# Pronghorn Triple Play



## FishNaked (Apr 15, 2009)

Wow what a weekend!

I left mid day on Wednesday with a friend to go meet my brother in Wyoming. We all had our pronghorn tags in hand and the early rifle season opened the next day on Thursday. My brother Cade beat us there and spent a couple hours scouting. Carson and I arrived just about dark...then rambled around for an hour or so looking for a camp site before we drove into town and the local RV resort. It wasn't fancy but turned out to be a good choice for only 20 bucks a night. I don't have a shower and the hot water heater is fried in my pop up and this place provided both. Cade had seen several bunches of antelope and had a nice heavy buck picked out for the next morning. Our tag was an early depredation hunt.

We woke up early on Thursday and hurried out to where Cade had last seen the buck the night before. We spent all morning looking and couldn't find him...he must have wandered deep out into the badlands. This turned into mostly a scouting day...burned a tank of gas driving around and looking at over 300 antelope and more than 60 bucks. Our hope with this tag was to find one 80" buck and a couple of 76 inchers. I teased Carson driving over how awesome it would be to drive home Saturday with three 80" bucks in the coolers...he thought I was crazy!

We looked at several good bucks on Thursday...but kept talking ourselves out of them. Let me explain right now that we are experienced antelope guys and normally do a great job at field judging pronghorn...usually down to 1/2" on the hoof. Between the three of us we've been in on 30+ antelope kills over the years....with 8 bucks over 80". We were grossly mistaking great bucks this trip however...as I'll embarrassingly confess as I finish telling the story. We kept talking ourselves out of bucks...wishing them to grow bigger another year or two...and down the road we'd go looking for the next.

We spent the day glassing and went back to camp late that night almost discouraged. Cade and I both made the comment that we were surprised at all the smaller "cookie cutter" bucks we kept seeing and disappointed we didn't find one shooter that first day. We decided we better not be so picky...that now we only had two days to shoot three antelope. One of the first bucks we saw that morning was just a pretty buck with ivory tips and piqued Carson's fancy. Carson wanted to go back and find his ivory tipped buck the next morning.

Friday morning found us back in the same position looking over the same fields of the walk in area. Where it was a walk in area we were worried that other hunters came behind us the day before and shot the buck and chased the others away. As luck would have it the antelope were still there. 50 some does and 12 bucks all milling around. We found Carson's buck and made our game plan for the stalk. After 20 minutes we were in a great position but the antelope had crossed the fence onto the adjoining property that was off the walk in area. I backed out and found the landowners name and number to call and obtain permission. I called that number a dozen times over the next 3 hours with no answer. I didn't want to chance spooking the antelope so I never walked back in to where Cade and Carson were hunkered down. I watched the whole episode from my air conditioned truck from a thousand yards away.

Finally the antelope started feeding back and crossed the fence onto our side. 3 steps later and 80 yards away Carson dropped his buck with one shot from his 300 WSM. Cade was on camera and filmed the whole stalk and waiting and shot. As we approached Carson's buck we couldn't believe how much bigger he was that what we'd been guessing. We all thought he was going to be a 14" buck in the mid 70's. Wrong! His right side topped 16" with 6 3/8" bases and a 6 2/8" prong. We measured him twice and this mid 70's buck taped out at 83 1/8"...WOW![attachment=7:30tsy82b]Carson 1.jpg[/attachment:30tsy82b]
We were all dumfounded at how off we were. 1-2 inches...maybe 3...ok that's not good but acceptable...but 8" off? We passed this buck up the morning before...what was wrong with us? So now we are thinking about all the other bucks we passed up...how good of bucks were they really?

