This isn't a big antler story (cow tag) but here is the herd I started after at 10:30am from 1 mile+ away. (At the time I was disgusted with myself for getting busted by a lone cow at 75yds at 8:30am just by being careless.) This group had one herd bull, a couple of smaller bulls and 40 some cows. A spike was run off early. A sneaky 4x4 hidden in the rocks spotted me at about 3:00pm at 80 yards while I crawled thru an open sage field but fortunately the herd bull ran him off before he could sound the alarm.
Keeping wind, trees and rocks in my favor I very slowly closed the distance as they periodically fed and bedded on the edges of semi-open terrain. I actually ate lunch and sat around for an hour behind a single tree while they bedded in a meadow I could not approach.
6 hours later at 500 yards. They eventually bedded in the right side of the photo and I ran around to the left to close distance while staying in a draw and out of sight. I know my rifle limitations and I was wanting a shot of 200 yds or less. I ended up shooting across the meadow in the photo.
She was the second cow to stand up. The first stood right in front of the herd bull.
158 yards. As I shot the herd exploded in a cloud of dust but hung around just over the hill for over an hour as the cows called and the bull bugled.
I didn't find her immediately and thought "did I miss?". I had to go back to my shooting spot, range the shot again and then found her in the sage. My orienting tree was about 80 yards behind where she dropped and I was looking in the wrong spot. She took one step and died. I got her skinned, quartered and everything off the mountain a little before midnight.
Another group I saw the following day while helping a buddy.
