Here is a short version of the hunt we had near Glenrock, WY. There were seven of us from Michigan that shared this hunt. Four of the seven had never been pronghorn hunting --- green horn rookies when it comes to pronghorns. We had the good fortune and pleasure of going with some bow hunters with several years of experience hunting goats and we also had a terrific outfitter that has many years of experience as well. There were numerous pop up blinds, box blinds, elevated box blinds, and tripods scattered on the property over water and salt. The outfitter would place us where he thought we would have the best chance of seeing nice animals up close and personal. The first two days of the hunt the weather was outright cold and wet for that part of the country and hopes were not high that first morning. None the less there were 4 animals taken on the first two days of the hunt, and two taken on the third. At least two of them will make the P and Y. Oh ya, I missed a close shot on a nice buck the third day but I will blame it on the lack of experience. Not knowing that compared to whitetails you can move around quite a bit on pronghorns if done right. So being ignorant of that I didn’t capitalize on the weakness and blew the shot. Bummed me out.
I was the lone man out on Monday, our last day of the hunt. I hunted a ground box blind, one that had been seeing quite a bit of traffic when the weather finally warmed up. At around 8:30 five nice bucks showed up at the water but acted very nervous and didn’t stick around long enough for me to feel comfortable taking a shot. A minut later I found out why the were so nervous. When they took off this guy came running down from the ridge to my right and chased all of them away except for a small 1.5 year old buck. After several nervous minutes the bigger buck calmed down and began to circle the water hole and stuck his head in the water giving me a slightly quartering away shot. I can remember seeing the arrow disappear into his right side in the area of the liver. He of course took off like he was shot out of a canon for about 80 yards, stood there for about 30 seconds, and then lay down. A minute later his head went down and I knew at that time the arrow must have taken out the left lung as well as liver.
I didn’t know this at the time but the outfitter and four of my hunting partners were watching the entire episode from a distance through their spotting scopes and binos! LOL. Good thing I didn’t know that at the time!
The shot was 10 yards and I made it with a 54 lb MOAB Thunderstick and a Magnus Stinger tipped 2213.
It was one of those once in lifetime hunts that I will never forget, nor will I forget the new friends made and good times shared with some very close friends. I’m a most fortunate, lucky, and very grateful bow hunter.
Tom
Topic: Daily Hunt Pics and Stories 2008 (Read 8633 times)
