Well, I'm sorry to report that my coues deer record remains intact with coues 3 - Vince 0. 
I glassed up a lot of deer, scouted out a prime location, and even managed to play guide for a friend, a very good friend, and put him on deer on opening day. I've never taken a deer and started hunting deer seriously three years ago. Only hunted them twice before. One of those times was a coues hunt but as I now refer to it, I went hiking with guns, and had no clue what I was doing.
Anyway, to make a short story longer as my lawyer friend would say, Wade couldn't get a shot at a forkie, then missed a nice 100" estimated coues at 100 Yards, but it was a running shot, and finally got a nice 7 pointer on opening day. Day two was a bust for me. Nothing but does and fawns. Day three was looking bleak until about mid-day when we spotted another 100" coues but I was unable to get a shot. So back to camp and off to bed we went.
During the night the wind really picked up. This of course caused the elusive coues to hunker down. Glassed up a spike, legal here, with some does but passed on it. I still had that 100" coues on my brain and was glassing for him until just after mid-day. With the winds picking up we went to a high hilltop, one of the few locations where we could get cell service in that unit, and I called my wife for a weather report. She gave me the bad news, the weather/wind was predicted to increase the next day, which was the last day of our hunt.
So, given the bleak conditions, tiredness of both parties involved, and sheer frustration we packed camp and headed back to town. I am happy to report that the previous two seasons have taught me a lot, along with some help from a couple of friends. Wade got to go first on coues, this being his first coues hunt, because he's the guy that helped me on my WY antelope hunt. I got to go first there, filled two doe tags inside one minute, so it was his turn to go first. He told me hunting coues deer is probably the toughest deer hunting he's ever done. Sometimes I wish I was in Texas, where I could just turn on the corn feeder, but then that wouldn't be hunting in my mind.
I'm also happy to report that my exercising paid off tenfold. No knee pains or infirmities to report. Now I need to start planning next year's, 2014, coues hunt, a possible backcountry hike in late season elk hunt for 2014, and definitely a moose hunt for 2015.
Vince
I glassed up a lot of deer, scouted out a prime location, and even managed to play guide for a friend, a very good friend, and put him on deer on opening day. I've never taken a deer and started hunting deer seriously three years ago. Only hunted them twice before. One of those times was a coues hunt but as I now refer to it, I went hiking with guns, and had no clue what I was doing.
Anyway, to make a short story longer as my lawyer friend would say, Wade couldn't get a shot at a forkie, then missed a nice 100" estimated coues at 100 Yards, but it was a running shot, and finally got a nice 7 pointer on opening day. Day two was a bust for me. Nothing but does and fawns. Day three was looking bleak until about mid-day when we spotted another 100" coues but I was unable to get a shot. So back to camp and off to bed we went.
During the night the wind really picked up. This of course caused the elusive coues to hunker down. Glassed up a spike, legal here, with some does but passed on it. I still had that 100" coues on my brain and was glassing for him until just after mid-day. With the winds picking up we went to a high hilltop, one of the few locations where we could get cell service in that unit, and I called my wife for a weather report. She gave me the bad news, the weather/wind was predicted to increase the next day, which was the last day of our hunt.
So, given the bleak conditions, tiredness of both parties involved, and sheer frustration we packed camp and headed back to town. I am happy to report that the previous two seasons have taught me a lot, along with some help from a couple of friends. Wade got to go first on coues, this being his first coues hunt, because he's the guy that helped me on my WY antelope hunt. I got to go first there, filled two doe tags inside one minute, so it was his turn to go first. He told me hunting coues deer is probably the toughest deer hunting he's ever done. Sometimes I wish I was in Texas, where I could just turn on the corn feeder, but then that wouldn't be hunting in my mind.
I'm also happy to report that my exercising paid off tenfold. No knee pains or infirmities to report. Now I need to start planning next year's, 2014, coues hunt, a possible backcountry hike in late season elk hunt for 2014, and definitely a moose hunt for 2015.
Vince
