sickles107
WKR
I moved to Montana in January of 2019 in search of bugling bulls and unlimited sheep tags, though I later found out about another challenge that would consume my thoughts and motivate my archery prep all year long. Spot and stalk archery Antelope. In the summer of 2019, in the three weekend window between archery antelope opener and archery elk opener, I chalked up somewhere around three dozen unsuccessful stalks within 100 yards of the skidish speed goat. This summer I went into the season full of motivation and confidence, and on my second weekend, 17th stalk of the year, I was able to get it done. The below are some lessons I learned after watching many early season highly pressured antelope butts run away from me.
1. Park your truck, and walk far into the middle of nowhere
In Montana, if you want to see antelope, driving around is a great tactic. If you want to put an arrow in one, not so much. The antelope you see from the road are the same antelope every other guy sees from the road. They have been stalked 12 times by idiots that park their truck on the side of a gravel road and then use it for cover, and after opening weekend, any antelope within easy glassing distance from the road is 10x more spooky and switched on than an antelope that is a mile or three behind some terrain. Once I stopped hunting and glassing directly from my truck, my success of getting within range went up exponentially. Get far away from roads and people, find a glassing knob, and be patient. Just as much as they seem to disappear into thin air, they also appear out of thin air as if they climbed out of a hidden bunker. There are folds in terrain that you can’t see, that make the landscape look flat for 50 miles, though it is not. Topo and water on the edges of barren flats are your friend. Once you glass up an antelope from away from the road, start planning your stalk.
2. Learn to enjoy cactus thorns in your knees and elbows
Once you actually find an antelope, you then have to determine if it is “stalkable”. This means in the trip between your glassing spot, and getting to that animal, it cannot detect you, not even once, not even a glimpse (more on this later). use any and all terrain, Big rolling hills are great, tall sage or bushes are even better. Identify dead space that you are free to move in and go slow. Now my definition of “stalkable” and “deadspace” changed greatly once I learned how to get low. I mean really low. This year on a failed stalk I used a bush and some hills to get within 400 yards, then I used a 12” high rolling knob, and a 12” high sage bush as cover to belly crawl about 400 yards, to get within 50 yards of a pair of bucks that sat in the middle of “flat” “unstalkable” terrain. You would be amazed how well you can hide behind the slightest terrain feature if you just get low and put your elbows and knees in the cactus (packing knee pads and tweezers is optional).
3. They have good eye sight, but seriously like really good eyesight, sometimes.
So you have a bedded buck, good terrain, and your on the move, cussing that guy on rokslide as you puncture your elbows with cactus while you crawl 800 yards into a flat using a twig as cover, and actually praying that cow shit patties are around to use them for elbow relief. This is where details are important. Belly crawling is hard, and if you put your butt too far in the air, that glimpse of movement is enough to spook a buck enough to at least start looking your way, As is the sun flash from glass like binos or a range finder. Im also convinced that the damn animals can see through bushes of a certain thickness. Limit glass, limit movement, stay low. While you may think you got away with it, he knows something is up, they have eyes in the back of their heads, you only get one chance to mess up, and you need to use that chance to range!
4. Actually getting to draw your bow is possible!
I run a single pin, so my shot process goes something like this; get within range, peak up, range, get back down, adjust sight, draw (often parallel to the ground), anchor, peak back up, and shoot (if it gets that far). Im not Levi Morgan, I don’t like guessing yardage at distances past 40. I need to range. The reason it is so important to not be detected in your stalk is that 8 times out of 10 you are often detected when you range. If the antelope is already weary and looking your way when you come up to range, its almost always game over, and if not, when you come up to shoot he is so switched on by detecting you a third time, he is gone. I have had much better success ranging, and then ducking back down and drawing behind cover, than trying to draw quickly while in sight.
5. Be confident in your shot
I define my personal range limit to 80 yds based on my practice and confidence, last year I set my personal limit to 60. whatever it is, define a max range for yourself and stay true to it. It is easy to shoot tight groups on a calm range, but try doing 20 pushups and then shooting that tight group again at 80 while kneeling. After belly crawling a couple hundred yards and coming to full draw on an animal you are not supposed to be that close to, while kneeling on a cactus, you are not exactly calm. The last piece to this worth noting is the ethics of launching an arrow at a weary animal at long range. Antelope don’t jump strings, they straight up step out of the path of the arrow if they really want to. You have to keep in mind how long your arrow is going to be in the air and how switched on the animal actually is. I don’t like to rely on luck much, but there is a grey area you have to define between ethics, luck, and skill when playing this game.
6. A game of odds
I will usually keep track of failed stalks within ~100 yards. If i kept track of every single stalk, weather it be blown at 400 or the animal is just truly not stalkable once you get to 200, it would be in the hundreds. you are going to blow a ton of stalks, and you are also going to get so close you can almost taste it. Keep your head up and treat every stalk like it is the first one of the season. somewhere on this forum i once read the best peice of gear you can pack is a good attitude.
