In 2015, me and a few buddies hit the road for our first western hunt. Arizona was our destination, and Coues deer were our quarry. A massive ice storm delayed our arrival by 2 days, leaving us with only 3 days to hunt. I ended up missing a small buck at 43 yards on the last day after a 3 hour stalk. We all returned empty handed, but I vowed to return again. With a little window of time open, me and my friend Bubs (Brian if you want use his legal name) decided to try a Coues 2.0 trip. On January 2nd, we land in Phoenix at 7:30 am. A trip to Cabelas to get tags, and Wal Mart for some food, and we’re headed south in our rental car. As we drive further. The snow starts to appear, and by the time we reach the road to our determined campsite everything is covered white with a couple inches of snow. What the heck is this Arizona weather? We get the tipi set up, shoot our bows, go about getting some camp chores done, and gathering firewood. With the stove ripping in the tipi, we hit the sleeping pads for an early alarm the next day. After our coffee and oatmeal we’re loaded up and hiking up a ridge above camp. We make it to a small clearing where we can see a few ridges in the distance and get my binos and spotter out. Glassing on a tripod makes life so much easier, so we settle in behind our nockers and immediately start finding deer. We watch deer traverse the hillsides for a few hours and find a few really nice bucks, one of which would easily push 100+ inches and 2 others that are 80-90”. After stalking in 2015, I had a different plan for this trip. My main goal was to scout from a distance and get an idea on the deer movement and then move in and ambush hunt from the ground. After a few hours of watching bucks cruise and bump does around I had a plan. Me and Bubs drop down and I leave him in a spot where we saw a good buck chase a doe into. I continue lower in the creek bottom, and find a 40 yard stretch the forms a bench at the end of a small finger with plenty of tracks in the snow. I sit down and let out a few grunts. Within a minute the buck we moved in after is headed my way. I get ready and range him as he enters a clearing. 44 yards. I draw and chaos ensues. With all the cold weather and snow, my rest has frozen and is not coming up. In total, I frantically try to get the rest to function and end up drawing on the buck 4 times before he finally gets to 17 yards and catches my wind. A beautiful 8 pointer (or 3x3 with eye guards for you western folk). His dark rack and long browtines will be burned in my memory for awhile. Bummed out but excited about the quick action I run up and grab Bubs and tell him we have a plan for the rest of our week. That afternoon we hike into a different drainage to do a real quick scout but find no tracks. We hurry back to where I called the buck in and get settled in about 50 yards apart from each other. If there is one thing we’re good at as Midwest deer hunters, it’s sitting still and waiting for deer to walk by so that’s our plan. I grunt after a few minutes and it isn’t long after that I hear Bubs “Meh” and his bow go off. In a flash, a buck runs by me with blood pouring out from his shoulder and I see him tip over. Day 1, 1/2 tags punched. Bubs is super excited as I round the corner to find him. He victory spikes his bow and we tackle each other. His first non Illinois whitetail harvest is down, and we go head it’s way. The next few days are more of the same. I sit the same spot on Day 2 and I pass a spike. Day 3 we go up higher and see 3 does close, and the 100ish buck and a spike on the next ridge over chasing a doe. As we walk back down that night, it’s apparent from tracks in the snow the deer are still moving through our original area. Day 4 we are greeted by rain and wake up late. It breaks a bit at 10:30 and we head out, but after 2 hours it picks back up we are going to back to the tipi to dry out. A little latter, I go out solo and pass a spike as the sun peeks out. Day 5 of 6 and we’re back in the killing spot at daylight. It’s pretty cold, and I do a practice draw on my bow and again, the rest is frozen. We fiddle with this for a good while and come up with a game plan that Bubs will lift the rest up manually after I draw and I give him my rangefinder to tell me the range should I need it. We try this out and I do a practice shot and it works fine. I’m pretty defeated though and not full of a lot of confidence in my equipment. Bubs tells me I’m killing a buck at 9:45 that morning. I tell him “Get out of here Notradamus”. At 9:42 a doe comes running down the hill, and it isn’t long we hear a buck grunting behind her. I see he has a fork in each side and I’m happy to shoot him. I draw and the buck enters a lane I believe to be a bit over 40 yards. I hear Bub whisper something and I think he’s telling me how far but I can’t hear him. He’s asking if my rest is up (which it is). The buck gets ready to walk through the opening and I stop it. We finally sync up on what we’re saying to each other and he tells me 41 yards. I touch my release and the arrow disappears behind the bucks shoulder. Bubs gets to his camera and gets a first reaction out of me as I can’t believe it all just happened. I look at my phone and it’s 9:46. The buck runs further than we thought it would, but we find it after a bit. I’m super excited to get my hands on my first Coues deer. We get back to camp and I start butchering my buck. Bubs gets a fire going and we eat deer backstrap tacos as we start cleaning up camp. It was a perfect ending to an absolute blast of a hunt. Not many people understand why we leave Illinois to come hunt such a small critter, but these things are a blast and live in some awesome country! I’ll be back again one year. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Dude, that's a great story and I'm happy for you- I know we've PMd a couple times back and forth, so you already know I really want to do this. What a cool hunt. Thanks for sharing. BTW, I've hunted MW whitetails for 30 years now and depending on the circumstances sometimes a little 5 point still gets me going. Up here. Well done.
Great hunt. Sorry about the rest. Kinda weird because it couldn’t be that freaking crazy cold down there ? But what could you do ? Warm breath maybe ? Bic lighter to warm it ? I’d take it off if it were me. Common sense says Illinois hunting is much colder and severe then Arizona. Curious what rest it is ? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
The rest was a Hamskea. It has been a great rest for me up until this point. The first day we had 6” of snow, drifts on the mountain were up to our knees in spots. Temps that night hovered around 10. Needless to say, the rest got wet on the hike up that morning. When it froze up on day 5, it was following me sitting in the rain the day prior. Temps again that night dropped well below freezing. I’m sure the conditions had something to do with it all......but yeah, I was less than pleased with how it performed this time. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
That's a great story AND hunt. Congrats on the buck! Blessings...........Pastorjim Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N900A using Tapatalk
Holy cow Scott, I know those critters aren't easy, but you showed them how it's done! I always wanted to chase Coues someday, sounds like a riot. Congrats to both of you!
Fred, it’s a super fun hunt. I’d be glad to help ya out with some planning if you ever head that way. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
