sodakadventure.com Blog

So it’s Friday Morning before opening day, I have a big day planned, there is a cattle sale in Faith, and I’m in need of some more big black angus mommas, so I go out to make my daily circle, and just South of my home, right along the highway there has been a large herd of does hanging around. I decided to go see if any Bucks had moved in yet. Sure enough there is a big one, he is way out passed his ears and has a thick neck and huge shoulders, this is a wallhanger, at least for this part of the country. I know deer season opens in the morning and I know people are driving up and down the highway scouting. There is no way he’s going to make it until Saturday, to many people with Buck Fever, that have no regards for property boundaries. However I have things to do, so I high tail it to Faith for the sale.

When the sale is over I hurry back to the ranch, I have a busy morning planned and we are holding off on Deer Camp until the following weekend. I go to see if I can find the buck, he is nowhere to be seen, I’m sure someone took a shot at him, and ran the herd off, but that’s hunting.

The next morning, I have to turn out the cows I bought, as soon as the trucks get there, I’m suppose to help my neighbors ship calves, and my wife went on a shopping spree in Rapid so I have all 3 boys to take care of. I wake up at 4am, about 2.5 hours before sunup. I’m trying to figure out where that buck could have gone, I’ve already talked my mother into watching the 2 younger boys, I tell her, “I’ll have them there at sunup” believe me I wasn’t a second late on that promise. The little ones are taken care of, I call the trucker he says he is about 45 minutes out. I tell my oldest, “lets go look for that buck”. Sure enough, he was headed right back for his spot by the highway, I’m a little torn because my buddies are coming for Deer Camp and I hate to shoot my deer without them, but this idiot is not going to live another week so I pull out my rifle and step out of the truck, telling JJ to stay and when I call him bring the pickup. Everything worked perfect, dropped him with one shot, took some pictures and had him gutted and loaded before the trucks arrived with my cows.

Look out Jim Shockey

I went to the neighbors and helped them get trucks loaded, then stopped and talked to some buddies, and show off a little. Then hung the deer, fed some cows, got the kids, and finally skinned and deboned the deer, due to the heat. He is 100% on ice now. Not exactly how I would have wrote the story from scratch but this is how it happened, heck I didn’t even cammo up and I have a lot of money spent on cammo. This will give me more time to run the video during Deer Camp next week. Stay tuned for round 2 of our Video Adventures.

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So here we are 2009, time for the annual Antelope Hunt, decided to try and do some filming since my wife got a Sony Handycam for her birthday last May. I got an old tripod out of the closet and on October 3rd, 2009 I was going to become just like Jim Shockey, with my friends as the hunters and me as the Guide/Producer/Cameraman. Let me just say this, easier in theory than in reality. We had a great hunt, got a doe 3 nice bucks, all 3 were herd bucks of some kind and had some age to them, none were over 16″, but they were all trophies in our minds.

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The top buck was the first one we got down, he had a nice black face, great horns that came forward instead of straight up. The ivory tips were nice too, Courtney made a great shot and dropped him in one.

The 2nd buck was taken on Sunday Morning, we got 2 bucks out of this large group of antelope we had watched and filmed them the day before but they were just over the fence out of our hunting ground, I was sure they would be back in the morning so we came and it was productive. Check out the broken tips on him.

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I've been watching this buck for almost a month, he looked old, walked with a limp, and definately had one horn that looked shorter than the other. He won't score high on the B&C, but he also wouldn't have made it through the winter, so I'm happy I took him, check out the ivory, and the one horn that is really curled back, giving you the illusion that it is shorter. Made a stalk on him on Sunday morning got to within 200yds and took the front shoulder out in one shot, gave him one more to make sure he was down, seconds later Chief let the hammer down on his, we approached from different angles so we would have the escape covered and it worked perfectly.

Ok back to the filming; we failed to get a kill shot on film, we tried and tried but we had such a hard time getting close that getting them shot was about all we could accomplish, however we made our first “SoDakAdventure.com” Production, and as we get better, we will buy better equipment and shoot better video. Don’t be a critic, just enjoy!!

Click on This Link for Video: 2009 Goats, SoDakAdventure.com Productions

Today I was in the grocery store, and ran into a couple of friends, they were talking about finding the “Big One”, with antelope rifle season just over 1 week away, it was easy to understand what they were talking about. I love hunting, and a few years ago I too was obsessed with the “Big One”, but it’s lonely, and somewhat unsuccessful. I spent hours, no days, by myself. I would sit on hilltops with nothing but binoculars and my dog. I would spend countless sunsets with my back to the beauty looking for the glimmer of a huge rack on the shadow side. After 2 years of this selfishness I realized hunting is about more than a tropy, it’s about sharing. What is a huge buck without someone to share the experience with. It’s like the single guy who buys his 5 bedroom dream home, with no wife or kids to fill the rooms. Wouldn’t he be just as happy an apartment? I would love to shoot more trophies, I would love to hold records, but what fun will it be if I don’t share it with my friends? A few of my buddies are coming to hunt antelope next week, and I can’t wait. I’ve found a couple bucks that might be trophys, but I won’t mind if one of these guys get them, as long as they let me tag along. And for you guys out there searching for the “Big One” don’t forget to send your pictures to stories@sodakadventure.com

I know it’s a busy time of year, it is the 10th of September and we only have one entry in the Coyote Contest. Not our usual success rate here at SoDakAdventure, so to get this thing off the ground we are working on Donated Prizes. You catch a kill on video and we will judge it, email your video to stories@sodakadventure.com we will post your video free of charge. One stand per video please, you can enter as many stands as you like. No videos will be posted until November 1st.

Here is how they will be judged.
1 coyote on film = 10pts
Kill shot on film = 10pts
Shooter & Coyote
in same frame = 25pts
Call sound in background
with at least 1 of the above= 5pts
More than one Coyote = same points re-added, points double depending on situation

So take your time and get some good stuff, no entries will be taken after 12am on November 1st.