10 day solo Kodiak goat hunt

[AK Troutbum]

Wow looks like an awesome hunt. I hope to do something like that some day. What tarp and bivy is that? Looking at getting a similar set up.


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I used a Mountain Laurel Designs cuben fiber Solomid and a Titanium Goat Kestrel bivy.


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[AK Troutbum]

After about an hour and a half of hiking, I spotted a bear digging up roots about 400 yards or so, below and in front of me, and on the same hillside that I was side hilling along. I needed to get around him, so I climbed a little higher with the hopes that I would be able to make it past him without him noticing me. I was just about by him when I got busted. Initially he laid down and watched me for several seconds then stood up and started walking up the hill towards me. I immediately stopped and started waving my arms and yelling "Woe bear, get out of here bear", at which point he started running/charging. I was probably over 300 yards away from him and he was running uphill so not exactly at breakneck speed. I pulled my rifle out of my gun bearer and chambered a round, all the while continuing to yell. By the time I had chambered a round and shouldered the rifle, he was about 75 yards, or so, and closing. I went ahead and put the crosshairs on his forehead and pulled the trigger, only to here a "click ". My first thought is, shit misfire, so I quickly attempted to chamber another round, only to find that my rounds were stuck in the magazine and not chambering. By the time I cleared things up and had a round chambered and shouldered the rifle (it seemed like minutes had gone by but in reality it was only a few seconds), the bear had turned off at around 20 yards, and started siding hilling away from me. When this all started I remember thinking to myself, "Man, I'm only a little over an hour into my hike/hunt (although not actually hunting because it was the same day I was flown in), and I'm going to be dicking around skinning out a DLP bear".
So I hiked for another three hours, made it well into my area, and set up my spike camp at 3000' elevation, while watching a nanny bedded down just a couple hundred yards from me.

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[Daniel_M]

Awesome! Nothing like a curious bear to get the blood flowing.

 

[Slim Jim]

Bad ass!! You Alaskans are f--n crazy! I wouldn't be able to sleep at night knowing there are griz close by

 

[AK Troutbum]

The following day some clouds had moved in but it was otherwise still a very nice day with temperatures in the mid 40s and just a nice occasional breeze. I decided to get up on top of the mountain that I was on and then basically just run the ridges in hopes of finding some goats. After hiking about 3 miles further in I found a band of goats on an adjacent mountain that was probably another 3 miles away, give or take. So I decided to get closer and get a better look. As I was making my way to them, I would periodically come down off the ridgetop to take a peek over the side of the mountain and see if there was anything hanging out in the crevices. Once while I was doing this, I looked back and spotted a billy just under 1000 yards away. I sat down, pulled the spotting scope out and got a better look at him. After seeing that he looked like a decent goat and that he was in a very conducive area for putting on a stalk, I decided to go after him. It took me about an hour to get within the general area of where he was, find him, and set up for a shot. When I finally set up on him, and ranged him, he was 146 yards and directly across from me. I sat there for a while trying to determine whether or not I wanted to end my goat hunt on my first day of hunting. I had plenty of time to set up my spotting scope and Phoneskope to get some good video footage through my iPhone and thought it would be cool if I could video everything. After a bit more pondering on whether or not I was going to take him, I put some foam earplugs in my ears and waited for him to get into a good position. I had decided to take a neck shot in the hopes of severing his spine, to anchor him right where he was. Everything was perfect, he moved into position, and I pulled the trigger. The recoil from the rifle did not allow me to see where my bullet hit, so what I saw was him turn his head and look at the rocks behind him where the bullet had impacted. It was a complete miss and I laid there, dumbfounded as to what the hell had just happened. After a couple seconds he turned around and walked away, around the side of the rocks that he was on, and out of sight. Clearing my eyes in disbelief having just blown a slam dunk, I quickly went to the video footage to see what had happened. My shot was a solid foot over where I was aiming. The rifle I was using, I had purchased used and it had a 3-9X33 Leupold CDS scope already mounted on it upon purchase. It shot very well at the range and was all dialed in but I did not have an elevation turret cap for it, and never really gave it much thought. Apparently, when Taj (my pilot), was stuffing it into the scabbard on the struts of the plane, the elevation turret got spun around, and I was no longer at zero. I quickly turned the turret about 12 inches down, threw everything into my pack, and took off after the goat. I was eventually able to catch up to him and after a bit of chasing him around, ended up shooting him in almost the exact same place that he was the first time I took a crack at him. He took a step or two and went down in the scree, and that was that.

