Canadian Wolf Hunt

Joined
Feb 18, 2021
Messages
1
Well I guess I better share my nightmare so other people don’t have to go through the same thing.
So a couple weeks before we left my buddy who was suppose to go on the hunt, his son got burned real bad at work. They had a burn pile going and another kid that worked with him decided to add some fuel to the fire. He caught the gas can on fire and then basically threw it at my buddies kid. He was life flighted to Las Vegas burn center.

So needless to say my buddy didn’t end up going. He had his other boy go with me since he already payed for the hunt. I tried to call Swoop airlines and get the name changed to his son, but they wouldn’t do it not even for medical reasons. so my buddies kid had to buy an additional plane ticket and two bags. Saturday I drove to Vegas and met them at the hospital to see my buddies kid and see how he was doing then our flights were at 9 pm.

We show up about three hours early to the airport to take care of everything. An employee for swoop didn’t show up until about 2 hours before the flight lives at the ticket counter to check in. We were first in line and go up to the counter. We say we need to declare our rifles.The lady said she would have to call and find out how to receive them because she has never taken one before. I am thinking this is not good. So she gets on the phone and I hear her saying “ oh no that’s not good. What can they do?” So she tells us that Swoop airlines doesn’t accept firearms on their planes. I didn’t check because it was my first time flying with a firearm and i just figured if they were allowed it was across the board. My bad. Well that’s not going to work out and we try to get a voucher or a refund and they say no.

We walk down to West Jet and ask if they accept firearms and they say they do. We say when is the earliest flight and they say tomorrow at 11:30. So we get a hotel in Vegas and leave the following day. We arrive in Canada and it’s -28 deg. We get all our stuff and get the rental truck and start the 6.5 hr drive north. We arrived at camp at midnight. This is probably the second worst part of the trip. We get put into a tiny room with three twin beds. The sheets and pillow cases haven’t been washed in what looks like 3 years. I had to use a jacket to cover my pillow so i could sleep. I am not one to usually complain about my accommodations, but it was pretty bad. The bathroom was disgusting with urine all over the toilet and mouse piss all over the counter. The shower was also nasty. That’s about the only complaint I have with the accommodations. The food was good and they were nice.

So day one we had to make sure our rifles were sighted in. We set up at 245 yds and shot. It was a balmy -35 deg. I set my rifle to 260 yds on my turret and hit about an inch high. My buddy was low probably from the drastic temp change. Sighted in in southern utah over 100 deg and now shooting in -35. So we get that taken care of and take my buddy to his stand. I had to ride a sled about 9 miles into mine after a 30 min ride in the truck. First day I see a coyote and ravens. Buddy sees just ravens. Day two and three are the same. Just an average temp of -35 lows into the -40’s. I have never had my feet so cold.

I ended up taking my boots off when I got to the stand and putting feet warmers on my socks and then tucking them into my IWOM suit. About the only way I could set for 9 hrs in that cold. Other then that I was good. Hands stayed warm just in my pockets with hand warmers in them. Day three was about the same as one and two until I was going to leave my stand. I walked the 400-500 yds out to the sled and then tried to start it. The electric start had been giving me trouble and had to use the pull start. About the third pull the pull cord breaks about 6” from the handle. So here I am about 9 miles from the truck with no service after dark and it’s about -38 deg. So I start walking up the trail. About 4 min into it my batteries on my headlamp freeze. I walk about a mile and can finally get service. I call the guide and no answer. So I call my buddy and tell him what’s going on and that I will keep walking to the truck to stay warm. I had a beanie with a little built in LED light on it and luckily it worked. So I could see about 15’ in front of me. As I walked out I crossed about 5 different sets of wolf tracks over my snowmobile track from the morning. One set was pretty fresh and was chasing a Whitetail down the trail. I know it’s probably all in your head at that point, but it’s pretty freaky. Anyways about 4 1/2 miles and 2 1/2 hours later the guide showed up. I am pretty sure I got a mild frostbite on my Fingers. All my fingertips fell off within a week of getting back and I had no feeling in them until they fell off.

Some good news for day three one of the other guys in camp shot a wolf. Day 4 was more of the same cold and no wolves. One of the other guys in camp had a pack of 5-6 come into his bait and missed one at 250yds. Day 5 we had to move our stand because the wind shifted from north to south. So myself and my buddy got stuck in different stands. My buddy had two wolves come in that evening and missed one at 245yds. So at least people are getting shots. I myself sat the last two days in that stand and never got to see a wolf. That’s how it goes with hunting. We were 75% on opportunity so IMO that is pretty damn good and hard to beat. Just sucks when your the 25%.

So Sunday morning we get up and make the 6.5 hr drive back into Edmonton to catch a flight the next morning. Luckily we were already booked with west jet. The guide sent us a text that night and said “I told you so”. It was trail cam pics from the baits we sat the first 4 days. Both of them had wolves on them on the 5th day. We sat them the 13-16 and on the 17th both had wolves. Mine was a beautiful almost all white one with with two blacks and a grey. Talk about salt in the wound. The wolf pics are all off my bait right before we got there and then the day we had to move baits.

I learned a lot of important stuff on this trip and I will be trying again. Might go to BC this time. I will post what pics I have.
Thanks for all the interest in the hunt.
I am responding to the review that jarheadhunter provided in his Alberta Wolf hunt. I was on that hunt. The outfitter is Byron Wolf of Wolf Huntin Adventures. I have hunted with Byron in the Yukon and have known him about 20 years.

I have some hunting experience: 2 Grand Slams, The Triple Slam, North American 29, Magnificent 7, etc.

Byron is a good outfitter and what he provides is about what you expect at -40F.

Stuff happens.

My son-in-law and I did not observe any of the problems jarheadhunter did. We were in the same building.

We were scheduled back 3/3/21 for the same hunt, but Covid prevented our return.

We will be back on the same hunt this next season.

Byron has wolves and knows how to get them.

I observed that jarheadhunter was not prepared for that hunt in that weather.

James Brogan
Athens, WV
 
OP
jarheadhunter
Joined
Sep 10, 2013
Messages
320
Location
UT
I am responding to the review that jarheadhunter provided in his Alberta Wolf hunt. I was on that hunt. The outfitter is Byron Wolf of Wolf Huntin Adventures. I have hunted with Byron in the Yukon and have known him about 20 years.

I have some hunting experience: 2 Grand Slams, The Triple Slam, North American 29, Magnificent 7, etc.

Byron is a good outfitter and what he provides is about what you expect at -40F.

Stuff happens.

My son-in-law and I did not observe any of the problems jarheadhunter did. We were in the same building.

We were scheduled back 3/3/21 for the same hunt, but Covid prevented our return.

We will be back on the same hunt this next season.

Byron has wolves and knows how to get them.

I observed that jarheadhunter was not prepared for that hunt in that weather.

James Brogan
Athens, WV
LOL. Ok James. I bet it was nice getting a room with two queen beds while we had three twin beds shoved into a room that should only have one. Not to mention you guys brought your own sleeping bags and laid them out on top of the bed. You probably didn’t see the mouse crap because I took the liberty of wiping it off the counter so I felt I could set my clothes on it. I had to wrap my pillow with my jacket so that I could sleep at night.

To be honest this post hasn’t been looked at and commented on since I wrote it over a year ago and my intentions of the post had nothing to do with bashing or dropping names or anything. I simply mentioned that the accommodations were not as clean as I would expect. I never wrote any reviews and never intended too. I hope you have a great time going back. Myself I am booking with another outfitter.
 
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