First Western Hunt Complete- West Nebraska Archery Pronghorn Success

soggybtmboys

Lil-Rokslider
Joined
May 20, 2016
Messages
168
Location
Upper Midwest
WEll, I'd like to say thank you for all the info on here and to report back in, our trip went off pretty smoothly. Weather was challenging with all the rain ahead of time and the first half of our hunt was cool and comfortable. Goats did not seek water like we had hoped they would. Second half of the hunt was better, with increase temps and bucks starting to separate a bit and younger bucks pushing does some. REgardless, was a bit more challenging than previously had thought to get done with a bow, and on day 3 I connected with a decent buck. Long sits and limited opportunities were the norm for the group the week we were there. My step daughter missed an opportunity at a stud buck on day one, as she started to draw down, a cow cam in and ran her buck off the water tank. Another hunter shot a dandy, but recovery was following day and he lost more than half of it due to yotes, young man made his first kill on a nice buck that had been wounded the week before, and another young man managed a successful stalk and arrowed his buck at 40 yards.

My buck came in relatively fast and wasn't dilly dallying around at the water tank, I had seen him pushing some does around earlier. From the time he entered into my frame of view until the time of execution of shot, the entire encounter only last 19 seconds. I am unaware if this is normal pronghorn behavior or if he was just anxious to get back to the girls since there were other bucks in the area. He rounded the side of the water tank and was even with the mineral station at 25 yards and i came to full draw, and gave him a light meep and he stopped. Double lunged him, and he ran/jumped over and flipped over at an additional 40 yards, got back on his feet, continued to try and clear his lungs, then laid down and expired. Total distance of recovery from my position was maybe 65 yards is all.

Fun trip and I will do it again in the future, and hopefully get on some really big bucks doing some spot and stalk or decoying when they are rutting. I saw quite a few when large groups would come around, but pretty much was slim pickings for opportunities as the weather was not conducive to pushing them to water like we had hoped.

Thanks again for the tips and advice, here is my first pronghorn from my first poke out to western states. Thanks again
 

TC406

FNG
Joined
May 22, 2019
Messages
87
Congrats and nice work. Bummer about the other guys getting chewed up by coyotes, why wasn't it recovered that night?
 

HunterHawk

Lil-Rokslider
Joined
May 26, 2015
Messages
284
Location
Littleton, CO
Congrats again! Getting my water tank filled tomorrow.. just in time for rain moving in on friday most likely after a long dry spell.. just my luck!
 
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