This is a still photo at the exact moment that I pulled the trigger and missed, taken from my video footage.

Then The goat looking back over his shoulder, at the rocks, where the bullet had hit.

Upon returning back to spike later on that evening I found these three brown bears (mama and two, approximately three-year-old, cubs) walking by my camp. The wind was in my favor, so they had no idea that I was there.

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[Daniel_M]

Excellent photos!


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[norsepeak]

Fantastic adventure and awesome pics! Congrats!

 

[AK Troutbum]

I spent the following two days packing the meat and hide back to my spike camp. It was pretty slow and go in the terrain that I had to cover and that, coupled with it being about 6 miles round trip, and I am just no longer capable of carrying 100+ lb. packs very far anymore. I also figured that I had the time so I may as well focus on being safe and taking my time. On the second day of packing back to my spike, the weather started to deteriorate, and by the fourth day of the hunt, it had started raining nonstop with very heavy winds. I still had to get everything back to the lake which was another, roughly, 6 miles round trip. I was only able/willing to do one load a day, so after 3 loads/days, I had everything back at the lake. The rain and wind continued, pretty much nonstop, for the rest of my trip. I had been on the phone with Taj multiple times over the course of the next 5 days but the weather did not permit a pick up, so I just had to deal with it. Within a couple days, the ground, around the only area that a person could pitch a tent, had become saturated and either had several inches of standing water or running water. The mountains, surrounding the lake on 3 sides, had running water/waterfalls coming down from every little crevice in the mountains. I probably should have taken a picture of it because it was like nothing I had ever seen before and it's really just too hard to describe. My main focus became trying to stay dry, which became impossible. Twice, I woke up in the middle of the night with several inch of water in my tent. I had broken out my Mountain Hardware 4 season tent and although it had never once failed me, in the almost 20 years that I've owned it now, it did eventually succumb to the rain. I guess that's why it's called a tent and not a boat. Pretty much everything that I had, eventually became soaked and my last two nights were spent wearing all of my wet Primaloft and merino gear and trying to stay on my pad to keep out of the water. I think that I can say, without question, that those two days/nights were the most miserable 48 hours of my life. To make matters a little worse, the temps had dropped, and so the rain had become mixed with snow off and on. Oh, and the wind, did I talk about the wind? Well the wind blew, to beat the f***ing band, for the entire last 5 days. When Taj was finally able to get back out to pick me up, he told me that Kodiak had received almost 6" of rain in one day setting a record. Here are a few more miscellaneous pictures from the hunt.

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[Slim Jim]

Congrats! Tough as nails brother

 

[rodney482]

Thank you for sharing!!

 

[Shrek]

Congratulations ! Nice goat ! Getting soaked like that had to be miserable. I hope the cooler temps helped and you didn't lose any of the meat or hide in all that water.

 

[Summitmike]

Nice work! Intense!

 

[Mjm316]

Great story again Greg! When you get a min can you do a run down on your gear and how it performed in the weather you were in. Thanks

 

[littlebrotherC]

Thanks for taking the time to write this up. Good work.

 

[tonarcher]

What an epic adventure!
Much respect for anyone that can do these types of hunts.


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[kodiakfly]

Pretty epic conditions. What dates did you span? The third and into the fourth day of my hunt was multiple inches and 40+ mph. Wondering if we weathered the same storm. I had running water through my camp as well, but I didn't have my goat yet so I was not feeling much motivation at that point.

 

[AK Troutbum]

Pretty epic conditions. What dates did you span? The third and into the fourth day of my hunt was multiple inches and 40+ mph. Wondering if we weathered the same storm. I had running water through my camp as well, but I didn't have my goat yet so I was not feeling much motivation at that point.

I flew in on the 4th and out on the 13th.


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[kodiakfly]

Ah different storms, mine was late September. I read this whole thread, but maybe missed it...what did he measure? Awesome goat and awesome effort. You earned it!

 

[Daniel_M]

Greg were you using the Kuiu Chugach or Yukon?


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[AK Troutbum]

Ah different storms, mine was late September. I read this whole thread, but maybe missed it...what did he measure? Awesome goat and awesome effort. You earned it!

Thanks. Just over 9" with 5 1/2" bases and 4 1/2 years old.


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