Dad and I headed out early Wednesday(11/16) morning for our annual whitetail chase in the Texas Panhandle. We left out around 6am and met up with my good buddy John(pullit) around 3:30 that afternoon. It was 89 degrees when we rolled into camp, so we were not very optimistic to say the least, but we unloaded our gear and headed out for a quick hunt. We only saw a couple small bucks that eve. The next morning I headed back to the same pasture I hunted Wednesday eve and planned to do a little rattling. When daylight came I had a small doe standing in the field, but no other deer in sight. About 10min after shooting time I grabbed my rattle bag and made a little racket. The doe didn’t care much for all the noise and spooked over the ridge. I laid the rattle bag down and kicked back for the long sit ahead. I didn’t really expect much to tell the truth as it was mid 50s that morn and a prediction of 80 that afternoon. Shortly after I rattled that first time I looked to my left and there he stood on a little knob about 300yds out. He was just standing like a statue looking in my direction, trying to find the bucks. After a couple mins he started easing my way and even though he was in range, I was going to let him get as close as possible. When he reached about 250 he turned a bit to the right, so I gave him some light rattling and here he came again. He walked up to about 120yds and just stood there facing right at me. I knew I was fairly well hidden as I’d placed my turkey chair behind some brush with the tip of the ridge to my back, so I just waited for him to turn. After about 5min(seemed like much longer) he finally took one step left and I couldn’t take it any longer, I settled the hairs on the point of his shoulder and touched off a round. At the shot he took off running to my right, so I bolted another round and got ready for another shot, but I could see the right leg flopping and held off. He ran over the crest of a hill and I saw a dust cloud fly up shortly after, so I figured he was done. I gave him about 20mins and eased over to have a look, he was done. I hate to shoot on the first morn, but his beams were past his nose and tines plenty long, so it was a no brainer for me. Turned out to be a nice 8. He would’ve been a 9, but his g4 on the right side was busted off flush with the beam. Beams were over 24 and 2s nearly 12(low 140s). I was tickled to say the least and the best part was now I got to hunt with buddy John and watch him punch a tag.




New 257Wby officially broken in

Since I tagged out so early, I got to tag along with my good buddy John for 4 days. That first eve we saw a 120s 8, then shortly after we had a wide shooter buck come in chasing a doe behind us, but that rascal saw us about the time we saw him. The next morn we headed back to the same spot and braved some ridiculous wind, but only saw a small 8 and some doe. That eve we tried a small rye plot down in a creek bottom and ended up seeing a nice 8, but he had some broken tines. We also saw a 3.5yo 8 tending a doe, but he wasn’t very big. The third day we decided to sit on a bluff above a river bottom. While we were driving in a really nice 160+ buck chased a doe over the ridge about 150yds from the truck. We bailed out and tried to head them off, but no such luck. The remainder of that day was a ball of fun, we probably saw 25 bucks chasing doe, but never had a mature buck offer a shot.
Sunday was our last day to hunt and ole John was getting a bit itchy lol. We started off the day with the plan to wait until light and spot and stalk our way to the same point where we saw all the bucks the day before. Since we were going to have to wait until light to go in, we stopped by a rye field to glass for a few mins. We slipped down a row of hay bales then started glassing. There was a doe about 100yds out and another dark spot about 250yds out. As shooting time came, John said “There’s a buck behind that doe!” I said where? John “right behind her, good buck!” The rifle comes up and I finally spotted him, but couldn’t tell much. Then the safety flips off and John’s finger is on the trigger. I said “You sure he’s nice? I can’t tell much.” John: “Yeah man, he’s a good one!” I knew it was game time at that point so leaned back to get away from the bark of that Wby lol. BOOM….POP! “You got him man. I heard the pop!” Then we headed down to see his buck. John had put a good shot on him, but he wouldn’t give up, so he finished him off. As we were standing there at his buck, we look up at the hay bales and there was a giant 8pt standing about 40yds from where we had shot and all we could do was wave at him as he went by. John’s buck was indeed a mature big body buck:

Dad was having about the same luck as John on his hunt, he only saw young bucks the first few days of the hunt. On the third day he decided to try for a mulie buck mid day as it was opening day for MD. He spotted a nice buck bedded with about 6 doe about 3/4mi across a cotton field and luckily the cotton was high, so the stalk was on. He was able to get probably 80yd b4 the buck stood up. The cotton was too high for a shoulder shot, so he put one through his neck. Turned out to be a huge bodied 5x5:

Dad finally saw a nice whitetail on the last day of the hunt slipping through a canyon and made a heart shot at about 100yds:


It was a really fun hunt with good friends. I’m already looking fwd to next year.

