I'm not sure how Chad made it through another shift. Sorry about that bud.
(I think he may have to wait until Monday to catch up)
We had a pretty good day yesterday. As I've said before, we're kinda holding back until our third member shows up here.
After waking up yesterday morning surronded by antelope, we went on to find a superb buck hanging in cover that we could have easilly (?) used to our advantage.
We settled for a nice picture instead. It's in Vance's camera and we'll try to post it in a bit. Like I said, we're saving him. Are we great guys or what? :D
Of course we received his gear via next day air yesterday and have decided it would be fun to hide his stuff at different locations around the ranch... kind of an easter egg hunt on a grand scale.
Aside from the putzing around with the goats I fixed up my crock stick with a new antelope horn handle and we got out the decoy pattern that our friend "Kojac" sent... very nice pattern by the way!
All the materials were collected... paint, piece of paneling, etc. and we're gonna crank that out today. When the timing is right we're gonna put it to real good use.
As with any other bowhunting, this antelope hunting about diversity and we're reaching deep into our bag of tricks.
I guess it's as much about wanting to do it all as anything. Preparation and execution go hand in hand and add flavor to an already tasty bowhunters stew.
We'll get a few pics of the decoy making process... if we don't lose any fingers in the cut out phase.
I went out to retrieve my game camera yesterday and was disappointed to find that I'd only gotten 3 exposures.
Two were empty except for sage brush and pond water and the third was of a wide eyed (and somewhat startled) me as I missed my approach and came in from the front of the camera in the dark.
The last minutes of light were spent hunkered in the sage trying to lure a coyote to our simulated dying rabbit calls.
While the coyotes were less than receptive, we were buzzed by some kind of owl that hung around quite a while.
I kept a wary eye on him as he was intent on finding the rabbit that he was sure waited in the odd shaped sage bush.
The last thing I wanted was to have him land on my head.
Since I was calling at the time, the owl passed behind Vance without drawing attention at least twice.
I gave a low whistle to let Vance know something was up and to clue him in on this cool little event. He gave a squeek or two and had the owl within inches of his face several times.
I finally quizzed the ranch hands about what they've been seeing during their comings and goings around the ranch.
Looks like we now have a couple of prime spots for calling El Zorro... No! Not Antonio, either.
By the time we got in last night I was beat. Living at 8000 ft. can take a toll on an old fat man that normally lives at 800 ft.