Good morning every one, 48 degrees and as clear as a bell outside. 3/4 full moon still out this morning. Thet means nearly no moon next weekend...thats good, because next week end is opening week end.
Well I finally got all the taxidermy unpacked yesterday. It was tough getting them all hung. This house is about a 1000 square feet less than what we have had in the past. A lot of memories in this stuff. I haven't had everything I evershot shoot, mounted, just the special ones. The first thing I ever had mounted is a bear I shot In the Umpqua River drainage out in Oregon back in 1976. Lot of good stories out of that hunt.
The oldest mount is my first deer. My dad saved the rack up in the attic and when he and mom retired and the sold their home he gave me the rack. I got a cape and had a shoulder mount made.
I decided to put the Mt Reedbuck and my big Blacktail over the computer desk.
I said there is a lot of memories in this stuff. I took th is Blacktail in the foothill south of Grants Pass OR in 1985. I was going to colleg at the time. One of the professors had some property and invited me to hunt it. I scouted his property and saw plenty of sign, but never saw any deer. What was encouraging was some tracks I found on the my way out of the property. The was a muddy section of the logging road I was walking on and on the way out I found deer tracks in my tracks. The deer had moved behind me after I passed, and the tracks were huge. When season started I would visit this property every other day. Each time I went up and came back I would find deer tracks in my tracks. I decided the next time I went up I would move past this mud patch and then sit down some where I could watch. It didn't take long and several does started out the brush directly down wind of me and move down the hill and through the muddy area which was quarting the wind to me. I didn't have a doe tag, but my wife did. A couple of days later I took the wife up there and we set our ambush. We sat there for a few moments, it had to be less than 5 when we heard some crashing and thrashing in the brush upwind of use and below a landing. We also heard deer snorting.
We quietly stalked over to the edge of the landing and we saw a doe about 30 yards away standing there looking around but not seeing us. I pointed at my wife and pointed at the deer and she shot it. It dropped at the shot. When the deer dropped a buck stepped out of the brush directly behind the doe at maybe 35 yards and I shot it. We moved down to the deer to check and make sure the were dead. As we walked towards the deer a second big buck took of and as it jumped a log the wife threw up her gun to shoot and nothing happened. She had forgot to chamber a new round when she shot the doe.
Whe we checked my buck we found it was a nice it was a nice heavy 4 point. It was a very mice Unfortunately one of the points on one side was broken off. I also noticed that the hair on the deers chest was all chopped up. We look around the area and notice the ground was all tore up and hair was every where. And, laying there in plain sight was the broken tine. We also noticed the does back was all wet. It was obvious what we had stumbled on to. A buck had found a doe to breed and a second buck came along and challenged him and the fight was on.
The wife doesn't do field dressing so I got to the business and we made the drag out. It was a good mile back to the truck and it was a very long drag. Glad she didn't get that other buck. When we got back to house we put this buck up on the hay scale and ti weighed 145 lbs. That is a big Blacktail
I took the cape to the taxidermists and he reattached the broken tine. He told me that it was to bad the time broke off as other wise the deer would have made the book.
I also took the rack to the gunshop and entered the big buck contest and took third place, my son took second, but that is another story for another day.
