Memories from hunts

[H4831]

Hunting is comprised of three parts.

1) Planning. We have often heard people say that planning the hunt was often more interesting/fun/enjoyment, than the hunt itself.

2) The actual hunt.

3) Memories of the hunt.

My favourite, without doubt, of the three parts stated are the memories. So many times I have relived the memories, best of all with the partner on the trip.
I could list by name eight, outstanding partners on various great hunting trips, multiple hunting trips with each of them. So many times I have sat with one or more of them while we went over a fabulous trip we had been together on, usually into some beautiful mountain range. Many of those trips turned out to be a lesson in endurance, legs more tired than you ever thought they could get. But it was all forgotten, when you each dropped your pack at your little camp and your partner didn't hesitate ten seconds to rest. He just started out to make the fire and start the coffee cooking!
Sadly, very sadly, every one of those eight great people have now passed away!
I have often shared great hunting memories with other people who would be interested, but I think we should do it here. We all have memories, lets share them with fellow CGNs. Ok, I will start.
One of my first observations about hunting memories, is the great memory is seldom, or never, about shooting some spectacular animal, but about other parts of the hunt.
One of my great hunting partners was a fellow who had grown up in Switzerland and spent much of the time of his early life in the Swiss Alps. He was the best mountaineer I ever hunted with. We were on a pack in goat hunt in the northern Rockies, in an area new to us. It took two days to get to the spot in the last trees bdore timber line, where we made our little camp.
The first evening, just before dark, I spotted with my binocular a goat about half a mile away. As we watched, more goats came and it was a mineral lick they were coming to. The mountain goats kept coming until thirty one had gathered at the lick!
That scene will never be erased from my memory.
So, come on guys, lets hear them, we all know you have good memories.

 

[AKD]

my friend, I can feel ur ichin to get out in the woods bad this year.

 

[7.62mm]

the great memory is seldom, or never, about shooting some spectacular animal, but about other parts of the hunt.

H4831, my friend, you have said it all right there. I have countless little stories, and memories, that I will always cherish. I have shot trophies.....to me.....and been sorely disappointed that a good friend couldn't share it with me, and I have also harvested a modest game animal, that I will always cherish because a certain friend was with me, or could share in the hunt

Great thread!

 

[ronecol]

I totally agree that hunting is so much more than the shooting of an animal. Although some elation is natural with that success the true joy comes from the total hunting experience. And in that context the killing of the animal is a small and sometimes unnecessary part of it. That must be so because many of my hunts over the past 50 plus years did not result in the taking of an animal but were extremely successful in the good times had the memories provided.

I think my greatest hunting pleasure comes from being able to do it with family. When I was younger it was with my father and uncles. Now it is with my children who are all adults with families of their own. As I ponder the hundreds of memories which I cherish one recent one pops to mind. In 2007 for the first time my grandson, 8 years old at the time, joined us at the deer camp for the last night and day of the rifle hunt. As much as his dad and I enjoyed having him there the best part was how much he enjoyed it. That was definitely a milestone for me. By the way he continues to go with his dad to the bush every chance he gets. He’s a pretty good (well supervised) shot with his Model 39 Cooey. He’s the next generation and will no doubt carry on the tradition and that makes me feel good.

Ron

 

[220Swifty]

I look forward to making the memories moreso than the kill.

I plan to get out on my first serious bow hunt this week, and even though i am only looking to get a mulie doe, i am feeling pretty excited.

 

[Noel]

I remember my first moose hunt with my mentor Mervin.

....I'm fifteen, just my second season out for big game and have no clue about anything. He loves to tell this story to anyone who'll listen when I'm there. I wonder how many times it went around when I'm not....... Here it is as he tells it. Mostly true...lol

He starts out "Well you see there Noel was {holds his hand up about 5' off the floor to show my hieght then} and then there was his old Mauser rifle {raises his hand another 12"}......
"I'd have to keep tellin Noel to slow down, that fresh dump of wet snow was holding them spruce boughs down low. Now Noel was short enough to scoot under them branches but everytime I'd snag my hat and get covered in snow."

"Then we saw them, three moose standing about 80yds through the trees, I pointed at them and said there you go Noel, there's your moose." Now I knew what moose look like in an open field, but not when their image was broke up in the timber. I never got a shot off.

Then Merv goes on "then we turn around and go south a ways and I tell him agian, there's your moose right by that tree". I lifted that old iron sighted 30-06 and tried to look like I knew where the moose was. Naturally I had no clue as it's image was broken up and before I got glasses I had a horrible challenge with my vision for hunting. I shot the log right in front of the cow and she happily plodded along out of sight. "You got it!" he said. I was shocked and asked where it was. "Right there", he said pointing to the log and he laughed. I was humiliated and embarassed.

