Outdoor Writer

Good job, Troy. You're the man!!! -TONY

See the other point I made about the constant monitoring the condors get. The eagles -- especially the scavenger goldens -- get little attention in that regard. Thus like most of the other critters, there's little concrete data recorded. It's no different than when they radio collar wolves and such. They know immediately how to locate it and also know when the animal is no longer moving and is probably dead. -TONY

Way to go, girl! -TONY

Opinions are good! You know what they say about them. -TONY

Actually, Lark, I would guess they let the condors play with toys and eat foods imported from China. Just beware of those black helicopers flying near your place. -TONY

Here are a few more photos. -TONY Another of Roger Bell's buck with guide Chanse Snow. The red arrow at the upper right was where Roger's buck was bedded. When he was hit, he got up, ran a few yards before going down and then started tumbling, stopping just short (where the other arrow is) of going off the steep cliff. That's Chanse standing to the left of the arrow. This is a wider view showing where the buck went down. Hard to see in the photo but Roger and Chanse are standing where the arrow points. Chanse and Roger dragging the buck down to where I had brought the truck. I had dropped them off about 1/2 mile away from the bedded buck, and they worked their way to within 160 yards to a ridge to the left of it. Once I heard the shot, I drove back to the spot where I took the photos of the cliffs. This is a photo taken of the ranch terrain from the area where I killed my buck. The snow-covered peaks off in the distance are within Rocky Mt. NP. All the brush is mountain mahogany.

Well, if we ever get to reschedule the party at my place, venison summer sauage will probably be part of the finger -eating goodies. The gal who runs the meat processor here let me taste a slice of all three varieties and they were all great. I guess they should be at $3 per lb. in addition to the normal processing cost. -TONY

Thanks, Jim. We had to do a lot of cleaning up with mine because it spewed lots of blood from the mouth. We also cut the tongue out. -TONY

I'm not sure why he named that buck "fuego" and the other "aqua." I'll ask Chanse when I see him today or manana. For some reason, your link is corrupt for me. Here's a link to the Hunter's Journal page and the photo of the big one. -TONY

I'm not a big fan of European mounts. So if I do it, I'll probably go all out and likely do it in a sneak position with a slight turn. -TONY

With this outfit on this ranch, any older buck less than a good 4x4 is a management buck or cull. There are also many of what they consider trophy bucks. The one killed yesterday was a 206" and one of the best ever taken on the ranch. It was quite unlike most of the typical Colo. mulies. It looked more like something that would come off the N. Kaibab. -TONY

Indeed!!! I love it. It has been to Canada, Africa, New Zealand and even California if you want to count that as a foreign country. . BTW, the mule deer are already in their rutting pattern right now. Every good buck is with a harem and chasing the ladies to and fro. I don't think the does are hot yet, however, because we didn't see any that would stand still for a buck. -TONY

Yup, that's exactly why he's a management buck. If you look closely, you will also see that the brow tines are at the front of the antler bases and pointed forward at about 45 deg. rather than straight up. I think he's unique enough to hang on the wall, so I caped him in case I decide to go that route. I'll upload a few pix of the terrain when I get a chance later. Here's another pix with the John Deere Reaper in the photo. -TONY

Not sure if he had once visited, but he was miles from those fields where I harvested him, and Chanse -- my guide -- had been seeing him in this area since Aug. But he had a very nice layer of fat and ran only 20 yards or so before he fell dead. They estimated him at 6 yrs. old. Here he is in all his glory. -TONY Front View: Side View Roger Bell's 3x3 from yesterday

I ended my quest this morning with a very symetrical 3X3 with 17" back points and 23" spread. The John Deer Winchester came through again with another one-shot "harvest," and not one bit of meat affected by the shot that took out the heart and one lung. Pictures on the late night news at 11. Having the backstraps cut into steaks, tenderloins left whole and the rest, about 50 lbs. worth, into three types of summer sauage -- regular, hot n' spicy and jalapena/cheese. -TONY

Nah. That photo is really an anomaly of sorts because only a very small part of the 35,000-acre ranch is that type of country. Most of it is typical rolling foothills with some serious canyons and the main vegetation covering all the slopes is mountain mahogany. Then way low down near the main ranch house, there are probably 200 acres of alfalfa fields. So the place is actually like a candy store for deer. -TONY

I'm tired and about ready to crawl in the sack, but I thought I'd give a quick report of today's happenings. My hunting mate from Oregon, Roger, killed a nice 3x3 management buck today. It's very high and symetrical but lacks a lot of mass and spread. The one trophy hunter who was with a different guide shot a super heavy and wide 8x9 or so. It looks like a N. Kaibab buck and grossed 206!!! I did more shopping today than anything, mostly to give the guy hunting with me first crack. We saw no less than 100-125 deer, with many shooter bucks included. Some of them are off-limits for me, though, because they are legit trophy quality deer and not cull-type bucks. We did spot one monster 3x3 and another 4x6 that we will try to relocate again tomorrow. I'll post photos of Roger's 3x3 tomorrow after I "harvest" my buck. I didn't get any pix of the biggie, but the guide did and will have them on the outfitter's web site soon. -TONY

Dandy buck. Congrats to Ashley and a "good job" to dad. -TONY

Because mammals have different digestive systems than those of the avian creatures, it take much more lead to enter their blood streams, which is where it needs to get to be lethal. That's why people can go through life with a bullet or shotgun pellets embedded in their bodies. For the most part, the mammals eliminate most lead they might eat in their feces. Birds, however, ingest it and then it sits in their gizzards where acids break it down and send it directly into the blood stream. This is also why lead shot was killing millions of waterfowl; they ingest it like they would small pebbles to aid digestion. They weren't dying because a hunter hit them with a few stray pellets or two. Lastly, all the other critters do not have a hundred people constantly monitoring the movements, both visually and through radio telemetry. IOW, a sick condor is noted very quickly and caught for treatment. Some survive and others do not. I have no doubt lead poisoning kills other scavenger type birds and perhaps even a few mammals over time. The latter would be more affected by tiny particles that might be easily acted on by the stomach acids. It would take quite a bit to kill them, however. But there's an awful lot of country out there where they can curl up and die, and of course eventually disappear -- ashes to ashes, dirt to dirt, so to speak.

Congrats to your boy. That will be a hard one to beat as he gets older! -TONY

Just shooting my ol' tried and true .264 with Win. factory 140 PPs. And hopefully we have a few geese thrown in. This is the crew I'm hunting with. If you look at the deer pix in the TROPHY ROOM section, you'll see some of the management cull bucks they take each year. This is one from earlier this year. -TONY

Salt, corn and apple-flavored Pop Tarts. -TONY

I'm at the Comfort Inn in Wellington, Colo. as I type this. Left home yesterday about 6 a.m. and arrived here last night about 950 miles later at 8:30. Won't start hunting until tomorrow. -TONY

Box has an easy, casual style of writing, so it's not a burdensome read to keep up. He keeps his plots fairly simple too, but as you say, they are intriguing, especially when someone uses taxidermy skills on a human. -TONY

Good job, guys! -TONY