Here's my first Sitka blacktail buck on my first Alaskan hunt.
A pretty wide and heavy forky with no eyeguards and short forks...
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This buck was special for many reasons.
First of all my dad was there. This was his first backpack hunt, first deer hunt with a traditional bow and first deer hunt outside of Georgia.
After the pics and a few moments to take in the big experience we were short on words and ready to start the best part of any hunt, turning it into food!
As some may remember I made a knife for my dad and myself this last year and this is the first animal they have been used on (check the homemade section for that thread). The helle blades maintained their edge and the handles were great in the palm.
Now part of any successful backpack hunt is the best part, the pack out. But before that started we got a few uninvited guests coming to crash the party as the sun went down.
We had between six and ten foxes coming within feet to grab a mouthfull of our meat all laid out cooling so we tossed some fat scraps and bones to them as the rain lightly fell to keep them off this valuable commodity.
Here's a pic that really doesn't show what was wanted as the flash hit the rain, but you can be sure there are no less than three foxes in the frame, you can bet your backside on that...
So we are breaking the buck down per Alaskan law with all rib, neck, quarters, straps, brisket, and hock meat needing to come out before the antlers.
As we finish the first half I notice two bucks off about 300 yds and dad takes off.
That turned out to be not only futile as the wind switched, but also pretty damned foolish as we didn't get the buck caped, the meat cooled and into the packs until midnight.
At this point I made another mistake. I knew the drop to the creek and back up the other side was steep, but also knew it cut off a few miles from how we got in there. On the way down, sliding the last few hundred vertical feet on our backsides as the ridge was that steep I knew I screwed up big time.
We then had no way out of that canyon but up the creek. Damn...
We got to our camp at 0400. It blew rain and wind so hard we had to lean into the wind like it was an elephant.
I will add here that my dad is a tough hombre but has never done a pack out, nor a backpack hunt.
A few times we had to have a pow wow as he wasn't totally sure I knew where I was leading him though I was 100% confident. Eventually we hit some very obvious parts of the mountain that even he remembered so we were both in pretty good spirits when we started the short downhill strip to the spike camp.
We very happily ate a MH meal and passed out till 0900 when we hiked down to basecamp and submerged the meat into a hole in the bottom of the creek. Deep enough to be unseen and un-smelled by foxes and the bears.
Then we got weather like I have never seen.
Insane weather that was reminiscent of hurricanes and such from South Georgia.
That night we stayed at basecamp and left the next morning for the top where we sat in the wind and rain till dark. Never seeing past 40yds.
The next day at 3pm we glassed up a buck. Off we went, closing the few miles relatively quickly.
We popped over the edge of the ridge and had the big fork at 10yds. I whispered to dad to get ready and took one last look at his antler tips when I saw him looking our way...
Like a damned fool I poked my head up to see him beading down on me at 10yds.
Now here again I acted like a rookie big time. I was wearing my ghillie getup and knew he only heard us shifting location. No way he smelled us with the solid 30knot wind and because I could only see him thru the grass he couldn't know what I was or that I was capable of pooping out a diamond because I wanted dad to kill him so bad, but I got nervous and went to draw on him.
He ran off about fifteen more yards and looked back, right as the widow spit a meat missle with nothing good to say...
Holy Wright Brothers, the arrow flew like a beer can with one wing, and missed his backside as he took off. Dang wind was brutal on those 5" feathers. I swear I saw it spin a 360 on the way there.
Off he went and I swear I didn't stop beating myself up for the rest of the day.
I know if I had relaxed the buck would have also. I also know that dad would have gotten a shot and that I screwed that up.
But we had almost five days left and we thought the weather was done beating us down...
Well the next two days were more of the worst weather I have ever seen.
Imagine steppig out of the tent wearing a full legit rainsuit to pee, wind at your back.
Now imagine the wind whipping so hard that you are peeing on yourself even with your back to the wind.
After another two days of being tent ridden and climbing the mountain with zero visibility with high hopes it would break everyday, only to come down at sundown having not seen past 50yds at any time we were starting to truly understand that "mother nature was the boss out here".
Finally it broke again at about noon and we were off. We still hadn't seen a buck within a few miles of camp and we headed out the longest ridge we could find.
Pretty soon we had a small 3 pt bedded and we stalked into 70yds with no possibility to close the distance.
I stayed put and dad circled with the wind to come over on top of the buck.
I'll be damned if he didn't get within "this just might work" range when a doe and two fawns came up and started feeding above the buck, busting dad when seconds before I was posing that dead buck in my head for my dad's first bowkill...
After that we got on a group of 9 deer that had two good bucks and a funky spike with eyeguards and a reverse G2.
I won't drag this out anymore than I already have. I got within ten yards of the lil freak spork and would have ground checked him but he got "friendly" and came close to see what that moving bush was. I had my BlackWidow on my right side, as harmless as a church mouse. I made a push for the other bucks after lil freak got antsy and blew them out of there.
As they ran off the two good bucks ran towards dad and I had a great feeling...
In the end dad got both bucks into 45yds but wasn't comfortable with the shot with his longbow and let them walk off.
Next day we got within 40yds of s great three point that we glassed from a solid mile and a half. It was without a doubt the best stalk I have ever put together, and had my dad there with me the whole way.
He eventually fed off and I made one more low probability stalk on a bedded buck half way up the mountain. The wind switched and we headed to camp for the last night out in the bush.
That night we stayed in basecamp as we were two miles from either camp, but spike was up and over multiple 800-1000 ft ridges and then back down to just above sea level and up the next. We woke up early and left at first light to go make one last push before having to pack up the spike camp and hike down to get extracted.
We saw deer and made a few hustles for them but just ran out of time and we flew off that night to dinner again at Henry's. 12 prawns, Texas toothpicks, calamari, and two pitchers of Alaskan Amber and we were ready for bed.
I'll get some more pics up here covering our last day in Alaska as well as a few more to fill in our whole trip.
I will say this, my old man is as tough as anyone I have ever met. He was game for anything. He hiked out part of my buck in conditions that I know most wouldn't even consider, and kept a smile on his face the whole time. I remember laughing together at about 3am on that pack out with my buck when we finally knew where we were, though I knew the whole time. Freaking fog and rain so thick the gps wouldn't pick up the satelite from on top of the ridge.
Dad, thanks for an insane "trip of a lifetime" that we need to do every year.
Topic: Bowhunting Alaska with my dad (Read 1126 times)
