... that you didn't take?



(Yeah, I know. How does this relate to Alaska? If you need to ask, you probably needn't respond. )

Yup. Portage River, spring of 2004. Walking along the river bank just to get out of Los Anchorage for a day.

A cow moose charged out of the alders and came across the gravel bar, stopping about ten feet away. I had drawn my pistol when she came boiling out and had about 4lb gone on a 4.5lb trigger when she whirled around and took off back to the alder patch.
As she trotted back, I noticed the placenta hanging out of her vulva and the fresh bloody liquid on the backs of her legs. She had just given birth.

Damned glad I didn't finish that trigger squeeze.

Ed

A couple of weeks ago I did not take an easy shot at a respectable coues deer. It was fifteen minutes into legal shooting light of the opening day. I just didn't want the hunt to be over that soon.

As it turned out, I got a better deer the next day.



KC

Nice picture there, KC, thanks. Would be nice knowing that story. Was that in Az? With a guide? Do you make that a yearly hunt?

Yes, every time I drive past a bar or a liquor store!
make mine a root beer!
or a ginger ale if I am in the mood for the hard stuff.

A shot not taken is a miss--

A shot not taken is a cripple not lost.

I had a head on shot on a pretty decent buck at about 120 yards Saturday. Problem is my muzzleloader gives 4-5 inch 50 yard groups. If that 127 grain patched round ball hit the soft part in the middle at the base of the throat, it'd punch the heart and that buck would be stone dead, but if it hit out by the shoulder, it didn't have enough weight to break bigger bone after penetrating meat to reach it. All things considered, a cripple was more likely than a clean kill. I let the hammer back down and tried to close the distance. By the time I got there the buck was gone. Oh well, it was the right thing to do.

I'll take a side of clear conscience with my tag soup.

Tom

The older I get, the more I miss. (Sometimes not being young - and dumb- ain't all bad. )

Had an easy shot at a nice moose across a swampy area, couple hundred yards max. You know one of those with the deep narrow stream running through it. I'm still glad I didn't take it.

My first year as a legal resident of Alaska and able to hunt as a resident, I went on a sheep hunt. Our second day also happened to be the first day of moose season. As we were making our way toward a band of sheep that were too far to determine whether there were any full curls, we spotted a bull bedded down. The bull was 60+ inches and unaware of our presence. I briefly flirted with the idea of taking him but it was 75 degrees and we were 12 miles from the road. I did put a stalk on him and closed to less than 20 yards before I popped my hat on some brush to get his attention. Once he figured out where I was and what I was he went about getting out of the area with some haste.

jaguar:

I've gone on that hunt five times, in southern AZ. We backpack about three miles to some springs and hunt from our spike camp.

Before dawn on the second day, we climbed a ridge across the valley from our camp. We got to the top of the ridge just as the sun climbed above the horizon. My friend started glassing from the saddle. I walked around the ridge to another saddle where I sat down to glass. Two nice bucks were in a gully just below me, maybe fifty yards away. But I couldn't see into the gully, so I didn't know they were there and I don't think they knew I was there either. After about half an hour, they began strolling out of the gully. I was surprised to see them so close and I kicked some rocks loose while I was grabbing for my rifle. They took off at the sound of the falling rocks. I could see that both were nice bucks. I shot the leading buck from the sitting position while he was running. I think I hit him at about 280 yards and he crawled a short ways after that. The rangefinder said it was 300+/- yards from where I was sitting to where he laid down.

No guide. I go with a good friend who lives in Flagstaff. He's the other guy in the photo. We've hunted together since 2004 in AK, WY, CA, AZ, CO, etc.

KC

First day of winter moose season some years ago, I had ridden the 40 miles or so it took to get "into the country" when I saw a pair of big paddles in the middle of an alder patch which was situated about 40-50 feet above the ancient river bed, a river which is now a trickle by comparison, running down the middle.

With moose, the killing is so easy compared to what comes after, a fact that I didn't take to heart when I was 25 or 30, and this was a decade or two after that.

Some say snow machines are cheating for hunting. If that's true, I 'cheated' for almost 700 miles more before we got our yearly meat put away that winter.

I went back over the original opportunity in my mind several times while rolling those additional miles, but I never regretted not burning powder the first day.

I posted mine before, with pictures. - "The best shot I never made". We got blown out (snow storm) on a sheep hunt 18 miles hike back in, still with 3 miles to the sheep.. Wife, son and I all had caribou tags and had walked through hundreds of caribou on the way in, with the season open.. On the way out, 5 miles from the highway, my son took a young bull. On reaching the vehicle with that one, we learned season was to close at midnight by emergency order. After only 3 days, the quota had been exceeded. Leaving my wife and dog at the truck with the meat, Ty and I headed back in a mile for the last 2 or 3 hours of daylight and spotted a huge bull on an adjacent hill.

It was about half dark by the time we got over there, we couldn't get closer without being spotted, he was mere yards from heavy cover, I had no good rest at 264 yards, and would have been shooting through the tops of grasses about half way between us. Crosshairs were all over that bull, so he walked.

Ty and I both came back to the truck with big chit-eating grins.

I can't recall any particular shots, but I just won't shoot unless I"m 200% sure...

Now a buddy shot a bou, thankfully not a moose, but it was standing in the river at the edge... I'dhave waited... he didn't.... river wans't deep, but it was late September out of Aniak and the one lake we started on had already frozen over once... the water was cool...

Caribou can be dragged by hand... Even a calf moose is a challenge for several guys.

Carbon credits?

That was quick! Stalk much?

He always seems to be right there! He makes me uncomfortable... I need to find a safe place!

if you are saying out of the river... well the two of us could not get him up the bank as it was a sharp drop to the river.... so gutted in the river to remove weight and then hack a hole in the alders and manage to drag him... would have been easier if it was deep enough to float him some.

