Favorite mounts

[Bobbyboe]

What is your favorite or best mount in your collection? This is my favorite, a New Mexico buck I got several years ago. The taxidermist did a great job. The shed was found while packing this buck out. I made the cedar pedestal the mount is on.

 

[roosiebull]

This archery blacktail is my favorite mount… not sure if it’s my biggest, but it’s my favorite, and the hunt leading up to it was unreal too, coolest blacktail hunt I’ve had, and it was a buck I found the year before, but after I had killed a buck, and how it all came together will probably never be equaled. Couldn’t picture a cooler coast buck

 

[LoggerDan]

The only animal I have ever had taxied. An 8 year old black tail. Really wanted to mount this Miley.

 

[Bobbyboe]

The only animal I have ever had taxied. An 8 year old black tail.View attachment 523687View attachment 523688 Really wanted to mount this Miley.View attachment 523694

The torn up ear on that mount is pretty neat.

 

[LoggerDan]

@Bobbyboe

yes, I really liked the torn ear. This guy was a scrapper for sure. I shot him on opening day. We saw each other, but I guess he didn’t fully recognize me as a human and I guess he assumed I was another buck. He bristled up, then stiffened up and did the whole stiff legged slow half circle towards me. He laid his ears back and was mad dogging me like a mean ass dog. He had eight does with him, way before the rut. He was really something. I can’t help but wonder what he looked like three years before. He was definitely on the decline and his teeth were very worn. He was sway backed and had a big pot belly gut. I told the taxi to oust him the way he was seconds before I shot him, ears laid back. Besides the ripped ear, he was completely scarred up, from his rump, sides, neck and face.

 

[bigmoose]

This guy is my favorite out of my collection. We were hunting the Madison Range in Montana in 1976. I had spotted this buck the day before in an avalanche chute on the south side of the mountain right at tree line. The next day I climbed the west side of mountain in the dark. I was at the tree line at daylight. I had just started to traverse the mountain when I spotted him walking 400 yards below me. It took a couple shots to bring him down. When I walked up to him I was just blown away by the size of him. I had no idea mule deer could get that big ! I had thought he was just a 22 inch 4X4. His rack came out to his ears but instead of 22 " ears, his were 26 ".

I field dressed him and pulled him under the shade of a tree and then hiked back to camp for the horses. We packed him out like an elk, 4 quarters and the neck on two horses. Back at camp we weighed all the pieces (except the lower legs) and came up with 306 lbs. !

This was a turning point for me. Up to this point, I had taken 15-16 bucks hunting 2 states a year with my family. From then on I started getting picky and just hunting mature bucks. I was hooked on big mule deer.

The taxidermist used his biggest form on the buck and even then had to buid it up to fit the cape. He mounted several more for me that had bigger antlers but every time I went to his shop he would bring up that big Montana buck saying it was the biggest bodied buck he had ever mounted. To this day, I've never taken one that was bigger or as big.

 

[seacow]

Foster's Bighorn Rio Vista, CA