We headed back to the house and when we were crossing a big clearing I had a feeling to check over my shoulder. Sure enough just then a cow stepped out 450yds yonder. I remember saying "ah crap" and just staring at it. Merv just yelled "shoot!" That steel butt was beating the tar out of me as six rounds went south all over the place. Merv's son was watching from the house, laughing at how I rolled back in recoil from each shot.

A 90lb kid aint meant to shoot this big iron! A old codger back in the valley had loaded up a bunch of 180 Hornadys with H414 for me and he wasn't kidding when he said it was a hunting load!

Then after he lets a big laugh go he continues.....
"And ya know, Noel almost knocked that old cow over but she gathered herself up and trotted into the timber where we just came from."

We decided to let her settle before tracking her and headed to the house so Merv could have his coffee. My wool socks were soaked from the wet snow and needed drying. They had no forced air furnace like we did at home so I hung them around the chimney pipe of the air tight stove and then forgot about them.

Well the fire had been stoked before I put them up there and soon they were more than drying, they filled the house with smoke and I will never live that one down. I get reminded ever year since and that will be 19 years this fall!

That afternoon we headed out to track the cow. Me in my well singed wool socks and Merv with his 88 in 243 were ready to get blood on our hands. It wasn't long and he was cussing me for going too fast and always going under the boughs that would get him showered in snow when he tried. That was the longest afternoon of my life. She laid down alright, but not until she wandered every little bit of their bush quarters. We got her just before last light and the work began. If I recall we were back to the yard with the moose in the truck about 10PM. I had my first moose and to this day it is still the biggest cow I have ever seen on the hook.

Merv had a stroke here a couple years back and doesn't go like he used to, gets tired easy. I take him as far as my truck will allow and then we wander a ways more, sometimes sit down and just yack away the afternoon waiting for the sun to set. Sometimes we fill a tag or come home empty handed but I just don't care. I treasure every moment afield with that guy regardless.

 

[sealhunter]

So many hunts,...so many memories..

I remember beinga young boy chasing at Dad's heels, up one barren and down the next as we partridge hunted all over God's country and occasionally Hell's half acre. I was in my glee when he'd drop a partridge. I can remeber the smell of his cloth and canvas pack sack, the half brass imperials,.. the dog standing and working the ground... there are hundreds of memories in there,...a few in particular when we would leave our area for some place I had only heard about when he and his buddies mentioned them,... always good...

Last fall had some great memories too..

For anyone familiar with Newfoundland, in particular the Avalon,.geese are hard to come by. Well last fall Dad was here visiting in Saskatchewan so as to get in a little hunting with me...
He was awe struck at the geese,.shooting shells like he had only done years ago..boxes of them and full limits of birds,..
We even put the stalk on a small slugh of geese..down on our bellies crawling..(newfoundland style) We junped the and got a couple...

Another good hunt was with an old buddy from St John's, Scott Andrews. We went Caribou hunting and nduck hunting a long ways in over the barrens.. it was a wonderful day and hundreds of caribou,,

Another great day was in the area northwest behind Grande Cache in the mountain clopes and crrks of the Rockies..We were elk hunting. Me and Jody this time. There was not a breath of wind. A crisp 3 degrees celsius, and a beautiflul morning gazing down a long creek, hundreds of feet below us as we sat on about an 18 inch wide goat trail..drop off on both sides..

Me and Jody were also famous for hunting grouse with the .22's and having a blast... good times..

I remember one day we switched to winter tires and we hand tightened the lugs..we were in behind elmworth somewhere, or was it moonshine, when we lost the wheels

I had a flask in the truck to celebrate if we got anything,..but we didn't. We stopped by Jody's house, completely beat out, tired, exhauseted, giddy from a full days hunt...
He ran in the house for 10 minutes to grab something or other (take a dump probably) and when he came out, The flask was 3/4 gone and me with a good glow..oh how did he laugh
We pulled the truck in the garage, had a few more drinks and his wife dropped me off home,...drunk !

I slept like a baby!

 

[Brutus]

