Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game What was your best hunt?

Hard to choose, for me.

My 2018 Afognak Island elk hunt is up there for the mental and somewhat less physical aspect of it.
My 2010 Shiras moose hunt is up there too. Solo on horseback 8 miles in.

Often though I think my "best" hunts are bird hunts. Chukar and especially snowcock will drive a guy insane.

I think you’re the first I’ve ever heard of to go after snowcock

I've been after them 5 times. Got shots (albeit, long shots) each time. Hit one in 2018 but he got into a 500-1000 foot cliff and I never could find him.

The guy I go with has killed 5-6.

They're my kryptonite and they're tougher to hunt, physically and mentally, than anything I have ever been around. One day it'll all come together.

Got to take my Father deer hunting at the property that my wife's mother owns in Parker county.

It was the last time he got to hunt and it was a hoot.

Did not shoot anything but some bull.

Wished he could have gotten to go more.

He has tumors in his lungs that went active after that November and stayed sick till he passed.

Most memorable and best usually involved the most work, often several years of trying to fill a tag or get a particular caliber of critter. My first archery bighorn was taken on my 5th CO tag and was the culmination of years of dreaming and finally going sheep hunting and over 60 days in the field over the 5 years to get the first one.

Another is a big CO archery 6x6 elk that grossed B&C taken in a NW drawing unit was taken on the 24th hunting day plus 6 scouting days that season. I still consider him my top critter.

An archery mountain grizzly in BC took me 5 seasons as well. It was about as exciting as it could get when he ran by at 2 steps after a 13 yard shot! Not charging, just escaping...too exciting none-the-less!

An archery Brirtish Columbia Stone ram took me 6 season and 8 backpack hunts, again about 60-some hunting days and a great feeling and fond memories from that hunt.

There are others but the four listed above are all so good that I can't chose which is my favorite.

It was my 73rd, this past 12/14. I already had an 8 point from November. Rain for days, and now 6am clear, with a 30° drop from midnight... I had to go out. I was a mile in, several hills and draws away from my Grand Caravan. After all the years, I knew how promising the day would be. I was sitting in a lawn chair next a dirt mound, from a long gone uprooted tree. 7: 30, a gorgeous buck walked out at 50 yards. He went down from the shot .....50 Cal muzzleloader. I hang and butcher all deer on the spot of kill... Took my time getting him into my backpack. Later, 9am, at home, with a second cup of joe.... I thought of all the deer... since 1959. No shower necessary, as I hadn't broken a sweat. I thought of my recent 4th anniversary, of getting a new aortic heart valve... A birth defect that was causing serious problems at 69. 5 hours of complex, cow valve transplant, open heart.
Having someone hold your heart in his hands changes things. I thought is this my last deer? I really am pretty much on top of my game still... I dunno.. sure seems like a good time to stop. So, if this wasn't my best hunt, it certainly was close.... The land I hunt, has been sold to developers.

Probably when my dad visited me in AK and he shot his first and only black bear. Good times

Bill and I both used 30-06. His is a pump, mine was a Remington 700. I sold that and now I use a T/C Icon Weatthershield 30-06. Shoots MOA out-of-the-box.

Drew Nevada Nelson permit first time I applied. Got a great ram. Made the best shot ever on a running animal at about 265. Everything went perfectly. At night I could see the lights of Vegas. I loved the country, was just North of LV.

Other great hunt was for a doe pronghorn in the Pahsimeroi valley in central Idaho. Camped at base of Mt Borah. Cold clear early October morning. Was accompanied by my old beagle. After the antelope was in the cooler spent the day shooting jackrabbits. Perfect.

Really hard for me to choose as well, guess I’ve been spoiled with good hunts with my old man and pards, and some damn nice critters. Huntin with my kiddos rates right up there. Family aside, Alberts rates right up there, the folks that live there, the vastness of the country and animal quality is hard to top. Montana never disappoints, neither does Hawai’i.

Arizona coues with with Greg and Bama last year was a top 5’er, stupid awesome country, sign of illegal immigrants, great company, awesome food, nice weather, and probably the coolest of all deer species, cagey little buggers!! Add that up and it’s a hellava good time.

...there were about forty of them, moving in and out of the thick jesse. We could occasionally see legs, and hear grumbles, but were unable to discern which were bulls, or cows. Nothing for it, but to continue dogging them, frequently stopping to check the ash bag to be sure of remaining downwind of them. We knew at some point, we would have an opening adequate for a shot. But, not today. We returned to camp, and planned our strategy for the morrow.

We departed camp before the sparrows awakened. Our early departure was necessitated because the distance to the hunting area, Gunguwe. The drive would be about an 1 1/2 hours. We wanted to arrive in the cool of the morning, just as the sun was rising. By late morning the temp in this valley would reach upwards 100F and hunting in the thick jesse was virtually without any appreciable breeze. Our PH Dudley was confident we would be successful before the heat got to us.

Choice, our tracker, climbed a convenient tree which was above the valley floor in an effort to get a visual. We watched for an indication, and shortly Choice was smiling. Game on!

