Brian and I headed up to Saratoga, Wyoming for a 3-day Antelope hunt. On the drive up we started to see antelope now and then but mostly on private land. The weather was a bit grim for a desert environment: 45° and raining steadily with a forecast of more rain for the next day.
Brian found a very cool hideout campsite and we also practiced shooting at various distances with his rifle since we had skipped the planned trip to a rifle range.
While we practiced the weather kept on getting worse and worse, there was lightning in the distance. Clouds and rain were closing in from the mountains to the west and suddenly there was a vicious crosswind of 35 to 40 mph that was driving the rain at us while we were trying to practice shooting.
It rained off and on through the night and in the morning it was 40° and drizzling. We gritted our teeth over the conditions and went out looking for Brian's very first antelope. As we turned onto the forest service road, there was a lone doe antelope at the rim of the hill staring right at us from 400 yards away. Maybe a good omen?
Desert roads rarely see nuch rain and it's still rarer for them to have a lot of rain like we were getting. The dirt turns mushy and super slick but Brian's SUV was up to the task.
We drove around in the areas that I had scouted weighing our options as to where the goats might be. We started to see groups of three, five and even 15 but always it seemed on private land or impossibly far away. One Buck was on the rim of a hill near private land and was locked in on us from 800 yards away. The desert sage bushes being a foot tall offered practically no cover for us to stalk.
We were getting pretty discouraged when we came around the corner of a pretty flat open area. There were two different groups of antelope, one at 400 yards away and another at 600 yards away ...on public land.
Brian got out his rifle, loaded it and began to skulk down a gully to try and get closer to the goats while I looked on with binoculars. The group of four was watching him intently and looked like they were ready to skedaddle at any moment.
Brian lay down for a prone shot, amazingly completely concealed beneath the sage. After less than a minute, the goats went from extremely wary to complacent and they went back to feeding. Brian was preparing his shot.
Bam. Shot fired but only three goats raced away. Neither of us was really sure whether he'd hit the fourth.
We found the doe and Brian said words of thanks for it passing on it's life giving bounty. We processed the doe using the "gutless" quartering method even though neither of us had actually done it before. We packed up our campers and headed back to Brian's house - a day earlier than planned. An amazing adventure that I was lucky and proud to witness. Brian is one happy hunter. 😎
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