It was the deer season of 1996. And as alot of us westerners know, it was a long cold winter. However, the first opening day was upon us, whitetail season in South Saskatchewan, which sounds plain vanilla, but my hunting buddies and myself searched high and low on the prairie farms looking for virgin territory to hunt.
A little gas money, politeness and persistance paid off in spades! We had permission to hunt three farmyards and adjacent land along the banks of the Wood River, not far from the small town of Coderre, next to Gravelbourg.
Four of us split into seperate pairs, my group decided beforehand to keep to the uplands, while the other two fellas went straight to the river embankments.
We were about a half hour late, and the early morning gunfire, from other deer hunters, pushed our hopes of a quickly tagged out hunt into the ground.
So without further delay we split up from the truck to our designated areas to lay in wait for our prey.
Myself and Mike, found ourselves on that sunny cold morning, listening and seeing across the rolling hills, other hunting parties seemingly successful, for most of that morning.
Then while crossing a field to get nearer to a natural bottleneck, I became aware of several deer running in our direction, quite some ways off still, and they were seemingly unaware of our presence. I grab Mike's cuff and almost drag him to the slight screen of poplar trees to our front, in hopes of an unexpected ambush.
I tell him quickly, in whispered tones of our lucky situation, and as I prepare to pull off an offhand shot, he snickers at my efforts.
Little did he know, my frequent jackrabbit hunting, was about to pay off. Thankfully I had three in the magazine and one inside the chamber. I waited for the two large does to pass us, and I set my sights on clipping that nice big buck trailing them.
With each shot, black dirt from three clear misses, erupted from the hard frozen ground, and my fourth and last round connected with a vital spot.
The deer collapsed in a heap, my hunting partner shaking his head as if to say, this is going to be ugly.
With confidence I stepped across the winter landscape and was greeted with a very very dead deer, with my connecting shot breaking his puffed up neck.
Later that day at 3:15 PM, we push another buck into our laps, with my bolt action .308 dropping him at a total of thirty feet from my rifle muzzle.
Mr Buck Number Two, was distracted by my hunting partners efforts of pushing bush at a leasurely pace.
Myself I was glad to get up from my frozen perch, across a long wide trunk of an elm tree, he was looking directly away from myself, as I pulled the trigger.
The meandering Wood River was kind to us two that day. Not too kind though, as pulling those deer through deep snowy embankments, to the pickup truck, was some kind of effort indeed, and very memorable. When all the needed work was finally done,and we were safely home, Mike broke out his homemade wine and we all indulged, sharing each others stories in kind.
Man it went down good that evening!
This was that cold day in November, opening day of whitetail season 1996.

 

[H4831]

Good stories, guys.
A lot of years ago we had a very active archery club in Prince George, BC. We were a pretty close group that hunted together, shot together and partied together. A very good friend of mine was in the BC game Department, and while not an archer, he often partied with us and knew everybody.
One winter day he called me to say someone had reported that a moose calf had been hit on a logging road near Hixon and was lame. He said to get my bow, he would pick me up and I could shoot him.
We found the calf on a logging road, he went off the side in the quite deep snow, turned and looked at me. I managed to put a broadhead from my Bear, semi recurve, squarely in his chest. He wobbled a bit and fell over. When we dressed him out the arrow had gone right through the heart.
On the way home we stopped at the beer parlor at Red Rock, in the Hotel that used to be there. I hatched up a plan. We made our own arrows, excellent precission made arrows, from scratch. We often personlized them, usually with a paint scheme, or markings, so we often knew other peoples arrows.
My plan was to stop at Jim's house, who was the head of the club and a guy that would get a joke on anyone he could. It was black dark when we got there, so I sat in the truck, unseen, while our game department friend would rap on the door, with my bloody arrow.
When the door opened, my friend, in a very solomn voice, told Jim that someone had poached a moose and he had found the arrow. He asked Jim if he knew who owned the arrow. The vehicle window was open so I could hear everything. Jim examined the arrow, and I know full well he knew it was mine, one of his best friends. All he could say was, "I'll be damned," over and over. He was genuinely shook!
When I thought it had gone far enough, I jumped out and said, "I wonder who's arrow that is?"
He knew he had been took! All three of us, usually with other people, rehashed that story many times, with me saying I was just waiting for him to finger me. But he didn't.

 

[Ariser]

Another Kodiak Kill

Hello H4831 , Thanks again for that 1957 Bear Kodiak . Which is still in my careful care . You sure killed many Moose with it .

 

[Eagleye]

Yes, my first deer hunt in the late 50's. Salmon Arm was my hometown at the time, and plenty of good deer areas nearby. I was hunting on "Yankee Flats" with an older German friend who was a skillful and kind mentor. He instructed me to go around a small island of brush in a big fir stand while he slowly walked through it. [He had some notion that a deer might be hiding there.] Imagine my surprise when a 3-point buck came out of the brush, completely absorbed by the person coming through the brush, thus completely unaware of my presence. I was packing an M17 30-06 at the time, shooting Dominion Kling-Kor soft points. I remember shaking so badly that I could not keep the sights on that deer, only about 80 yards away. I finally got a shot off, and the deer just jumped a little bit, but was obviously not hit. Panic set in, and I emptied the rest of that magazine, shooting again and again till the buck was down. I am not proud of the misses [3], but I can still remember the words of Max: "Well, congratulations son, you are now a hunter. A real hunter cares about the game, cares about the areas he hunts in, and cares about others he comes in contact with" We sat around the camp that evening, had tenderloin and beans, and talked a lot....ahhh, what memories these are!!! Max is long gone, but his words will stay with me till I'm gone. Regards, Eagleye