Well I think the Montana
hunters are all going to have similar
stories considering the storm that rolled thru here. My wife and I debated about taking
our 8 month old along with us on my antelope hunt, as we watched the weather we knew this probably wouldn’t be a good idea so they stayed home this weekend.
I set out in search of “Ol Wiley” on Saturday knowing that if it is windy in our town, I knew it would be much worse where I would be hunting. So with this knowledge I know what I can’t hunt or scout if I just stay home, so I head out with plans of using Tony Tebbe’s “cute little Duiker call” attached to my jacket hoping to call in a few coyotes or a red fox or two. The winds never let up in any of the areas that I passed and knew that it was just too
windy to make an attempt at calling critters so I pushed on to the area where I would scout for antelope for Montana’s rifle
season opener on Sunday.
Well as luck would have it I find two coyotes mousing near a creek bottom and after a couple of shots with my
Bushmaster Varminter it was all said and done a double and no calling. Now if you all are a lot like me, you just don’t get the satisfaction you get when calling in a critter but all the same one male and one female were taken, a breeding pair?….not anymore! I was however able to use the “Coyote Drag” I purchased from Loren
Reese, talk about a great product.
Unfortunately I had the PMAG full of 40 grain Nosler ballistic tips and not the PMAG full of full metal jackets and was unable to salvage the pelts! This was however the first coyotes taken with my Bushmaster and it performed well!
So back to the other task at hand, scout for antelope for the following day opener. I arrive at my normal hunting area only to meet with several snow drifts and no other vehicle. Sign? This could be good or bad or am I just pushing it? These sorts of things really make you think when you hunt alone, but I thought I came all the way over here, I might as well check things out. The snow was somewhat deep in this area and I was not finding any sign of antelope. It was getting to be late evening and the winds and snow were still causing me grief. I wanted to make a giant loop but then I got that feeling in my stomach that I should just go out the way I came in and with thoughts of my daughter and wife at home, I think about these things a lot more than I used to. I turn back and the storm seems to have strengthened, I do however, locate three nice bucks and about 15 does. I make it to the highway and it is solid white! The winds are blowing snow sideways and for that matter, the road was not only white but it was a sheet of ice and the winds are pushing my full size Dodge all over the road, I put the truck in four wheel drive and drive only in third gear. Suddenly I realize that I am the only one on the road, I finally make it to the Interstate and everyone is pulled over on the off ramps. The 15 mile or so drive took me well over 40 minutes to make. The next 17 miles would prove to be
even worse. I couldn’t hold up because the town I had a room in was 17 miles and the weather was not looking promising at all.
As you can imagine, thoughts of “why am I out here” and more importantly, “I need to get to a safe place” as thoughts of my daughter and wife passed thru my head. There were snow drifts ranging from 3 to 4 feet tall and solid ice and snow packed road surfaces as well and that sideways
blowing snow that made visibility tough. I had to rely on the markers on the edge of the road to keep me between the lanes. A trip that normally takes about 45 minutes to drive had now taken me well over 115 minutes ,but I arrived in a town with no vacancy and parking lots full of truckers, THANK GOD I had made a reservation. I got settled in and called my wife to let her know that the Interstate had been shut down in the direction I had just come from and that I would sleep in and head home via another route in the morning. It just didn’t feel right risking it all for an antelope.
Morning arrived and the Interstate was to open at 10:30 so I called home again and told my wife that I was going to go ahead and give it a try and locate a buck,
but if it looked unsafe that I would turn around and head home. The roads were mainly clear and the snow was not
accumulating so I thought I would give it a try. I arrives at the area I scouted the evening prior only to find nobody had been in the area before me and that the antelope were not here either. So I make the loop and try another area. Camps had goats already hanging in camp, ATV’s and UTV’s were hauling antelope and bloody tailgates showed all the signs that the antelope had moved out of my area where the snow was deeper to the lower grounds with less snow and that folks here were having better luck. I locate a couple of herds, but they are on the run with ATV’s and full size vehicles in chase, they crossed our hunting district into the adjacent hunting district and were now gone. I continue to hunt, but have no luck locating antelope in this area and don’t hear any shots either. So with the day coming to a close, I call home and ask my wife if it would be better for me to stay one more night, as I have Monday off, rather than have to come all the way back out the following weekend costing me in gas and a room again. We agreed that it would be smarter to stay again and that hopefully my luck would turn around on Monday.
Monday morning arrives, I get the Diesel all warmed up and head out in the dark. Now for that gut feeling, where are the antelope going to be? I decide not to give up on my area so I head back thinking that the previous days hunting pressure may have pushed them into my favorite spot. I arrive and again no tracks in the snow and I pass on two separate coyotes in hopes that just around the corner there will be antelope. I should have shot the coyotes!
So I make a loop and arrive in the previous evenings area where others had better luck than I. It is now 8:45 in the morning and I take a position on some high ground to glass. It is a beautiful day,
but no antelope in sight, I head over to another location a short distance away and I see a nice buck and two does. I shut the truck down and grab the 22.250 and head out. Just over the rise I can see the bucks horns, I sneak over and they take off. An adjacent road had a vehicle coming down fairly quickly and the antelope spooked. I take the shot and the buck goes down, I sneak in close enough to make a clean kill shot and it is all over. I say a quick prayer as I always do and then the limited work begins. I take a few photos, call my wife and baby girl and head out. By the way, the Loren Reese Coyote Drag worked well on the antelope and it didn’t hurt things that there was snow to drag on.