have a map of these tribel lands or a boundry discription? DCM

I sent my applications for the left over elk tags to the address listed on their web page, and my apps were returned to me saying there was no such address. I had my wife check the address and it was correct. Is the Game and Fish accepting mail at 5000 W. Carefree Highway? I will not be hunting because either the post office or Game and Fish has messed up. This really stinks!!! DCM

There page stated to Please Mail Left-over applications to: Arizona Game and Fish Department Attn: Draw 1st Come 5000 W. Carefree Highway Phoenix, AZ 85086 I have the page printed out rite in front of me and the envelopes with a post office sticker saying no such address. I believe if you can still pull up the web page on the G&F website for left over tags. It know shows there are no tags left but the address is still there. DCM

I will be doing a fund raser with my 4H shooting group. But I wish I could go just to fill out a blue card so I cold tell them what a mistake I think they are making by decreasing some hunts upto 80% just so they can increase other hunts by the some or more percentage. I think I saw one hunt with like 150% increase. There goes Coues hunting as we knew and loved it. The December tags will know by like drawing for the strip and take 10 to 15 years to draw. Although if it is like anyother meeting the snobs will thumb their nose at anyone making coments and do what they want to make more money and ruin hunting. DCM

Here is my brother-in-laws WI Whitetail from last November. He already has it home and on the wall. I have a trip planned for this year to try and get me one like it. DCM

My brother-in-law sent me some photo's today of our December Coues. I think they look real good for just over three months being mounted. Has any one else got their mounts back yet? Lets see them! Now I just need to waite until my Thanksgiving WI Whitetail hunt to go pick it up. DCM

There are 700 tag decrease in the December hunts and an increase ranging from 10% to 130% in the number of tags for the early whitetail hunts. The only units that got an increase in the December hunts are the alternative hunt management units. For those that like the other units the chance of getting drawn just went down the tubes. example is the 70% decreae in unit 27 December tags down to 15 tags. The department wants increased oppertunity and increased income. And will throw quality out the window to pad their pockets. Unit 27 had a 130% increase in tags for the early hunt from 150 up to 350. Plan on lossing some more of the unit 27 archery oppertunities with in the next couple of years. With unit 1, 3a - 3c, 3b in the White Mountains going to a draw where do you think all the archery hunters are going to go? My quess is unit 27 BYE BYE January hunt. I have not had time to do a complete review but it looks like deer hunt is going to the masses of peaple. DCM

Question??? Now that archery is going to be a draw in some units will they have a manditory reporting requirement or will they just have to fill out the servay card like the other draw hunts??? DCM

Public input Meetings start today, is anyone going? They are decreasing the December whitetail tags by around 700.

Of the 45% that were returned how many reported harvesting an animal? What was the mandetory harvest reported by the archery hunters? Are there any unit specific information available? With 700 tag decrease in December Whitetail tags, They should show there reasoning other then because they can. All of the units that were on the list to go to an archery draw are going that way. It would be nice for the department to be upfront with their information and post the numbers in the way that they are using them. When was the hunt recommendations posted? The first public meeting is today in Pinetop. Has anyone had a good chance to look at them and going to make the meeting tonight for comments? DCM

White Chevy four door. Saw you yesterday coming up out of Rye into Payson. When you slowed down in Payson to turn I noticed that your right brake light is not working. Sticker sitings are becoming pritty comman any more. DCM

CnS I did a gut less quartering and deboned all the meet from the coues deer with in a half hour of them being shot. The only thing packed out was the meet, cape and heads. My sons mule deer was about a half hour pack out. His deer was gutted immediately and skinned about an hour later when we got to camp. No meet was lost from any of the deer we harvested. DCM