But i'm sure others have endured much more. Regardless I"d have waited before shooting, and regardless the water was cool.

Just trying to help...

There is nothing that frightens me more...

As it should be.

My 13-yr-old son, Ryan, has been deer hunting patiently and diligently with me for three year (see pic 01). We had been backpacking hunting in the national forest, where we had awesome times, but there are fairly few deer. Then, recently, I got one while we were hunting a friend's private land when Ryan didn’t have a reasonable shot. Nevertheless, I was proud that Ryan was extremely happy to be involved in a jointly successful hunt and did much of the work butchering the deer (see pic 02). Then a few weeks ago, when I was 200 yds away, he made all of the right decisions and made a one-shot off-hand 64 yd kill on a fairly-big buck (with small horns) that died three feet from the blood spatter (see pics 03-04). Already experienced, he worked hard in dressing, skinning, and butchering his deer. We were camping nearby, and (along with some steaks we needed to cook), we grilled his deer’s tenderloins over the campfire and ate them (Pic. 05). I was glad that I had left him briefly to do some other things (cook breakfast), and he did all of the decisions and shooting on his own. Good man. Best shot I never made. Now, I just need to the same with my 11-year-old younger son. We tried, a few days later, and he had a shot at a deer at about 50 yds, but he is too small to make an off-hand shot reliably. So, he rested his forearm on a branch, which makes sense, but the branch broke and sent the deer away. I got him a shooting stick for his very-recent birthday.

My son was just getting started deer hunting. We had seen little and had no shots throughout the season. Just after legal shooting time on the last day, as we were heading in, a group of deer came up a fence line parallel to us, single file, in easy shooting range. I remarked that sometimes it works out that way and we watched them pass by and headed on in, me not only proud of us for not having shot, but even more so of my son for not even suggesting that we do so.

Sometimes it’s hard to pass on a questionable shot.

BTDT and was less proud than lucky at times. And then there's WTF did I get myself into here? (Which doesn't mean Wednesday Thursday Friday, though it can look like that kind of a time-frame might be required.)

Long ago I was driving in in Alaska in late December between Eureka and Glennallen and saw a red fox bouncing around about 300 yards away on the edge of a frozen pond. I pulled out a Mod. 788 Rem. in .223 caliber that had an old 4 power Lyman with a small dot. Mr. Fox was going away at an angle and when I thought every thing was right I pressed the trigger and down he went.

The snow was butt deep to a tall moose and I had no snow shoes, by the time I got to the fox I was cussing my self for not controlling my killer instinct. By the time I got back to the car I was looking like Frosty the Snow Man.

I was very lucky I hit the fox tight behind the shoulder, taking out some vitals and breaking the off shoulder. I was also vey lucky I did not wound the fox and end up chasing him all over Alaska.

Oh ya, it all ended ok for me once my pants dried, but I would not take that shot again. I got lucky.

[quote] Ever been proud of a shot...?/[quote]
last fall.....two shots and two elk.....both shots only a few seconds apart.....one at 335 yards and one at 375 yards......30-06.,,,....180 grain accubond.

I was deer hunting in Texas several years ago. While up in a tree stand, I caught a movement out of the corner of my eye, turned to get a better look and out walks a beautiful bobcat. I am thinking oh COOL ! I have never shot a bobcat. I drop the binos and reach for the old Ruger 30/06. I have the cross hairs aligned and there is maybe 8 more oz. left on the trigger pull when out walks 3 bobcat kittens. Needless to say I never completed the trigger squeeze. I spent the next 10 or 15 minutes watching her try to teach the kittens how to stalk a rabbit. One or the other would start to lose patience and try to get ahead of Momma Bobcat and she would somehow bat it the kitten back in its place and continue the stalk. They were unsuccessful, but the kittens learned a good lesson inpattience and stalking skills. I still have'nt killed a bobcat. Porsche73

Yep

Pards first sheep for himself. 275 yards downhill on top of a bluff

I had the video camera going to record the kill. He looks over his shoulder before taking the shot to see if I’m ready to record and sez. Hold everything!

Wtf I’m thinking, I don’t have the lens cap on, it’s in record mode.

He says look behind you at that full moon coming up through those wispy clouds. It was beautiful so I took some footage of that and then he made the 1 shot kill on that sheep

Been my hunting pard for 30 years or better. That lil story sums it up as to why about as well as anything could.

That whole hunt was probably the most satisfying hunts I’ve ever been on. Had it all hardship, weather, lil danger involved, and utterly beautiful the ground we covered

Add fresh sheep ribs over an open fire when we hit timberline and our protein starved bodies from working so hard


Pure bliss, punctuated with bouts of misery.


Helluva time we had

I am right there, Randy. Nice word portrayal!

MarineHawk,

Great story and great job on raising your sons!

Ed

I have turned down a number of iffy shots on overseas guided hunts due to either range, wind or other conditions, and gone home empty handed.
And would do the same thing again under identical circumstances.

+1 nicely done Randy!

Jeff

Passed on the largest elk I've ever seen. About a 350 yd poke but the winds were around 35+mph. Pretty sure I could have hit him, but I had no idea where that might be. Took a fair 6 by that was at about 150 yds.

I am not saying I've never tossed one out there, but while I did it a couple of times in my youth, I quickly realized its not worth the hassle.

I won't shoot unless I'm 200% sure of the shot. Even then every now and then something will happen that I don't care for.

Passing shots, especially the larger/older etc. the game, is EASY these days. Its just not worth it. Even the 221 inch mule deer I passed on a moving shot. Much happier that I didn't screw him up and loose him or make him suffer, and very happy for the guy that killed him 3 days later!