There was one other buck in the bunch that definitely caught our attention over the three hours in close proximity glassing and waiting. This second buck had wandered over to the other side of the walk in area after the shooting with the other does and fawns and smaller bucks...they didn't bug out to the badlands like they should have. Cade knew that he couldn't pass up that buck a second time so we hurried and did the cleaning and caping chores on Carson's buck and put together a game plan for buck #2. After stalking into position Cade dropped his buck with two hits from his custom Weaver 300 at 358 yards. I was marking ranges for him as Carson ran the camera. First hit was fatal but a bit low...the follow up shot anchored the buck for good. Another heavy big buck...14 5/8" tall...6 3/8" bases...6 2/8" prong...taped out to 80 2/8".[attachment=10:30tsy82b]Cade 1.jpg[/attachment:30tsy82b] 
This buck had some really cool horn features and little devil points...we teased Cade that he was a non typical.[attachment=9:30tsy82b]Cade 2.JPG[/attachment:30tsy82b][attachment=8:30tsy82b]Cade 4.JPG[/attachment:30tsy82b] 
After the cleaning and caping chores we hurried into town for ice and to wash up back at the trailer. We were still dumfounded and giddy that we'd just shot two 80+ bucks within two hours of each other in the same field. We cooked breakfast burritos for a late lunch...replenished the drinks in the cooler...and back out to look for buck #3. We had seen another buck on day one that we nicknamed Chester. This is completely wrong but growing up there was a convicted child molester in our town that everyone knew about and kept all the kids away from...he wore funny suits with flowers on the lapel with slicked over hair...his name was Chester. This buck on the first day was always hanging around 3 fawns without a doe...so we nicknamed him "Chester the Molester" from that childhood memory we all had. Chester wasn't on a walk in area so we stopped at the ranch house and asked permission...which was easily granted. All these farmers wanted the antelope chased out of their hay fields.

We found Chester again but he was way out in the badlands and settled for the evening. We spent the last couple hours of daylight watching new antelope feed into these green hay and cut stubble fields. One buck caught our eye...he was the tallest buck we'd seen so far and had great ivory tips. [attachment=6:30tsy82b]Tall 1.JPG[/attachment:30tsy82b][attachment=5:30tsy82b]Tall 2.JPG[/attachment:30tsy82b]I took a liking to the buck and kept saying that if only he had a better digger that I'd have shot him already. We spent over an hour within 200 yards of this buck and I decided against it and let him walk away.[attachment=4:30tsy82b]Tall 3.JPG[/attachment:30tsy82b] We had the next morning to hunt and hopefully we'd catch Chester back out in the hay field. Antelope were always in the roads...crossing in front and behind us as we sat and glassed. It was early enough in the season and they hadn't been hunted yet so they were more tame and unskittish than we'd ever seen.[attachment=1:30tsy82b]Mirror.JPG[/attachment:30tsy82b] 
We turned our attention to the other side of the truck and a new buck had come in and bedded down behind us...maybe 65 yards away. First look at him my comment was "he's heavy" to which Cade finally picked his binoculars to his eyes and agreed. We nicknamed him "Roid" for Barry Bonds and the pumped up horns this guy carried. Still...we judged him shorter than he ended up being....this is with three pair of Swaro binos and a Swaro spotter on him all within 100 yards. Chester was a prettier buck and taller...bases were similar but Roid carried his mass all the way to his tips. One horn kicked forward and the other kicked back...making his side profile unique. I told Cade and Carson that I'd shoot him now if he only had ivory tips like that other tall buck....but I'd rather shoot him than Chester. Carson picked Chester to shoot out of the two and Cade thought that he'd also pick Roid because of his upper mass. Still...we let this buck walk away without shooting him. I wanted to kill this buck but also wanted a second closer look at Chester...are we idiots?

Saturday morning found us back on the same vantage point over looking the fields. It was already full of antelope and Chester was among them...Roid was nowhere to be found so we assumed he wandered out into the badlands for the day already. I said that I'd like to shoot Roid but passing on Chester again would be a mistake and I wouldn't regret tagging him. The farmer must have been messing around in the corn field down below changing water or something because the antelope all seemed more nervous this morning and they started filing out of the hay field earlier than normal. We got into position but Chester had already crossed the fence to the BLM side. He milled around and stayed close to the fence line...with many of the other antelope crossing back and forth and back again from side to side. We hoped that Chester would follow suit and cross back into the alfalfa.

