Muley Hunter

I'm curious. Do you like liver?

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I grew up hunting hunting mulies, I've hunted whitetails and I've hunted blacktails. Of the 3, a really big blacktail is the hardest of all of them to get. When you talk about whitetails and mulies, I'd like to point out that some really good whitetails come out of some pretty rugged country in Idaho, Montana, Washington etc... and I have personally seen whitetails over by Kremmling. Additionally altitude, in and of itself, doesn't necessarily make a hunt any harder than any other type of topography. Every habitat has its own unique challenges and must be looked at in that context.

When hunting high, you can sit and glass and let your optics save you a lot of walking. In heavy timber, that isn't possible. Of all the deer hunting I've done, hunting whitetails in the river bottoms of the FL panhandle was the hardest type of deer hunting I've found. The cover is horribly thick, you had to watch out for cottonmouths, diamondbacks and alligators. It is hot and humid, bloodsucking bugs are thick, the deer are spread thinly and it is nearly impossible to use a treestand. The only way to hunt them is to get into the brush and root them out. You will be wet, muddy, skeeter bit, scratched, hot, tired and unsuccessful most of the time. When and if you do get a buck it will probably be no bigger than a 3x3 (the soil is mineral poor and big antlers ain't gonna happen), weigh around 120 lbs live weight and you will value him highly.

Besides, a lot of the very biggest mulies coming out of Colorado are not coming from the high country at all. The plains of CO, WY, NE, and KS all have a lot of huge mule deer bucks. I've seen some monsters out in the counties of Yuma, Weld, Logan, Kit Carson, Phillips etc... feeding in corn fields and alfala fields. Matter of fact, it I wanted a real big mule deer I'd be looking in the prairie and not the high country.

Bucks like this are on the prairies waiting for the man who knows how to hunt. By the way, this is a NE buck.

Muley Hunter

I'm not going to argue with you about it. I've hunted both, and for my style of hunting. Muley's are harder in the country I live in.

Keep in mind I still hunt thick timber. Right where whitetails and blacktails want to be. It's also where mature muley bucks don't want to be.

Bullcamp82834

Big muleys are hard to get in my neighborhood. Average muleys are like fleas on a hound. Big whitetails aren't too tough if you can get access to a good timbered creek bottom.

I love to hunt high but around here there is usually enough early snow to move the muleys down by the time gun season starts. Find a timbered creek bottom right at the base of the mountain where the pines stop and the sage begins and you have solid gold. Whitetails and big muleys in the same general area.

Muley Hunter

True for rifle seasons here, but not for mid Sept muzzy hunts. They're all high, not near the rut, and smart. Trying to get one without glassing, and a scope is like bow hunting. I give all the credit to bow hunters who can get a trophy buck around here. Although they glass a lot which gives a small edge over me.

I've been at this awhile. I know what's harder and easier for me. It could be completely different for someone else.

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This is exactly my point. Seems that when someone mentions hunting elsewhere you're real fast to say it is so much harder the way you do it. Expecting others to simply agree with you is a stretch. The guy that goes west and stumbles into a 30 inch wide 4x4 mulie on the first morning of his first Western hunt probably isn't going to believe you. And the guy that hunted the same whitetail buck over several seasons in a hard hunted area before he tagged him probably won't either.

Based on my pretty extensive experience, I simply haven't found the mulie to be overly difficult in the places I have hunted him and I have hunted mulies with rifle, bow, muzzleloader, handgun and I even shot one with a shotgun. Maybe you have found them difficult, but that doesn't make you right and me wrong. That's why I specifically said that every habitat has its own type of challenges. Rather than dismiss the experience of others, welcome their viewpoints because info shared benefits all of us.

By the way, I'm going to apologize to the originator for hi-jacking his thread. This is about his bear, which is a good bear, and not about the differences in different types of deer hunting.

Ridge Runner

yes I also apologise for the hijack, royak, congrats on your first bear, you mentioned "she" inyour post was it a sow?
RR

Muley Hunter

You also misunderstood what I said, but you're right. We hijacked the thread. So, i'm done.

btw..I'll be bow hunting next year, so i'll find out what that's all about. I'm not sure it will be much different from my muzzy hunting since my range is only 40-50yds with a peep sight. However, i'll have a whole month to get it done with a bow. We'll see.

Wilcam47

Im not a fan of it...why?

royak

Thanks Ridge Runner yes it was a sow but it sure was a beauty