These are some things I wish I knew going into this seemingly impossible hunt, and hope someone can put them to use. I have found countless pieces of valuable information on this forum and thought it was about time I share.
1. Park your truck, and walk far into the middle of nowhere
In Montana, if you want to see antelope, driving around is a great tactic. If you want to put an arrow in one, not so much. The antelope you see from the road are the same antelope every other guy sees from the road. They have been stalked 12 times by idiots that park their truck on the side of a gravel road and then use it for cover, and after opening weekend, any antelope within easy glassing distance from the road is 10x more spooky and switched on than an antelope that is a mile or three behind some terrain. Once I stopped hunting and glassing directly from my truck, my success of getting within range went up exponentially. Get far away from roads and people, find a glassing knob, and be patient. Just as much as they seem to disappear into thin air, they also appear out of thin air as if they climbed out of a hidden bunker. There are folds in terrain that you can’t see, that make the landscape look flat for 50 miles, though it is not. Topo and water on the edges of barren flats are your friend. Once you glass up an antelope from away from the road, start planning your stalk.
2. Learn to enjoy cactus thorns in your knees and elbows
Once you actually find an antelope, you then have to determine if it is “stalkable”. This means in the trip between your glassing spot, and getting to that animal, it cannot detect you, not even once, not even a glimpse (more on this later). use any and all terrain, Big rolling hills are great, tall sage or bushes are even better. Identify dead space that you are free to move in and go slow. Now my definition of “stalkable” and “deadspace” changed greatly once I learned how to get low. I mean really low. This year on a failed stalk I used a bush and some hills to get within 400 yards, then I used a 12” high rolling knob, and a 12” high sage bush as cover to belly crawl about 400 yards, to get within 50 yards of a pair of bucks that sat in the middle of “flat” “unstalkable” terrain. You would be amazed how well you can hide behind the slightest terrain feature if you just get low and put your elbows and knees in the cactus (packing knee pads and tweezers is optional).
3. They have good eye sight, but seriously like really good eyesight, sometimes.
So you have a bedded buck, good terrain, and your on the move, cussing that guy on rokslide as you puncture your elbows with cactus while you crawl 800 yards into a flat using a twig as cover, and actually praying that cow shit patties are around to use them for elbow relief. This is where details are important. Belly crawling is hard, and if you put your butt too far in the air, that glimpse of movement is enough to spook a buck enough to at least start looking your way, As is the sun flash from glass like binos or a range finder. Im also convinced that the damn animals can see through bushes of a certain thickness. Limit glass, limit movement, stay low. While you may think you got away with it, he knows something is up, they have eyes in the back of their heads, you only get one chance to mess up, and you need to use that chance to range!
4. Actually getting to draw your bow is possible!
I run a single pin, so my shot process goes something like this; get within range, peak up, range, get back down, adjust sight, draw (often parallel to the ground), anchor, peak back up, and shoot (if it gets that far). Im not Levi Morgan, I don’t like guessing yardage at distances past 40. I need to range. The reason it is so important to not be detected in your stalk is that 8 times out of 10 you are often detected when you range. If the antelope is already weary and looking your way when you come up to range, its almost always game over, and if not, when you come up to shoot he is so switched on by detecting you a third time, he is gone. I have had much better success ranging, and then ducking back down and drawing behind cover, than trying to draw quickly while in sight.
5. Be confident in your shot
I define my personal range limit to 80 yds based on my practice and confidence, last year I set my personal limit to 60. whatever it is, define a max range for yourself and stay true to it. It is easy to shoot tight groups on a calm range, but try doing 20 pushups and then shooting that tight group again at 80 while kneeling. After belly crawling a couple hundred yards and coming to full draw on an animal you are not supposed to be that close to, while kneeling on a cactus, you are not exactly calm. The last piece to this worth noting is the ethics of launching an arrow at a weary animal at long range. Antelope don’t jump strings, they straight up step out of the path of the arrow if they really want to. You have to keep in mind how long your arrow is going to be in the air and how switched on the animal actually is. I don’t like to rely on luck much, but there is a grey area you have to define between ethics, luck, and skill when playing this game.
6. A game of odds
I will usually keep track of failed stalks within ~100 yards. If i kept track of every single stalk, weather it be blown at 400 or the animal is just truly not stalkable once you get to 200, it would be in the hundreds. you are going to blow a ton of stalks, and you are also going to get so close you can almost taste it. Keep your head up and treat every stalk like it is the first one of the season. somewhere on this forum i once read the best peice of gear you can pack is a good attitude.
These are some things I wish I knew going into this seemingly impossible hunt, and hope someone can put them to use. I have found countless pieces of valuable information on this forum and thought it was about time I share.
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. I think you are spot on with it being a game of odds, knee pads, and what you can actually get away with if you get low.
