Well, it finally happened on the 4th day of a 3 day Antelope hunt. The weekend started off with rain, rain, and more rain and if you are hunting goats over water from a blind, that’s about the worst weather you can have.
Instead of crawling in a blind on the first morning we elected to try to do some spot and stalking with a decoy. It’s early as far as the antelope rut but they are such a curious animal we though we’d give it a try. Right off the bat we spotted a nice goat with about 5 doe’s with him bedded on a hills side. Off we go, got to about 125 yards and I popped up the decoy, he took one look at it and started making his way towards us. This is my first antelope hunt and I’m thinking, no way is this happening. The goat slowly cuts the distance in half. I had ranged a bush in the area I thought he’d end up(30 yards) and then put my range finder down. This prooved to be a rookie mistake. He got as close as he was going to get, which was beyond the 30 yards I had ranged. It was on the crest of a hill and I’m thinking he’s got to be at least 20 yards beyond my marker. He finally gets broadside and I pull my bow back from behind the decoy and settle in for 50 yards and let it fly. Well, he must’ve only been 40 as my arrow sailed right over his back and my first stalk was over.
After that we spent some time in the blind and tried a couple more stalks to no avail. It had rained so much that the goats had many options for water and our blind locations weren’t getting hit regularly until the weather finally broke on Monday. Finally sunshine and mid 70’s and the goats started to come back to the main water source. A few small bucks but no shooters. Now I have to make a call to work and tell them I’m staying an extra day.
Got that all squared away and back into the blind Tuesday. Pretty slow start to the morning until about 9:30 when a doe comes in to water. She feeds around the blind for a while and then lays down about 100 yards away. Love the live decoys. About 10:20 the doe stands up and is starring at the hillside behind us and my camera man spots 2 bucks making there way down the hill to the water. He says to me one’s a shooter. So the small buck comes to the water first broadside at 30 yards and starts to drink and wouldn’t you know it, the shooter waters directly behind him. I’m thinking to my self, go figure, finally get a good one in and I’m still not going to get a shot. I got the bow ready to draw incase the little one finishes first and backs away. Sure enough, that’s what he did and I drew back and let it fly. The arrow found its mark and the goat ran about 60 yards and dumped. So we start filming cut aways in the blind and again, wouldn’t you know it, here comes the herd of 17 bucks that I’d been hunting all week heading to water. Just my luck. But I am very happy I finally closed the deal on a really cool buck.
Bud, Big congrats again 
Did you have to put his inards back inside the cavity for pictures? 
