106 Wyoming antelope hunt 2022

Mojave

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I’m gonna start the story off by saying that I’m sitting in bed with Covid thanks to my parents my wife is about to divorce me over it and I burn nine points for a tag I want to find a massive desert situation with no water and a huge drought I did get that out with my father and my uncle and that was really interesting considering they’re 84 and 70 something and it was 15 miles from my hometown so that was really cool since I haven’t been back there in a long time I’m auto dictating this to my phone because I’m not allowed out of my room so I don’t infect the rest of the house so it’s kind of a run on sentence but I’ll fix it later

My father and I who lives in Cheyenne drove to the unit the day before the opener. I am a disabled vet and Wyoming has a weird regulation weird and wonderful I should say. We’re 100% disabled vets are allowed to hunt five days prior to the season for elk deer antelope. So I took advantage of that. For my fellow 100% disabled but you have to have it document from the state that allows you to do it and I think it’s best to call and verify the date you have in your head is the date you can hunt. So I called the state game and fish last week prior to the opener and insured
everything was on the up and up.

We drove to the unit through Casper and muddy gap. The entire drive from Cheyenne to Casper I noticed that there wasn’t a lot of water and there wasn’t a lot of feed on the range. When we got to Muddy Gap it got hell of a lot worse. The unit starts at jeffery city and runs to beaver rim. On our first day of scouting we saw two bucks In the unit and one buck in town For a total of 10 to 15 antelope others were seen that were outside the unit but no trophies. With nine years invested in points I was looking for a 14 inch book with heavy mass and five or 6 inch cutters. I knew I was in a lot of trouble when we didn’t see anything even close to that. A lot of people don’t know this antelope are actually trophies in their second third or fourth year. It is a survival trait that insures Buck can breed Even with humongous droughts and Winter die off. Five and six year old bucks in The Northern Rockies are generally going downhill.

Anyway back to the hunting I shot my buck on the first day the first morning. Was skinned out and in an ice chest by 10:00. He was the only buck of any size we saw that morning. We only saw 20 antelope and we drove 38 miles in thr unit. My father had Covid and didn’t tell me. So he was in a hurry to get home early. So his 84 year old ass could get to bed.

Honestly i have two things to say sbout the hunt. First I’m glad I went because it gave me an opportunity to hunt with my father. My mother has dementia and she can’t be left alone and we really figured that out on this trip. Second even though the majority of the nine years were the porch points I was stationed overseas with the military or had other military duties going on do you not wait nine years for your stupid antelope hunt it isn’t worth it no Antelope is. Near the NRA ranch in Raton I saw an honest to goodness 90 inch antelope standing next to the fence even that buck isn’t worth nine years.
 
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Mojave

Mojave

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Here he is maybe 12 inches.
 

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Mojave

Mojave

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His skull is mascerating in a bucket outside. When i get it clean I’ll post another picture
 

wyosteve

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Glad to hear you got out. I drove from Cheyenne to Montana and back 6 times this year and have to say from Douglas to the Wyo. border I've never seen fewer antelope. A tough year out there for sure.
 
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Mojave

Mojave

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We had a family vacation and cousin came along. Cousin’s wife gave us all covid. Can relate a little, but did not wait 9 yrs to go. Can’t imagine the frustration.
There was deception with father because he wanted to hunt with me. Even though he knew he was sick and I told him if he was sick that I wasn’t coming and then I asked him if he was sick and he told me no. Which causes a lot of the problems that I’m having with my wife. Who now doesn’t trust me because she has been treated so poorly by my parents it’s just a lot of bullshit in the pot.

But really you can’t really do anything about a drought.
 
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Mojave

Mojave

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This is the number one reason these points programs need to go away it creates too much drama on a single tag.
 

Rich M

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This is the number one reason these points programs need to go away it creates too much drama on a single tag.
We had same thing w cousin’s wife not telling anyone she was sick.

Tell yer wife you are sorry and will be more careful w your folks in the future, consult wife during some dealings and she’ll feel more involved/important. Tough balance there.

The drought is horrible, hurting the critters and the ability to hunt.

A 0-2 point tag is like going to Walmart on a Saturday tho. I did it once and started collecting points. Then they started the 90/10 talk so my group got set up with a guide. We are at 4 pts.

Should be a fun trip. I just want to shoot one, sip whiskey around a campfire at night, and do a little trout fishing while we are there.
 
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Mojave

Mojave

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We had same thing w cousin’s wife not telling anyone she was sick.

Tell yer wife you are sorry and will be more careful w your folks in the future, consult wife during some dealings and she’ll feel more involved/important. Tough balance there.

The drought is horrible, hurting the critters and the ability to hunt.

A 0-2 point tag is like going to Walmart on a Saturday tho. I did it once and started collecting points. Then they started the 90/10 talk so my group got set up with a guide. We are at 4 pts.

Should be a fun trip. I just want to shoot one, sip whiskey around a campfire at night, and do a little trout fishing while we are there.
Have a great hunt.
 
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