# Well THAT was a frustrating



## mjbarney12 (Feb 13, 2011)

first ever muzzy hunt. Hopefully I learned something from the experience but after 4 days of HOT, DUSTY and DRY conditions we couldn't find a buck to save our lives. Saw plenty of does and fawns. Most does that had a fawn actually had two fawns so that's a good sign. Still, no bucks.

We only saw one of the camps in the area that had tagged a buck but I'm convinced that the bucks were there. We just didn't know how to get to them or be in the right place and we tried everything we could think of.

I'm assuming that the bucks stuck to the deepest, darkest pine forests they could get to in order to keep out of the heat and walkign through the pines was an exercise in futility. Walking through Aspens was just as futile. I did see antlers bruck a pine branch once as I bounced a buck from his bed but that was all I saw. I didn't even see his body and wouldn't have known it was a buck except for the flash of antlers hitting that branch for a mili-second and he was gone.

Well, I haven't decided whether to do muzzy again next year or not. My brothers and I wanted to try muzzy because we figured there'd be fewer hunters in the hills (true) and that we'd be able to get closer to the deer and have a better chance at a shot (true for does, not so true for bucks).

Does anyone have any tips for me for next year to improve my chances?


----------



## Huge29 (Sep 17, 2007)

This year is definitely out of the ordinary. I am hunting a LE area for elk, so the deer hunters have been out. I saw about 20 does and only one buck that was dead and torn apart by critters. I only heard of one being taken, 12 yards off of the road. There were only a small fraction of the normal hunters up there. I am feeling your same frustration with the elk. I have just asked around and decided to head into the nasty hard to reach stuff next hoping that it will produce as all of the normally great areas don't have a single track this week. Very frustrating to feel that you have done your part and gone to there they have been all summer to find them all gone.


----------



## BigT (Mar 11, 2011)

It was really quite frustrating for my boy and I until we started hunting the thick oak brush. Once in there we started seeing a lot of deer but they were difficult to see what they were. It wasn't until the last day I was there that we filled the tag and really it was dumb luck. My normal area was empty of deer and the other areas that were productive scouting had been overrun by sheep and cattle. Anyways, the heat made a difference I think. The deer we got we busted out of his bed at 7:30am if that gives you any idea of what they were doing. I was seeing many more deer during the evening hours. I was surprised a little to see them bedded down so early. If it were me, I wouldn't give up on the muzzy hunt. Give it a try with the new hunting units coming up this coming year. It'll be interesting though to see whether or not its difficult to hunt the area you've been hunting in the past.


----------



## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

This year's muzzy hunt has been nearly identical to last year actually. Hot weather, few deer. Weather turns just after the hunt ends, bucks show up for rifle hunt. I had several deer patterned including two really nice 4pts. Night after night I could ride up within 100 yards of them. They upped and disappeared monday... havent seen'em since.

I got lucky and stumbled across a buck Friday morning (only one I saw) & made a fricken unbelievable shot on it as it bounded across the canyon at 140yards. Bad part was as the crow flys it was a short distance away... to get there I had to go straight down 200 yards then back up a sheer face 200 yards to get at it  I can still barely walk today lol!


-DallanC


----------



## 400BULL (Nov 16, 2007)

Mid day Friday I decided I would take my oldest boy up for his first ever muzzy hunt. Don't know if that was a good idea now. After putting on nearly 9 miles of hiking over the weekend we only seen a half dozen deer or so. No matter how hard we tried we could not put a single antler on any one of them. From the sounds of it we were not the only ones having a hard time finding deer. We talked talked with two DWR officers Sunday afternoon to see if they had any suggestion on where I could take my boy. Between the two of them they had only seen one other hunter that had been successful. Lets hope it cools down some and the rifle hunt is a little better then the muzzy hunt. My boy is a little frustrated right now but not hart broken.