Have a good one and good luck,

loder

Congrats on the nice bucks, men.

You all did well. All very respectable bucks and a good hunt.

Thanks fellas.

For gear details:

My rifle was a 257Wby(RC #4, blueprinted 700, PTG bolt). 100TTSX at 3660(72.5g 7828 lit by 215GMM in neck turned WW 264WM brass). Leupold VXIII 4.5-14x40 in lapped TLW lows.

He ran about 100yds with no blood, not out of the norm with TTSXs for me. It blew the on side shoulder to bits and did a number on the heart. The exit was two holes and small(plugged with fat hence no blood). I figure it blew the petals:



Johns buck:
M700 LSS 257Wby, bedded, Leupold Mark IV 4.5-14x40, 100TTSX at 3700 via R25 in WW 264WM brass lit by 215GMM.

Dad's bucks:
Wby MkV 7mm Wby, bone stock, Leupold Vari-X III 4.5-14x50, 140 NPTs, Norma brass, 215GMM, R22

That does sound like a great time! Those tines on your buck are impressive, always making for pretty rack.....

Very nice indeed. Great pics as well.

Wow! You guys got some nice stuff!

Looks like a great hunt. Congrats to all involved!

Sounds like a lot of fun. Good times. Well done sir.

Very well done!

It was a good hunt with great friends and some of the craziest weather I have seen.
High temps was around 90 for the hunt, one day it was around 45 deg. that morning with 40-45 MPH wind, and the next day 29 deg's and no wind. The last day (the day I killed mine) it was 30 deg. and 20 MPH wind.
Went from hunting in short sleeve shirts to putting on about everything I brought.....

He would've went the first day in shorts, but man, those legs would have ran everything off the property

Congratulations. Those are some nice bucks.

Decent bucks to say the least....congrats to all!!

I was curious how you guy did up there this year Reloader. We were North of you during the same time frame, and 4 of us killed 4 bucks in the 130-140 class. We seem to be missing a year or two worth of bucks (age class), due to the drought of 2011-2012. Saw many young bucks like you guys did.

Congrats on some nice deer and a good time. That's worth it anytime.

Loder, couple nice bucks man. Congrats!

Nice Ronny!

OK, I will say it, 100 yards and no blood would make me uneasy with a heart that looked like that. You have told me before about your experience with no blood trail with the .25 TTSX. I still like my Accubombs in my .257 Roy.

Told you before, those are jail house legs,....they aint seen the light of day in years.....

Great photos and nice bucks.. Well done!!

Glad you guys had a good trip, enjoyed the read.

Congrats all around!

Great going for the three of you! Thanks for the well done report-I was looking forward to the details. Congrats all around!

I'll second that you did a great write up and pics of the hunt. Not to mention trophy's all around. That broke off 9 of your yours is huge.
the panhandle has some great deer hunting.

Thanks fellas!! It's definitely a good time each year. Looking fwd to next year and one would hope with all of the 2.5-3.5yos we saw running around that there should be some nice deer around in years to come.

Good Luck to all of you guys.

Now to focus on some rut action at home...

loder

I'm kind of on the fence with the 100TTSX myself after maybe 5 years with that combo. They penetrate like no other, but I think at this MV it blows petals at close range usually giving a tiny exit and lack of blood. I go for shoulders with them as straight up rib shots can give a pretty long death run, well over 100yds in some instances. High shoulder has been the best result with them, but that works with pretty much any pill. John's buck was pretty lack luster performance wise. You couldn't have placed it much better(hard qtr to and bullet went in base of neck and out ribs) and the buck was laying down looking around when we got to him. One through the heart and it still took that rascal 30sec or so to give up. Big body deer though, so that factors in a bit. I really wanted the SC2s to perk in this rig, but no dice. I haven't tried the 100 NPTs yet. They may work, but my last 257 didn't care for NPTs. Maybe this one will. I haven't tried the 110 NABs. The 90 NABs left a really sour taste in my mouth at similar MV in the 6-06, so kinda worried they wouldn't exit in the 257.

I did buy 10 boxes of the 90grn GMX. Not sure how those will do.

Have a good one,

loder