This month was my first time ever hunting... Ever.

[Tommo64]

Congratulations on a successful first hunt, a solo one at that. It is a very special feeling. You are clearly a thoughtful individual and keen to learn. I believe all good hunters never stop learning. It is certainly never too late to start hunting. I did my first hunt at age 55 and was blessed with a kill. A very modest fallow deer. Definitely no trophy but enough to fill the freezer. I was stoked, as we say here in Australia.

 

[WYO300RUM]

I'll have to second Ol'Red. I admire your perseverance and prepping for your first hunt. Now you have an addiction. A good one ! Lol! Welcome to the ranks. It will be more fun and safer with a hunting buddy. Great story and thanks for sharing it. Good luck in future hunts !

 

[kolob10]

Thanks for the write up! I can still remember my first pronghorn hunt. You did well and was rewarded with memories that will be rehearsed for many years. Congratulation.

 

[billcaldwell]

Doozy, in your first post of this thread, you said you're really interested in survival preparedness. In my opinion, THE MOST IMPORTANT thing you can carry is a Garmin Inreach. You can call for help instantly, as well as keep others informed of your location and situation, whether it's "all ok", or a dire emergency. The Inreach uses satellite technology and works everywhere, regardless of cell phone coverage. Having one is critically important especially if you're hunting alone. Every one of the serious hunters in our elk camp has one. When you send a message it includes your exact coordinates. We never leave camp without it.

 

[CNY Yote Hunter]

Thanks @Jeremy R Snyder . I just wanted to pass along that I did post at least one picture on page 2 of this thread. Now, if you meant you wanted a good picture, well, yea! I can definitely understand that (it's not the greatest picture).

I must have missed the pic in general I guess!!! I'll have to take a look, I don't mind the gore lol

 

[Mike Matteson]

Good Job!

 

[James DeTorre]

Hunting by oneself is like swimming alone. To be avoided. stay safe keep hunting.

 

[Rich Coyle]

Doozy,

Congrats on the successful hunt. Good write up.

 

[Stgraves260]

I have hunted for over 40 years you never know everything but what you should always know is your and your equipments limits. I know this is long range hunting and there's a lot of guys that can take game at 1000+yds I won't

I'm reading good responses to your question. I guess I take it for granite on my knowledge on what I take for survival equipment. A satellite phone, a Lensatic compass and Topographic Map of your hunting area. Mark your medical//safe way points. Med kit. Take spare batterie For your electronics, water/snacks, something to start a fire with. Snake bite kit. Paracord ( multiple uses ) you can make traps with it, help support a splint if need be. A Knife, A cable saw or small saw of some sort. Emergency Blanket ( they are very small and light weight ) Most import thang of all and you must not ever forget it " Toilet Paper " ( LoL ). The next one is really funny but I have used it out in the field. Tampons. Yep yep you read that right, Tampons. They are supper absorbent. Was hunting with a friend of mine in Colorado and we walked up on someone who fell off a pretty high cliff. His friend was on his way down to help him. We called for help using my sat phone and I used the tampons to help stop the blood from gushing out. I used Quick Clot but it wasn't enough. The bone was protruding through the skin. I gave first responders our Lat Lon and when they got close enough I used my flare gun to help them hone in on us. He was taken out by helicopter. I was told that it was their most easy and well organized rescues they have ever done. I hope I never have to go through that again. My friends don't make fun of my survival pack anymore. The bottom line is, you can never be over prepared. I really hope this helps ya out.

 

[CLeriger]

Very cool story. +1 for calling a hunting buddy. Lot of things can go wrong and it makes the overall experience more enjoyable.

 

[Slim in Wyo]

I grew up in the Los Angeles area and never had a hunting upbringing. I'm 41 now and for the first time ever, went hunting. I went all by myself.

I'm very interested in emergency and survival preparedness, hence my interest now. I wanted to try hunting, at least once for the learning experience it would be.

Got a doe tag for Pronghorn in East-Central Colorado. I had to do the hunter safety course 100% online because the state stopped allowing in-person training and they allowed purely online training. I have a lot of coworkers who hunt and I gleaned a bunch of info off of them, including borrowing a DVD set about how to debone in the field (which was very helpful).

I won a NRA sweepstakes a year and a bit ago, so I sold most of the guns and built a 300 PRC rifle. I wanted a hybrid hunting and long range rifle. I knew this was far more power than was needed for Pronghorn, but I figured I'd have to shoot them from 400 yrds plus, so I figured it'd do. I don't have a lot of money with four little boys and wife wholly depending on my pay check.

I bought a pack from Bass Pro. I also splurged and got the Sig 3000 rangefinding binoculars and an accompanying Garmin Foretrex Applied Ballistics version. After practice and zeroing, I was ready to shoot long range. (This site was invaluable for building that rifle.)

On the first day of my late rifle hunt (1 Dec) I went out on a cold very windy day. I packed too heavy and struggled hiking the 7 or so miles. Never saw a Pronghorn. The worst part was my eyes were shredded by the constant blowing dust.

