WY, Area 16 Opening Day Antelope Success - 10/05/12
Got this one Monday afternoon, east of Buffalo, WY, in antelope hunt area 16. Nice antelope for this part of the state. As a bonus it has an extra "sticker" point on the outside of each horn. It was bedded down in high sage not too far from a creek. There were other doe 'lopes and some mulies bedded down in the shade of some nearby cottonwoods. Friend Mike's sharp eyes spotted the buck's horns in the sage.
The particulars: The rifle is a Ruger No. 1AH in .25-06 that I've customized myself with Clements trigger, Moulds speed hammer, Blitzschnell mainspring, and Trop safety. Scope is Nikon Monarch 2.5-10x with BDC reticle. Shooting my loads with 100gr Barnes Tipped Triple Shock X-bullet (TTSX) loaded to around 3400fps (gets less than 3/4" groups consistently with that load). Shot was taken from prone position, with rifle resting on my hunting backpack, from the ledge just below the horizon over my left shoulder in the first pic, with a crosswind gusting up to around 15 mph. Range was 320yds lasered with Leica 1600B rangefinder. We had to do some hollering and make racket to get him to stand up. Perfect shot through both lungs, though just a fuzz further back than I normally like. I slightly over-compensated for the crosswind.
We found this one after several miles of tough hiking in before daylight that morning and seeing nothing worth shooting, and circling back towards the truck around mid-day. Had scouted the area the previous day but hadn't seen this buck. After he was down, got REALLY lucky and found a two-track that allowed me to drive to within about a hundred yards of him, so didn't have to pack him out through all those ridges and gulches.
![[Linked Image]](http://i129.photobucket.com/albums/p226/timebak/Hunting/IMG_2269.jpg)
![[Linked Image]](http://i129.photobucket.com/albums/p226/timebak/Hunting/IMG_2501.jpg)
The particulars: The rifle is a Ruger No. 1AH in .25-06 that I've customized myself with Clements trigger, Moulds speed hammer, Blitzschnell mainspring, and Trop safety. Scope is Nikon Monarch 2.5-10x with BDC reticle. Shooting my loads with 100gr Barnes Tipped Triple Shock X-bullet (TTSX) loaded to around 3400fps (gets less than 3/4" groups consistently with that load). Shot was taken from prone position, with rifle resting on my hunting backpack, from the ledge just below the horizon over my left shoulder in the first pic, with a crosswind gusting up to around 15 mph. Range was 320yds lasered with Leica 1600B rangefinder. We had to do some hollering and make racket to get him to stand up. Perfect shot through both lungs, though just a fuzz further back than I normally like. I slightly over-compensated for the crosswind.
We found this one after several miles of tough hiking in before daylight that morning and seeing nothing worth shooting, and circling back towards the truck around mid-day. Had scouted the area the previous day but hadn't seen this buck. After he was down, got REALLY lucky and found a two-track that allowed me to drive to within about a hundred yards of him, so didn't have to pack him out through all those ridges and gulches.