With Choice in the lead, we fell in step behind Dudley. Behind us came the local game scout with his ubiquitous AK 47. Expectations were high as we began our descent into the valley floor. In less than an hour, we were wet with sweat as we moved thru the jesse. We located the herd, but continually stymied in our effort to determine which was legal to shoot. We closed within twenty yards of them, only to have them move silently away. The good news...they were not alarmed. So far, they had not detected our presence. We pressed on. We now had been in the valley, and thick jesse for more than two hours. We stopped for a bit of water, and a short break. And..we got a break. In a matter of minutes after we began moving, we discovered the herd had located shade beneath some acacia trees. We moved ahead only twenty, or thirty yards in the direction of the trees, There they were!

If you've read this far, you've figured out we're hunting elephant. The elephant hunter is my wife, Donna. On to the finale.

Dudley made the approach with Donna close at his side. He knelt down behind a wait-a-bit thorn bush, and beckoned Donna to do the same. There were five elephant standing in the shade, totally relaxed. Dudley examined each one, and finally Dudley asked Donna: "Do you see the one looking right at us?" Donna replied, "There are two looking at us, which one?" Response: "On your right...shoot him right between the eyes." Donna took a deep breath, slowly stood up, moved the safety OFF as she raised the rifle, and shot the elephant right between the eyes. As the elephant was collapsing, the remaining elephant decamped in a cloud of dust, literally.

That, my friends, was my most memorable hunt.

This hunt took place in Zimbabwe in Oct, 1992.

Thank you! Great story.

Awesome story. Tagging just to come back and reread this from time to time.

here is a short story: son and myself have bowhunted alot over the years many great times together hunting,target archery and fishing. one year we bowhunted the great state of Montana in the mountains for elk,where i knew the elk moved thru alot during other bowhunts in past years.so during this bowhunt about the 4th day i had just tag a real nice cow elk at 8 a.m. and my son motioned for me to hide and start meowing some more so i did. over the hill came this real nice bull elk that stopped 30 yards from my hidden son, i had no ideal what was up above there on the flat ground which was a herd of about 50 elk. i watch son`s arrow go perfectly thru this big bull`s chest and watch the bull bleed, run back up the hill ,then this big bull was gone from my sight. next thing a heard was my son yell he`s down and dead. then we went up there to see his bull and as we walked up there that bull got much bigger than we thought.that was my son`s 4th bull with a bow and arrow over a few years and this bull elk had a huge body and horns.we estimated 800 lbs. live weight. we never have had this bull elk scored to us its not that important but i have one that scored 374 B.C. and this bull my son shot with his bow has bigger horns than my
B.C. 370 bull i shot with a bow .now at 8:30 A.M.that day 2 elk down both with a bow and arrow,there was a lot of work to do skin`n,quartering, haul`n elk meat and horns off that mountain with a cart . my son did all the hard work too. my friend the butcher said we should get a couple of horses to haul the elk meat out but my son said he could do it himself and he did with our cart and made a few trips out to the truck.when my friend the butcher seen the horns of that bull,he said gets those horns hidden before someone sees or steals those horns ,he also said that was the biggest bull elk he ever seen shot with a bow,butcher also said he only ever seen 1 bull elk bigger ever and that was shot with a rifle years ago. also when we went to town to the butcher shop with all the meat and that set of horns, the horns stuck out the back with topper back window open,it was a real site to see! my son had a huge smile all day long !

Similar to the OP, the one that stands out for me was my first elk hunt in 2006 that my wife accompanied me on. It was a guided hunt in the Flat tops of Colorado during muzzleloader season. This was the first time my wife was with me when I harvested an animal. She had helped me get a few deer out and took pics for me occasionally but she never went with me until this trip. I called quite a few outfitters prior to booking and finally signed on with an outfitter that assured me he didn't tolerate any drinking in camp.

We flew into Denver and drove to camp the next day after stopping at Outdoor World to pick up a pound of powder. It was a nice clear day and the scenery along the way was awesome. A young guy in a side by side picked us up at the trailhead and drove us into camp. We got settled into our wall tent with a queen size mattress and wood stove after meeting everyone. There were 11 other hunters in camp and one of them also brought his wife but she wasn’t going out hunting with him. By dinnertime it was down to around 30 degrees. After dinner the outfitter announced the guide assignments. It was supposed to be a 2x1 situation but the outfitter assigned a guide for me and my wife and also sent Jerry the young guy who picked us up to come along to assist since he was learning the ropes from Jason our guide.

