Rob Allen
Member
First off Thank you Randy for providing this forum and the opportunity for us to learn and interact.
I am a life long fisherman. I grew up on the banks of a river in South West Washington where i fished for salmon, steelhead and trout. As I became an adult I expanded my territory with trout fishing trips to Southwest Montana where I fell in love with the Madison river. I worked in fly shops for a few years then began working for a high end fly rod manufacturer back in Washington where i spent the last 15 years. The last couple years Montana has been calling me and recently landed a job in Bozeman, we will be moving there as soon as I can find a place.
last year was my first year of big game hunting, My wife has hunted for years but I never got into it I am the soft hearted sap who never wanted to kill anything. Until some hunting friends gave us an Elk hind quarter. WOW! Anyway I decided to get into hunting primarily as a way to spend time in the woods and to hopefully put meat on the table some day.
My first step was to buy a rifle after a bit of research i bought a Ruger American in .30/06 topped with a vortex diamondback 3x9.. Then i bought a pair of 10x42 diamondbacks a cheap simmons spotting scope some danner boots ( never knew I had a boot fetish til i tried on hunting boots)
We did tons of scouting and settled on hunting in North East WA for Mule deer where it's 3dt or better. On the second day I had an excellent opportunity. After our morning hunt we decided to go to town for gas and breakfast. On our way back to camp stopped by a piece of what on our garmin with On X maps told us was state land. where we spotted two bucks from the hwy. We parked and walked out onto the public property but quickly determined that the deer were in fact on private property so we went back to the truck.. However OnX gives you land ownership so we googled the guys name and got his address. We drove to his farm and asked permission and permission was granted.
We arrived back to the state land and saw the bucks were still bedded down but even at the relatively close distance we could not determine if they were legal or not ( spotting scope was back at camp ) So we tried to get closer for a better look there was nowhere to hide so the bucks just watched us approach without much alarm. I got to about 150 yards and got ready to shoot. Now these bucks were silhouetted against the horizon and no matter how hard I tried I could not put 3 points on him. My wife was approaching from downhill. the buck and I both looked in her direction at the same time and I missed a good view of his antlers. I turned back to him and he was standing, clearly 4 points on one side I reach for my rifle and he stands and disappears over the ridge.. I tried to follow but by the time i got to where he had been he was 300 yards away and headed for another persons property... checked that spot every day for the rest of the season but no dice..
I had so many great experiences that season I had no idea I would love hunting so much. Too late for the Montana draw and i probably won't have fulfilled the criteria for being legal to buy Montana resident tags but hopefully I'll be able to pick up an OTC deer and elk leftover combo...
anyway that's me and my story hope to meet some of you from SW Montana this summer..
I am a life long fisherman. I grew up on the banks of a river in South West Washington where i fished for salmon, steelhead and trout. As I became an adult I expanded my territory with trout fishing trips to Southwest Montana where I fell in love with the Madison river. I worked in fly shops for a few years then began working for a high end fly rod manufacturer back in Washington where i spent the last 15 years. The last couple years Montana has been calling me and recently landed a job in Bozeman, we will be moving there as soon as I can find a place.
last year was my first year of big game hunting, My wife has hunted for years but I never got into it I am the soft hearted sap who never wanted to kill anything. Until some hunting friends gave us an Elk hind quarter. WOW! Anyway I decided to get into hunting primarily as a way to spend time in the woods and to hopefully put meat on the table some day.
My first step was to buy a rifle after a bit of research i bought a Ruger American in .30/06 topped with a vortex diamondback 3x9.. Then i bought a pair of 10x42 diamondbacks a cheap simmons spotting scope some danner boots ( never knew I had a boot fetish til i tried on hunting boots)
We did tons of scouting and settled on hunting in North East WA for Mule deer where it's 3dt or better. On the second day I had an excellent opportunity. After our morning hunt we decided to go to town for gas and breakfast. On our way back to camp stopped by a piece of what on our garmin with On X maps told us was state land. where we spotted two bucks from the hwy. We parked and walked out onto the public property but quickly determined that the deer were in fact on private property so we went back to the truck.. However OnX gives you land ownership so we googled the guys name and got his address. We drove to his farm and asked permission and permission was granted.
We arrived back to the state land and saw the bucks were still bedded down but even at the relatively close distance we could not determine if they were legal or not ( spotting scope was back at camp ) So we tried to get closer for a better look there was nowhere to hide so the bucks just watched us approach without much alarm. I got to about 150 yards and got ready to shoot. Now these bucks were silhouetted against the horizon and no matter how hard I tried I could not put 3 points on him. My wife was approaching from downhill. the buck and I both looked in her direction at the same time and I missed a good view of his antlers. I turned back to him and he was standing, clearly 4 points on one side I reach for my rifle and he stands and disappears over the ridge.. I tried to follow but by the time i got to where he had been he was 300 yards away and headed for another persons property... checked that spot every day for the rest of the season but no dice..
I had so many great experiences that season I had no idea I would love hunting so much. Too late for the Montana draw and i probably won't have fulfilled the criteria for being legal to buy Montana resident tags but hopefully I'll be able to pick up an OTC deer and elk leftover combo...
anyway that's me and my story hope to meet some of you from SW Montana this summer..
