Routt County Pronghorn

[nmelktrout]

Headed back home to Routt County, Colorado for my second antelope hunt of the season. This was the first Colorado goat tag I've drawn and I was pretty excited to head home and hunt the high sage country with a couple of childhood friends. I've already had a good season on New Mexico's heavy-horned speedgoats and after NW Colorado's severe drought, had pretty low expectations for this hunt. I was pleased to learn that the rut was in full swing and had a short, yet successful hunt watching bucks chasing hot does all over the damned place. We looked over a few herds and passed a couple of good bucks before I glassed up this buck chasing his ladies. The stalk was on. After chasing him in circles he finally ran a doe in the right direction and I put him down at 248 yards. Spent the rest of the day glassing muleys and located a couple of absolute giants. We capped it all off with a couple of cold ones in a tack shed filled with decades worth of giant muley racks. One hell of a day to kill the absolute biggest bodied buck I've ever seen.

A word of thanks:

(My orange vest is sitting directly behind the camera for those that care)
-Cody

 

[Oak]

Nice buck. I grew up in Routt as well. That tack shed isn't just north of the highway, is it?

 

[nmelktrout]

Oak. It sure is. I grew up in South Routt.

 

[spook12]

Really nice buck!

 

[Dinkshooter]

I grew up in Routt as well.

Well, can't we just say you reached legal adulthood

Nice goat. I need to see this shed I think.

 

[Big Fin]

Sounds like a cool hunt. That is a big body on that dude. Congrats on a great buck.

 

[Oak]

Oak. It sure is. I grew up in South Routt.

SOROCO? Say it ain't so! (Hayden)

Well, can't we just say you reached legal adulthood

Yeah, kind of like you and Eagle County.....

 

[nmelktrout]

SOROCO indeed... only through middle school though. Was hunting with the Murphys this weekend just outside of Hayden.

 

[Oak]

Was hunting with the Murphys this weekend just outside of Hayden.

That's what I figured. Really nice folks. My little brother killed his first deer on their place when he was 14. A real bruiser that no 14 year old should ever be spoiled with.

 

[nmelktrout]

They are great folks. Mark is a good buddy of mine and will be chasing bulls in the Gila with me next week. That place has cranked out some giants over the years and is turning into a late season elk mecca. Saw one 200+ buck this weekend...

 

[huntbux]

very cool, nice buck

 

[bmack]

Great work buddy. Surprised you could get to 248 yards with those coke bottle glasses acting as giant reflectors!

See ya in 2 weeks. Gila time!

 

[arffdog875]

Congrats on a nice buck! We were N of Mabell this last weekend!

 

[tarheel]

Reading you guy's posts is like old home week. I used to hunt North out of Hayden along the East cog, some South of town too. Also hunted North of Maybell along Vermillion Creek, up on the plateau, and goats North of Irish Canyon. Love that area, but it's a long drive now.

 

[bjtc_brian]

Nice job! Cool looking buck!

 

[Dinkshooter]

Also hunted North of Maybell along Vermillion Creek, up on the plateau, and goats North of Irish Canyon. Love that area, but it's a long drive now.

It is a lot of preference points now to hunt that area.

 

[tarheel]

It is a lot of preference points now to hunt that area.

That's what I understand. Even back in the early 70's there were special draws for goats up in the corner and a special draw for elk as well. Don't remember the details of the draws, but do remember the 7X7 some Okie killed up on the plateau which was the absolute biggest rack I'd ever seen, and I've seen trophy heads in Denver from back in the 20's when there wasn't the kind of pressure there is now. He was a real toad, and I wouldn't be surprised if it weren't high up in the B&C ranks.

 

[mdunc8]

Great buck right there. Well done.

 

[nmelktrout]

Thanks for the compliments, guys. It does take a ton of points to draw this region of Colorado. The vast majority of the bucks I saw in the field and in the back of trucks were the typical 10" to 12" bucks that roam the region. Not certain why it is so hard to draw other than there are good numbers of animals.

Tarheel, my family antelope hunted in Brown's Park for over 40 years. At times we had three generations of family in camp. Those days are long gone so it was a very special for me to return home and hunt the country my mother's family homesteaded and that I dreamed of chasing goats in as a child.

Anybody else have any NW Colorado goat pics? I'd love to see them.

-Cody

 

[tarheel]

Tarheel, my family antelope hunted in Brown's Park for over 40 years. At times we had three generations of family in camp. Those days are long gone so it was a very special for me to return home and hunt the country my mother's family homesteaded and that I dreamed of chasing goats in as a child.

-Cody

This is the story of my first experience hunting in CO. I had gotten back from SEA in the fall of '67, was stationed in Denver and finally met someone who hunted; a couple of neighbors, so we planned a trip to Irish Canyon for mulies. All I had for a rifle was a 98 Mauser with original sights and no scope. My one neighbor had grown up in Hayden and used to hunt there, so off we went. The other neighbor's brother went along and we were in his jeep. We got off work Thursday, loaded up and took off on our adventure. The cam bearings on the jeep were so badly worn that over 45 and the top of the engine starved for oil and the lifters started rattling. After driving through the night at 40mph, stopping in Maybell for breakfast, and heading toward our goal we ran into a blizzard the likes of which few people experience in a lifetime. We ran off the road into the ditch twice because we couldn't see for the snow. Twenty feet of vision was about the extent of it, but we finally got there, found a large flat bottomed rock sticking out of the ground at a 45 in the edge of the buckbrush, and began to cobble up a leanto around the edge of the rock. No tent, mind you, and the cold front hit. It faired off, wind went to about 40mph and the temperature began to plunge. While we're constructing our shelter we began to notice all kinds of mulies headed through the park to our west in groups of up to 25 in number, and soon totaled well over 100, probably more like 150. They were all headed south and we were excited to be in such a game rich place; couldn't wait to morning. Little did we know that those deer were headed to lower elevations where there was less snow, and we had nearly two feet with shoulder high drifts. If by now you're thinking dumb and dumber, it was actually dumb and dumber times two. Only one of the four had ever hunted Colorado, and he was not the sharpest tack in the box. Two months before that I was in the jungle, and the only sleeping bag I owned was an old cotton fart sack. In my vernacular, down was the opposite of up, so needless to say, I didn't get any sleep that night, so cold I was shaking like a dog crapping peach pits.
Next morning dawned and all we saw was one nice buck and a dink with about 8 does which were feeding out in the middle of the park where the wind had scoured the snow down. They were too far out from the cover to get closer than 300 yds, and my neighbor (the dumb one) decided to do an end around and drive them toward us. They all cooperated; all the does that is. Big buck went SW, dink went West, and all the does paraded right by us. All the rest of the deer were down around Rifle/Buford by now if they were smart. Didn't see another deer that weekend.
I know this has been a long narrative, but it was my intro into hunting in the West, and it was so memorable I thought maybe some would get a chuckle out of us bumbling through that adventure. Fortunately I found better friends with whom to hunt after that.