Bonding

I guess just about every guy who has a little girl ends up taking one of those father-daughter trips when they reach their early teens. It's great time to bond before she gets a little older and get too cool to hang with her daddy. My bet is that most of those trips are to the beach, maybe an art gallery, symphony or heaven forbid and extended shopping trip to the Mall of America in Minnesota! Oh yeah, my buddy had to do that and it darn near broke him.

But no, my 14 year old baby girl made me proud when she announced that she would like to go out west on an antelope hunt.... I could handle that. Man, was I glad she didn't want to hunt kudu in Africa!

Our little get away took place last week in Montana with my good friend Jammin Krebs of Western Timberline Outfitters.  To say the least, he and his number one guide, Kyle, treated her like gold. Even though it was a rifle hunt, it was extremely challenging as the terrain was very open and the antelope were herding up in fairly large groups with lots of eyes to catch every movement.

She took her buck late in the second day of the hunt at 243 yards in a 30 mile per hour crosswind. That's a very tough shot even for an experienced hunter but she made a perfect shot on a beautiful mature antelope. I don't know what made me happier, the fact that she made a great shot or the fact that I didn't have to go to Macy's to see her smile!

New World Record?

When you travel to hunt and fish as much as I do, you learn to prepare for each trip the best you can, then take whatever comes in stride, good or bad! As most of you know, I have a tremendous passion for bow hunting, and over the past several years hosting various hunting shows on Outdoor Channel has provided me the opportunity to travel and hunt in places I could have only dreamed of growing up.

Last week I traveled to Newfoundland to hunt Woodland Caribou with River Run Outfitting for Scent Lok's High Places. I had been there this time last year and had lots if opportunities, but couldn't close the deal. I honestly left there very disappointed in myself. That being said, I traveled there this year with cautious optimism trying not to get my hopes too high. My realistic goal with to take a good representative Woodland (the smallest antlered of all caribou species), get a good TV show and move one step closer to taking all 29 North American big game species with a bow.

On the first day of the hunt I got very close to a nice bull but high winds kept me from taking the shot. We quickly located more caribou in the distance. In this group was the largest Woodland Caribou any of us had ever seen! We closed the gap to within 100 yards. Then to 50 where I took the shot, which did the job. I couldn't contain myself (you'll see in the show) when I finally put my hands on what unofficially will be...the new archery world record eclipsing the old record set back in 1966 by 20 inches!

Record or not he is an amazing creature and I was truly blessed to to have this opportunity. When I was growing up reading Outdoor Life and Sports Afield, I could only dream of incredible hunting adventures and world record animals, and now unbelievably, I may have lived the dream!

Packing him out

Perfect Shot

The past couple of days of whitetail hunting in Ohio have been amazing! Three days ago on our property near our home, my daughter Reanna took a beautiful eight point buck with her crossbow. It was so exciting for me to be right there and watch her make a perfect shot on her biggest deer ever!

As if that wasn't enough, I then headed out to Adams County to hunt with my friend Pat DeCastro of Kerry Automotive Group. He ran the camera for me as I took a big mature eight point. We estimated the buck to be around 5 1/2 years old! It will be hard to top this week, but I'm sure gonna try. I'm off to Newfoundland tomorrow to chase woodland caribou for another Scent Loks High Places episode.

Moose!

Wow, I know fishing tournaments and producing fishing shows earlier in the year kept me hopping, but at least in most of the places I fish I have some type of communication with the outside world. Yeah, I know.... still no excuse for not blogging regularly. But in my defense, in these past several weeks I have hunted some pretty remote spots!

 

Two weeks ago, my camera man, Gerry, and I were packed into a remote tent camp in New Mexico where we chased bugling bull elk unsuccessfully for seven long days. We averaged over ten miles of hiking per day with the last day being over 17 miles on our GPS.

 

Last week, I had an incredible hunt for Scent Loks High Places in Utah with Ryan Foutz and Kurt Wood of Bighorn Basin Outfitters. We were bow hunting for Shiras Moose. Shiras are the smallest of all the moose species and only have huntable populations in Wyoming, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, and Utah. It is a "once in a lifetime tag" in Utah, so I really felt fortunate just to get to hunt them. 

I was very surprised at the high-desert terrain in which the Shiras live. At over 8,000 feet it was a drastic contrast to other Moose hunts I have been on. The moose were in full rut and on day two, we called in two rut crazed bulls to within 40 yards! The cover was so thick it was difficult to get good video or a clear shot, until they got within 20 yards. My heart was pounding out of my chest as those bulls pushed each other around and raked the brush, grunting the whole time. I finally got a clear shot at the biggest of the two and made it count!

 

I feel extremely fortunate to have now taken the Canada, Alaska-Yukon and Shiras Moose with my bow. For me it was a major hunting goal fulfilled and a trip I'll never forget. 

Alaska-Yukon Moose "2009"

Canada Moose "2008"