The hunt started off with my son, Jake, (with no tag), my dad, and I (who both had deer tags). With the drought doing its damage to the Wyoming deer herd, Wyoming had cut many deer tags along with introducing antler point restrictions to 3-points or even 4-points or better. You didn’t have to be a biologist to see the obvious lack of deer with one morning drive around. With a few days to scout, we hadn’t seen a legal buck until the evening prior to the opener. We tried to pick him up on opening morning but with no luck. I had reservations about going into the area I believed him to be in and blowing it up and him out. We stayed back, hoping he would make a mistake. After several days, my nephew, Joe Danens, a Wyoming resident, showed up to help us out.
Running out of time, I made the decision to make a move into the draw I figured the buck was in. Jake posted up to come down the opposite side while Joe and I teamed up to move down the near side. As soon as we could see down into the draw, I glassed the buck up. He was moving to bed and was unsure what to do because he saw movement (us). He nonchalantly moved through our draw and was headed for a bigger canyon to the south. As soon as he went out of sight, we took off sprinting and hurdling sagebrush. We hit thick sage and had to slow to pick our way through. It was a good thing because I was sucking wind. I knew how far he could get by just walking, and we needed to cut him off. I was feeling the pressure when we peeked over the rim and Joe spotted him at 200 yards. I don’t usually need shooting sticks at that distance, but I was still sucking wind, making my crosshairs move up and down like a teeter totter. My pack was 20 yards behind me, so I went to an unsupported prone position to try and get control. My crosshairs were still moving up and down and the buck was looking to go when the magic happened. Everything went still. It was a perfect hit, and all his glory dropped on the spot.
Joe and I didn’t want to go down to the buck until my dad and Jake were with us. We made our way a little closer as we waited. Using his binos, Joe said, “I think he fell dead on a shed antler.” As I glassed the buck, amazingly, white antler tips materialized. As the four of us made the final approach, the buck wasn’t actually lying on the shed but was only a couple feet from it. This wasn’t just any shed, it was off of an old special buck. As I put hands on my 5x5 buck, I was so happy that the solid weight of his horns flowed all the way to the tips. He was not the widest buck, but he really had everything else, along with 4" eyeguards. This was such a gem of a buck amongst the empty Wyoming high desert. Joe set up a table in his camp trailer where we were able to skin and process the buck out of the sun and wind. I’ve had many special hunts in my life, and this one fits nicely into those amazing hunts. Thanks to my dad, my son, and my nephew.
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