salukipv1

Myfathertook his wild free ranging WY bison monday morning, quite an old bruiser, was in a bachelor group of 6-8 males, pretty certain he was the biggest certainly top 2. May go B&C, so that'll be pretty awesome if he qualifies, having to look into all the details of what goes into that, but ya, quite an animal.

Getting a shoulder mount, that should be pretty awesome too when it arrives.

If I recall correctly, almost 18" long horns, bases I forget if they were 16" or 18" but around that range I think.

salukipv1

dman4505

that's something i want to do some day, congrats.
how much meat did he get?

don

salukipv1

3 150qt coolers full of meat, stuffed full. Left some in Jackson with a friend.

760 lbs of useable meat/bone, they say 60% of that is what they get from it, so....the estimate is about 450 lbs of meet.

Haven't had any yet, hope it's all delicious though.

Rodmax

cant see pics!!

CAelknuts

Bison is probably my favorite wild game meat. It is excellent.

stealthycat II

I thought the Henry Mtns and some parts of AZ had the only free range bison in the US ?

Yellowstone bison maybe ?

I'd love to do a bison hunt

CAelknuts

There are other bison that are free ranging. He's almost certainly referring to a Yellowstone Park bison that came out the east side toward Cody. Wyoming F&G has a "wild bison priority list" that they maintain and when bison wander out of the park, they call someone to come hunt them. Most guys enjoy this hunt, and bison are wonderful table fare, but you probably wouldn't find this hunt to be to your liking.

There are a few other free ranging bison hunts out there, including the Custer State Park in South Dakota. Others are on some of the Indian Reservations, particularly in Montana like Fort Belknap and I think the Crow Reservation might have a few hunts as well. Most hunts are not considered free range, as they're not totally wild herds, even though the bison are wild. I hunted them on a 120,000 acre ranch in Montana, wasn't considered a free range hunt, even though that's one heck of a big chunk of country with almost no fences on it. Didn't matter, it tasted the same, and looked the same. It was interesting to do once, though I'd probably shoot one again just for the meat. I shotone and donatedpart of itto the Gallatin Valley Food Bank. I shot another a few months laterfor my own freezer, and then paid for anotherthat I had the ranch shoot and donated it to the Madison Valley Food Bank. They weren't very expensiveand it seemed like a good thing to do at the time.

stealthycat II

CAelknuts I'd like to shoot one for meat, horns/skull and hide with my recurve.

CAelknuts

With a bow, most hunters would find them to be a fair chase hunt, regardless of whether a private herd or not. Even a private herd on thousands of acres would be very fair chase with a bow. They generally live in open country, so staking them isn't easy. On the other hand, they're not as wary as most other species, and are approachable to a degree. The problem comes in trying to approach them to primitive bow range.