The Streak Continues

[Lookin4amonster]

When I found out that I had drawn a late December tag for the first time since '04, I knew it would be a good year for me to harvest my largest buck yet. I have been successful in the past increasing in score from previous bucks, and I wasn't ready to change that streak. The previous buck I had taken scored around 85" and my personal goal was to break the century mark, but 85 1/2" would have kept the perfect game goin' (baseball terms).

 

The odds started against me though, I started my new job in LA in October and getting a lot of time off to travel out-of-state was the first challenge. I was able to snag the day after xmas and that's it. 3 days is all I'd have to take my buck.

 

DAY 1

The day started at 1am at my parent's house in Prescott, we had celebrated Jesus' Birthday as a family and Mama Stevenson wanted every second with her boys (my brother & I), so we decided to leave early Friday as opposed to Thursday evening. We got to our unit around 6:30, which was about 30 minutes later than I would have liked to. The plan was for me to hike through this saddle that faced an ocotillo-heavy hillside where we've seen a lot of bucks in the past, and my dad and brother to glass other hillsides and see if they couldn't find anything I was missing out on. Mother Nature didn't keep up her end of the deal and we got rained/snowed on all morning and left w/o seeing more than 2 does.

 

After getting dried off and some feeling back in my toes, my dad and I headed back out in the afternoon. We were gonna sit another saddle and just simply glass. At least that was the original plan, my family has always been notorious for being impatient. None of us can sit down for more than 30 minutes before we have to get up and move around. That's why we'd never make it back east in a treestand. We glassed for a little bit, saw about 4-5 does and decided to move on. We repeated the same pattern till sundown and ended up seeing about 20 does and 2 small bucks. They were nothing to get excited about, but it was fun watching them kind of spar at each other for a bit.

 

DAY 2

The plan was to do the same thing as the previous evening. Glass several different areas and see if we can't stumble upon a nice buck. We walked all over the range we were in and saw deer everywhere. We couldn't put our bino's up without seeing deer... the only problem was they were all horn-less. We were really discouraged that the rut wasn't in full-effect, regardless of what all of you were posting

We had seen about 30-40 does without the smallest spike being seen. At about 1pm we decided to head back to camp and fuel up before the evening hunt. On our way back we spotted a doe & fawn below us trotting through the flats. They weren't spooked, but they were definitely on the move. We watched them for a bit and then I put my bino's down to see another deer standing about 150 yards below us, I took a quick look and told my dad, 'BUCK!' .. I quickly got set up on a dead yucca below me and found him in my scope. My dad was struggling to see what I was looking at. He said, "where?" to which I replied, "down there!" (that really narrows it down Einstein)

Anyways, I wasn't waiting for a better look when my dad said, "Wow Ryan, he's real nice!" .. I got a steady rest and was milli-seconds from squeezing one off when the old man said, " where the heck are you aiming?!? I'm looking over here!" WE WERE LOOKING AT 2 DIFFERENT BUCKS!

I moved my pack across the yucca and tried finding the other buck in my scope. "275", "330", "400" my dad said giving me yardages. Finally he stopped in a spot that was out of range for the 800 yard rangefinder (is it me or if those things say 800, it means 500?) .. I put my crosshairs about 2 feet over his back and squeezed one off .. BOOOM! All I could see in front of me was an explosion of vegetation! I had shot right through a yucca leaf. My dad was like, "where'd you hit" .. and that is a question that no one will ever be able to find. Shooting though that plant could have sent that bullet anywhere. I know one thing though, I didn't hit that deer.

It's a story for the grandkids in 30 years though.

 

The evening hunt was pretty melow, about 20 does and a spike.. nothing really to mention. On the way back to camp, I had a hunch that it would be a good idea in the morning to go with our opening morning plan. The deer gods really spoke to me!

 

DAY 3 (Last day)

At this point, I was getting disappointed.. my archery elk hunt was a bust to say the least, my brother had been unsuccessful on his 18b mulie hunt, and my december whitetail hunt was less than 24 hours from being a snoozer! It had been awhile since the Stevenson boys had gone 0-for & I was ready to drop the first things with horns to avoid the ridicule. The last thing on my mind was 'the streak' .. We hiked around the backside of the mountains to where our saddle was, seeing a handful of does along the way. Before we crested the horizon line, I turned to my dad, gave him the traditional fist-bump and we crawled over the top. About 30 seconds (literally) after reaching our spot, the sun came over the mountains and was directly in our face! I thought, "screw it" I'm walking up 50 feet, even if I'm directly in the open, I know there's a buck in here! We moved up to get the sun out of our eyes and immediately spotted 3 deer running up the far hillside. Doe .. Doe.. Doe.. SHOCKER!

I was all set up on my butt with the .270 Ruger laying across my right knee (that's right, I'm a lefty), when a 4th and 5th deer stepped out of the bottom of the draw. BUCK! .. oh, it's ON now! He stepped out broadside .. BOOM! .... KUUUUUWHAP! I looked up the hill and saw he had ran up the hill a bit. I thought I had hit him, but he seemed to be fine. He stood there waiting for his doe to catch up. I cocked another round in, put the crosshairs on him again.. "239" my dad said.. BOOM! .... KUUUUUWHAP! I look up to see him tumbling down the hill. Direct hit, no mistake here, I hammered him! If he blinked, he died in the dark!

The celebration ensued!

At this point, I was completely unsure of the size of the buck.. I knew it had horns, and I knew that we could go another year without tag soup. We walked around the bend to where he had tumbled, and to my surpise he was spectacular! THE STREAK GOES ON! The perfect game goes on another inning. I pulled him out of the tree & my dad & I started shooting off guesses of score. We agreed somewhere low 90's. I grabbed my pack and immediately went to grab my camera! Not in there! 'ARE YOU KIDDING ME!?!' I remembered putting it in my pack openning morning and now it's vanished like the Cardinals Super Bowl Chances (I can say that, I'm a fan!). I recalled every step I've taken over the last 3 days and don't even remember unzipping my pack once! Where the heck could it be!?! Would I really have to post on CW.com w/o pics!?! NOOOOOOOO! (honestly my thoughts)

 

We tagged, cleaned, skinned, boned-out, and packed back to camp. Those little bastards get heavier everytime. We got back to camp, I searched everywhere and still no camera. I snapped off a pic on my iPhone just for bragging rights, but I would have really liked some field shots. Turns out we had put my camera in my brothers pack because mine was stuffed to the rafters and it had slipped my mind.

Anyways, here's the 1 pic I did manage to get.

 

 

I personally like reading posts that are picture heavy with a good story, not story heavy with a weak picture, but if you managed to make it all the way through this.. brownie points for you!

[Coues Sniper]

Congrats on a nice buck

[Coues 'n' Sheep]

Way to keep the Streak alive!!!!

[AZ RANGER]

Way to go. nice buck, cool story

[Coues Archer]

Nice buck.

[willhunt4coues]

Sweet buck congrats

[Lookin4amonster]

Thanks for the responses .. wish I had better pics