On Friday Sept 18th after work my six year old son Dallin and i set off for Colorado for my archery antelope hunt. We left at about 7:00 and arrived in our Unit at about midnight. My boy was already asleep so I went ahead and set up our antlope blind in the dark. I had found this waterhole the previous week and knew that some good bucks were using it. However the antelope had been quite leary of the blind so I made sure to brush it in very well.
I then drove about 500 yards away and parked in a little gulley and set up our tent and we got to sleep.
The next morning I woke Dallin up and we walked to the blind before it got light. When the sun started to come up we immediately started spotting antelope from the blind. By 8:00 I had already passed on 4 bucks and had several does at the water. For those who haven't hunted antelope out of a blind this is an awesome experience. I had Dallin set up on the tripod with my video camera and he had a great time videoing all the antelope, potguts, and birds. Pretty soon a nice heavy buck came pushing his does to the water and Dallin said I had to shoot this one. He got the camera ready and did an unbelievable job of videoing the bucks approach and the shot. (When I got home and watched the footage I couldn't believe how well he did.)It was awesome and the buck went down within sight of the blind. Dallin was so excited when he watched the antelope go down.We got the antelope all quarted up and in the cooler on ice and I looked at my watch and realized it was only 10:00. We had planned on hunting in Colorado all day but we still had lots of hours left and I realized that I had a Wyoming antelope tag in my pocket as well. I said Dallin do you want to go to Wyoming? If you know my boy it didn't take much convincing. We hurried and took down the tent and jumped in the truck. About 4 hours later we were sitting in an antelope blind in Wyoming. Unfortunatley after 3.5 hours in the blind we never had any antelope come in so we took down the blind and headed out to find a hotel room. On the way to town, and with about 20 minutes of light remaining, we spotted nice buck in a good spot and decided to give it a try. I was able to get within 70 yards of the buck and I took aim and let an arrow fly. It him perfectly behind the shoulder. He traveled about 15 yards and started flipping cartwheels in the sagebrush. Once again my boy watched him go down. He was so excited.
I couldn't believe we had pulled it off. Two antelope with a bow in two different states in the same day with my 6 year old boy there helping every step of the way. I know we will both remember that hunt for a long time. That day will definetly be tough to beat.
Well we have been very busy here at Basin Archery. I just got back from a successful Wyoming hunt where I took an antelope and mule deer with my bow. I also had success on my Alaska caribou hunt in Sept. I was lucky enough to take a pope and young caribou at 69 yards with a grim reaper broadhead. He went less than 50 yards and died. It was a really fun time in Alaska and I hope to go back soon. I guess I have to go way back to early August to report on my Nevada archery hunt. I was able to take a 27.5" wide muley at 32 yards with my bow. We packed 7.5 miles in and had a lot of fun on a hillside we found during our early scouting trip. On top of all that I have been chasing a big 5 by 7 muley here in Utah since the opener in August. I finally got a shot at him last Tuesday but I missed. I was pretty heartbroken so we changed his nickname from 12 pack to heartbreaker. I hope to find him again soon before we get to much snow. I have once again been impressed with my equipment. My beman ICS Hunter arrows have been awesome.
The Grim Reaper broadheads have taken down all four of my animals this year with no problems what so ever. I am excited for my upcoming whitetail deer hunt in Kansas. I leave on November 6 and I am taking my boy to try for a turkey. It should be lots of fun.
Checkout pictures of these hunts in the Photo gallery