The four of us rode out on horseback the next morning in the dark. A few miles out of camp we heard an elk bugling. As we got closer the bull started coming toward us until he was only about 40 yards away across a stream. We couldn’t see him in the darkness but he sounded huge. Finally, Jason pulled up next to me and said we were going to keep going since it was still an hour before I could shoot and the bull wasn’t going to hang around that long with us sitting there. I couldn’t stop thinking about that bull as we rode along then 3 or 4 bulls started bugling off in the distance. It was just starting to get light when we pulled up at the edge of a meadow close to the bulls and dismounted. I could see 8 or 9 cows at the far edge of the meadow moving up into the trees and Jason said we were going to hook around the base of the ridge to try and get in front of them. As we moved along the bulls kept bugling but sounded like they were getting further away. We stopped for a few minutes and Jason tried cow calling. I heard something coming from behind us and a cow and a spike ran into about 10 yards as we stood there before splitting off. A few minutes later we got to the edge of another meadow and there was a 5x5 feeding along the ridge across from us. Once he got in the woods we crossed as fast as we could and slipped into the woods where he entered. I was following Jason and my wife was with Jerry above us. It was pretty thick and we had gone a couple hundred yards when Jason pointed uphill and waved me in. The bull was feeding away from us at about 80 yards but all I could see was his rump. There was a lot of brush between us as well so I motioned that I was going to try moving to the right. I had my gun up as I side stepped and kept my eyes on the bull. I think he saw me moving and turned to see what I was as I got to a little opening. I put the bead on the point of his shoulder and fired. He took off running down the ridge to our left and I thought I saw him stumbling.

I got out my gear to reload but I was so excited I kept dropping things. It probably took me 5 minutes to calm down and get my gun reloaded. By then Jerry and my wife made it down to us and said they had a birds-eye view of the whole thing and the bull was definitely hit. At that point we heard a crash off to the left in the direction the bull ran. We worked our way along the ridge and found the bull propped up against a pine tree with his head still up. Jason said if he gets up shoot him again to keep him from falling down to the base of the ridge. The bull struggled to his feet and I shot him again through the ribs into the opposite shoulder and he was done. After some high fives and a hug from my wife I looked at my watch and it was less than an hour since we left the horses.

Jason called into base camp for the packers on the radio and I could hear the other guides congratulating us on the kill. It was so steep we had to tie off the bull to keep him from sliding down the hill. It took awhile but we had him quartered and ready to load about the time the packers showed up. A front was coming through and we got hit with a nasty sleet storm and wind for about 20 minutes before we could load up. Amazing how fast the weather changes in the mountains! Had an awesome ride back to camp in bright sunshine. I took about 15 lbs of meat and the tenderloins in to the camp cook and we all had a great stew and the tenderloins that night.

We spent the rest of the week hiking around the area and took a ride out to a spike camp with the packers to bring an elk back mid-week. I found a nice shed also. A week I’ll never forget!

Probably Red Deer hunting in the Brisbane valley. This was the only hunt I ever trained for and much tougher than the elk hunting I did when living in Colorado. I trained with long walks started 3 months before the hunt and increasing in length as the fitness level increased. Physically challenging, deep forest with up and down hills and through valleys all day with stags tuned into every foreign sound or smell. The guides spent around 40 plus weeks in the bush every year. Don't ask about the snakes, bastards longer than the roads coming in were wide and very scary to walk among at night. I mostly carried a 1912 John Rigby double chambered for 350-400 Number 2 but took a stag on the last evening, last light, last day with my John Rigby .275 Mauser. Either rifle was the right choice.

For a single animal, it was a fallow buck we saw as we entered the property gates. He had a very shootable subordinate buck with him and around 12-15 does but was across the river 200 or more yards away on the neighboring property. Our side of the river was small in land size at 8500 acres but covered great buck territory.

We looked around and picked out the highest and nastiest mountain, (which we called hills) and after dropping our camp gear off at the barn, drove the additional mile or so to that mountain and stalked it from the opposite side. It was a punt, simply an educated guess based on where we would go to hide from the world during the daylight hours and he was found at the very top, laying under a pine tree with a dense patch of dogwood which is a chest high seemingly dead all the time scrappy bush you cannot traverse without making noise, hence his location. The animal kingdoms equivalent of a trip wire with bells attached.

After quietly traversing an old wire fence and entering the dogbush as quietly as I can't, he stood up, took a step forward and pulled his head back with the expression of, "what they hell are you doing on my lawn" and my 180gn Failsafe slipped through his chest just behind the shoulder as he turned and faced left for his escape over the bare grassy hilltop barely visible from our lower position.

He is the oldest deer I have taken with only 4 stumps on the bottom jaw and no teeth on the top. The Taxidermist aged him at 11-12 which was possibly his last season if I didn't come along. His antlers are very grown back but quite long for a fallow.

I've shot two of the big five, which solidly occupy spots 2 & 3 of most memorable, but my most memorable and the trophy I am most proud of is my California blacktail deer. Hunted for 5 years before I was able to punch my tag on a nice forkie. We were up on a ridge before the sun came out watching a game trail. As the sun started to rise, a few bucks crested over the top of the ridge heading down the game trail we were watching. A quick evaluation confirmed buck number 3, the last in the group, was the biggest (which ain't saying much for California Blacktail). Gave a loud grunt to stop them and pulled the trigger - buck rolled all the way down the hill, a perfect shot. An Incredible moment and was great to be able to share the it with my father.

It hasn't happened yet, thankfully.

Never will....You don’t hunt. You’re broke. You can’t wander too far from the house with your fears.

Keep up the veneer that you’ll ever amount to anything.

😎

PS

Steelhead is back!

Typical liberal.