400bull


----------



## kailey29us (May 26, 2011)

I had the same frustrating experience with my 13 y/o son. It's been about 5 years since I have hunted with a muzzleloader and it sucked. There was not as many hunters out as I thought I would see, but we didnt see much of anything. Tons of does and fawns. We only saw one buck and that was just before we went home, a little 2 point about 100 yds away. My son got a shot but missed. I talked to alot of people on Cedar Mountain and Bumblebee who had not seen a sigle buck since opening day.


----------



## WHutchings (Jan 6, 2009)

Have a NE tag for muzz hunted hard on foot and alot of miles on the atv. Not very happy with the buck to doe ratio,we saw in four days a total of 40 does and 2 spikes and 3 small 2 points. Not what we expected. The years past (5-10 years ago) we could hike not too far and see decent buck (22-24'' bucks). I did hear NE got it bad with snow this last year maybe that's the issue.


----------



## JuddCT (Sep 7, 2007)

I'm amazed at how dismal things seem to be especially with how much hiking most of you have put in.

However, I only spent 3/4 of a day hunting on the muzzleloader hunt and I think things are great (Couldn't get anytime off this year due to other hunts and had to get back for Conference on Saturday evening). I didn't see the big boys I was looking for, but I saw 5 bucks (small 4 point, 3 point, and three small 2 points) and a lot of does and fawns (a lot of the does have two fawns which is great). However, I know the bigger bucks are there as they are still appearing on my trail cams really early in the morning or really late at night. They are holding tight to some of the deepest/darkest timber right now (the hunt was hot), but I think they will start moving more with the snow coming. Sometimes it sucks but I think going through that thick stuff right now at a really slow pace is helpful as those bucks will just sit there 20 yards from you knowing you will walk right on by without seeing them, but they are there. I've counted over 20 different bucks on one of my trail cameras that have frequented the area over the past 2 weeks. Believe me they are there, but are hard to find. Oh yeah, SE tag in a very busy/easy access area.


----------



## Fowlmouth (Oct 4, 2008)

Opening morning was okay, I spotted 2 bucks 20 minutes after I started hiking. I let the lead fly at 90 yards and missed a big 2 point. The deer ran out of the bottom of the canyon and on a side hill straight across from me. I loaded the muzzy again and put the sight on the same big buck at 130-140 yards. I squeezed the trigger and heard the bullet hit him, literally I heard the bullet hit before my brother said "you hit him". The deer ran up hill and over to another small canyon, so we walked over to the other side where I shot him and there was no blood anywhere. We then followed the trail the deer had taken for about 80 yards and found the first blood, about that time the deer runs out and he was gimping on his right front shoulder. Followed small amounts of blood for 3/4 mile and then the trail ran dry. We did hear 1 shot above us while looking for the deer and hopefully someone got him. It was a frustrating hunt because of the hot, dry weather and frustrating to not find that buck.


----------



## MWScott72 (May 23, 2011)

The hunt was hot and dry and from where I was hunting, that meant the deer were bedding between 8-8:30 in the morning and didn't stir until sometime between 6-6:30 in the evening. I probably saw between 7-8 bucks each day; however, since I have elk in the freezer from last year and a late season cow tag this year, I was antler hunting more than meat hunting. Hiked into my area on Tuesday night and hunted hard thru Sunday morning. Could have ended the hunt three different times on a small 4x4, spike, and a fairly big 2x3. Was really tempted on the 2x3, but ended up passing because I was after a 25-26" 4x4 further down the canyon. Ended up running out of daylight and couldn't close the deal. Only saw that 4x4 and a 4x5 on opening morning that I would have pulled the trigger on. Just didn't want to pack a smaller animal the 4-5 miles back to the truck in straight up/down terrain.

I hunted a 5-day season unit, so my hunt is done. All in all, I had a great hunt, but do wish the weather would have been cooler. That would have really helped out on the deer movement. As soon as the sun hit them early, they would bed down for the entire day. Only days you could still hunt were Sat. and Sun. when the wind was blowing. Everything was so dry that it was pointless to do so on the calm days.


----------



## StillAboveGround (Aug 20, 2011)

Also thought I had several bucks patterned before the season...
But nada...
Cool and wet this a.m. very silent moving around...
Plenty of elk, but no deer at all.


----------

