Hunting Wild Bison in Wyoming

[coloradohoov]

Wild bison hunts have been in the news alot lately, both from Montana's upcoming season and the opening of the Jackson Elk Refuge to bison hunting. The Wyoming developments in particular have gotten a lot of media attention, and I recently heard the WY hunt referred to as "shooting buffalo in a barrel."

As someone who has hunted bison in WY, I objected to that, and wanted to share my experience. It's kind of long, so I'm working on it in phases.

Here's the first installment:
http://www.huntthewest.com/updates/updates-2005bison.htm

[gotlost]

With # 55 on the bull list I should be seeing my notice next week, they have sent out 40 so far and #22 got his Tuesday of this week. this anit no high fence hunt. It's a lot of work.

[WYOWIRES]

Man, I went from a little over 100 last year to 635 this year. Maybe they are just getting all the lucky people out of the way so that those of us that never get anything will have a chance.
Hope you get a good one.
WYOWIRES

[wyote]

I drew a cow permit over there 6 years ago and it wasn't like shooting fish in a barrel. The year before it took an average of 11 days to kill a cow. Bulls were easier to find, and I believe they told us 3 days hunting was the average for bulls. We had to hunt on NF or private land.

From what I understand they are letting hunters hunt the elk refuge this year and thats what all the hoopla is about.

[coloradohoov]

The success rate on cows is only about 1 in 3.
They stay in the out-of-bounds areas.
Opening the Refuge to hunting is really good news to the cow hunters.

I posted Part 2 of my 2005 hunt:
http://www.huntthewest.com/updates/updates-2005bison2.htm

[coloradohoov]

Finished up Part 3:
http://www.huntthewest.com/updates/updates-2005bison3.htm

[drs1961]

Goodstory hoov. I'm keeping up with it as I'm heading out to Nebraska in a few weeks with a Buffalo on the menu. Supposedly I'll be after free ranging Bison on a very large ranch. The outfitter recommended the head shot also. I was wanting to take one of my classic 45/70s but I'm not confident enough with their iron sightsfor abrain shot. The part about thumb tacking the blimp makes perfect sense as thisranch has deep coolies on it and recovery could be greatly hindered if Tatonka made it to the bottom of one before expiring from a lung shot. I'm now considering my scoped 30-40 Krag as an option. Thanks for the enlightenment.

[npaden]

Excellent reading. I'm waiting for part #4!

[coloradohoov]

Thanks for the feedback and for bearing with me as I got it written up.
Here's the 4th and final part:

http://www.huntthewest.com/updates/updates-2005bison4.htm

[AZBear]

Alex,

Thanks for the story and you had me checking the site often waiting for the "rest of the story".