One glance around at our surroundings as we waited we found a lone buck wandering in. It was Roid. Both Roid and Chester were so similar sized it really wouldn't have been a mistake to shoot one or the other...but I had picked Roid the night before and still liked his unique side profile so I stuck with that decision. With a steady walk he closed the gap to the field in no time and crossed the fence. All the other antelope except one doe and a fawn had left the field and were heading out to the badlands for the day...including Chester. We had to be careful not to spook the others as we made our way to the fence line and the location where Roid had crossed.

Peering through the tall weeds along the fence line we found Roid and his two female friends feeding out towards the stubble field. This actually presented a better back drop for a safer shot. I settled down on top of a broken off fence post and Cade had the camera rolling over my shoulder. I was shooting my new .264 Win Mag and a new load I'd developed...my first time ever shooting a custom load. I hadn't shot an animal with this rifle before and anxiously hoped for good results. He was quartering away so I placed the cross hairs 2 or 3 ribs back from his front leg and centered it up on his chest cavity. One steady shot at 198 yards and Roid dumped to the ground...piled up where he stood....SWEET! The 140 grain bullet entered where it was aimed and tore through his boiler room and came to a stop at the base of his neck on the opposite shoulder.

As we walked up to him he got heavier and heavier...the nickname Roid was certainly fitting. His best side was 15 3/8" tall with 7 6/8" bases and a 5 7/8" prong...his two mass measurements above the prong were 4 6/8" and 3 2/8"...WOW! His left side taped out to a whopping 44"...total of both was 84 1/8"...WOW again! This was the biggest goat on the ground that any of us had ever put our hands on...WOW a third time![attachment=2:30tsy82b]Zane 3.jpg[/attachment:30tsy82b][attachment=3:30tsy82b]Zane 1.JPG[/attachment:30tsy82b][attachment=0:30tsy82b]Zane 2.JPG[/attachment:30tsy82b]
Unbelievable that we'd just killed three 80" goats in two days. Unfathomable that we'd passed all these bucks on prior occasions because we thought they were too small or too short. We are still baffled at how far off we field scored all three...and our only conclusion is the incredible mass of them all made them look shorter than they actually were and skewed our opinions. We'll never look at another buck again and have the same field confidence we once had. This turned into a dream antelope weekend with a brother and friend that we'll never duplicate again. We killed three slammer bucks...and passed up 5 others that were in the same category as these three...Chester competing with Roid for top buck in the unit. Cade still wonders if that first buck he scouted Wednesday night was bigger yet?

All three bucks plus the others we scouted and glassed were caught on film and will be in an upcoming episode for Hunt Forever West. Give him a couple days and Cade will have more of the hunt photos posted on the website...http://www.huntforeverwest.com

Do you think we can be so lucky to draw this tag again next year as a second choice like we did this time around?


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## goofy elk (Dec 16, 2007)

Now that's a smoke'in dam good hunt.......Nicely done!.


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## Briar Patch (Feb 1, 2010)

Great story, great pictures. Unbelievable success! Very nice.


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## Size Matters (Dec 22, 2007)

Congrats those are all awesome bucks thanks for the report and photos. 8)


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## ntrl_brn_rebel (Sep 7, 2007)

That is absolutely awesome!! Good work......that is one hell of an accomplishment to take three B&C Animals with three tags in two days............unbelievable!!!! That is some hunting magazine material........... :!:


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## Bears Butt (Sep 12, 2007)

Man o man! Excellent story! My hunt doesn't start until the end of this month and stories like that really get me pumped up! Congrats on three VERY FINE animals!


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## h20fowl (Dec 31, 2009)

sweet cant wait for the video's to be posted


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## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

Awesome report, nice antelope.


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## sawsman (Sep 13, 2007)

Great speed goats!! Nice job.


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## Bo0YaA (Sep 29, 2008)

wow nice goats, congrats!!


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## dkhntrdstn (Sep 7, 2007)

cool looking buck there.


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