A few day later, I tried a different spot and immediately spotted a herd. I knew they had good eyesight but I figured I'd be able to get within 400 yards of them. Boy was I wrong! They wanted to maintain 1000 to 1100 yards at all times. I wasn't stupid enough to just keep pushing them (I knew being by myself that would never work) so I tried other strategies. One of my tries I circled about a mile around them down in a ravine they couldn't see. I emerged and had to keep very low to get to a ridge to see them. I hunched-walked without my pack 75 yards and literally crawled another 175 yards (it took forever!)... with my rifle draped across my forearms in a low crawl at times. When I emerged over the ridge, I saw all of the herd was bedded down except one doe which was a bit over 600 yards away. I was taking my time however, and very shortly that doe bed down and was out of sight from the low grass there. I could still see a lot of the other herd's heads popped up on alert, though they weren't standing, and farther at 700+ yards. I figured I'd try to shoot one of their heads. But it was a long shot, I didn't know where their brain cavity was, and I was having a hard time with the shadows telling if I was looking at a doe or buck. I was just unexperienced. About 20 minutes into this they all stood up! I looked for a good doe, but I didn't realize I would only have a few seconds to shoot. They all started running off before I was ready.... Lesson learned: when they stand like that I may only have seconds to shoot! Turns out they hadn't seen me, but rather saw another hunter hundreds of yards behind me walking by. That hunter probably had no idea they were even there. So that was discouraging. I hiked and crawled exactly 11 miles that day, according to my GPS. While hiking back to the truck I had passed by a Pronghorn skull and so I inspected it and learned the brain was a bit behind and at the bottom of the eye socket. This knowledge would prove valuable the next time I went out.

Days later I went out again, arriving to the parking spot with an hour before sunrise (with hopes I could hike the 2.5 miles or so to get into position where I figured later hunters would push the animals toward me.) The sun had come up about 10 minutes before and I wasn't really on alert while walking to my spot when I suddenly saw heads popped up right in front of me at a VERY close distance...close enough where I knew I didn't need to bother with ranging and dialing in my scope. I smoothly got down and loaded a cartridge. They were now all standing and starting into a quick walk (like they hadn't yet decided they wanted to run). I had read somewhere that often the matriarch leader of a herd will be large and take the lead when there was danger. I set my scope on a lead doe and because of what I read, the fact that she looked very large, and since I figured I only had seconds left to fire, I didn't bother looking at any other animals. She was walking right-to-left and I led my scope and waited for her to walk into it. (It was here that I could see she had a tracking collar on and it crossed my mind that I wasn't 100% sure I could kill a collared animal; I had a dozen arguments go through my head in a second and all seemed to say it would be okay.) I wasn't nervous, just methodically hurrying to shoot.

I shot and immediately looked up from above my rifle. While all others started in a run, my doe had its rump on the ground and was perched up with its front legs. I knew I had hit it, but not in the heart-lung area that I intended. My immediate thought was I needed to shoot it again to stop its suffering. I quickly loaded another round, and this time took five seconds to range its head... 165 yards. The correction is instantly displayed in my binos (it communicates with the Garmin via bloothtooth) and so I made the 0.1mil correction on the scope. I aimed for the brain cavity and about 30 seconds after I had shot the first round, I pulled the trigger again. I looked up and the animal was out of sight; I knew it had fallen. I was pleased I remembered to put my rifle on safe before moving again (Something I figured would be easy to forget and so I really wanted to ensure I got that little detail down.)

Upon inspection, and while cleaning and deboning, I learned that for whatever reason, my first round had hit and destroyed the spine about 2/3 of the way back. It also ripped open a large, 1 foot tear in the hide. It had bled a large pool down its side. Unfortunately, this made a good portion of the backstrap and tenderloins unrecoverable. The second shot was perfectly placed and I felt contented that I was able to swiftly end its life. But the scene was grisly! It still had its snout, but there was no "face" to the animal left. The 300 PRC blew away all brain, eyes and skull. It was just a cavity. Because of this, I'm not sure if I should post pictures or not; it was my best to be humane, but like I said, it is very grisly.

So that was my first time hunting. I learned a lot and reverently harvested the meat...not even a month ago. I don't know if cleaning and beboning it immediately helped, but I was pleased there was no prominent taste to the meat... All very mild. The first thing I did when I got home was to read about collared animals. I learned it is fine to shoot them but Colorado Parks & Wildlife prefers you remove the collar and bring it to them. I didn't have a socket wrench or pliers and didn't know this anyway, so I had left it, marking the exact spot with my GPS. I called them up and fortunately, they were fine with me just telling them the location.

After grinding and processing the meat, I ended up with 29 lbs.

I doubt this post will be of much interest to anyone else, but I just felt I should record my experience... If nothing else, for myself. Currently I am leaning towards hunting again next year.

Congratulations! I enjoyed reading your story. A very ethical hunt, which more should should try for. I am not of the opinion that anyone and everyone is capable of 1000 yard shots and most are not. I really like this site as a learning tool but I am afraid to many people feel if HE can shoot that far so can I. Here in the open country and the mountains of Wy when we are riding to check and move cows I too often run across wounded and dead animals that I feel were left to dye because people thought they missed at an extremely long distance so they didn't follow up. Sorry for the rant!! Guess I got up on the wrong side of the bed

 

[kkp005]

That's what it is all about. Congrats!

 

[Deleted member 107796]

Congrats and thanks for the excellent story. I too, started hunting a bit late at 28 or so and for pronghorn in the same area in eastern CO. Your kill was just fine in all ways. The distances involved, flat land with very little to hide behind and the small target that a pronghorn provides, all make it completely different from deer and elk, IMO.

 

[Mike Matteson]

I was a combat field medic in Vietnam in 1969. Just how many items are you carrying at one time while hunting. If it's in truck, ATC, ATV or something else then that was great, but carrying on your back at the same time. I am wondering just how you carried all that at one time. Just carrying items just to hunt and keep yourself safe is a lot to start with. An open fracture is a very bad thing for sure. I am 6-2 tall and can carry 50lbs which would be 25% of me body weight. That 25% is the guide lines to carry per your body weight. I do have a first aid kit in my pickup that will take care of most items needed.