HuntingNet.com Forums - MY ANTELOPE BOWHUNT..16 years old,17 inch antelope

THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY.........THIS WEEKEND

I'm 16, and I've posted here a couple times. I just started bowhunting this year, and my dad and I went out on the opener, the 7th for elk, but the weather was too rainy so we couldn't get there. Anyways, I let my dad relax and took my friend with me on sunday, the 8th, out to our farm to try to decoy one of the many antelope there. I had been scouting him all year, he was a 17 inch, huge curled antelope, that has eluded me for 3 years. Well, we found a good 14-15 incher bedded early in the morning, and snuck within about 300 yards, put up the decoy, and let out a few calls, he got up, came to about 150 yards, caught scent of us and took off. Well, we headed up to the top of our property, where we have a pond surrounded by clay cliffs, and CRP all around it. Sure enough, bedded along the cliffs with a couple does was the 17 incher. Well, Evan(my friend) and I drove the truck to about a mile and a half away, hid it, prepared(got covered in camo and cover scent) and began walking through the CRP to the pond. We got about a half mile away from the pond, and we were coming up to the top of a small hill overlooking most of our property when all of a sudden THERE HE CAME, he was chasing a doe and Evan and I hit the dirt and froze, they both ran within about 40 yards of us but never noticed us, he was huge! Well, evan stayed back and watched while I snuck up to the top of the hill and peered over and right there about 60 yards away there he was feeding with the does. Now, I was in CRP only about knee high, if that, and it thinned out into a stubble field/native grass knole. So, I attached my release, knocked an arrow, put my antelope talk in my mouth and slowly inched my way forward. Throughout the next half hour I would crawl, then they would keep feeding in the opposite direction, they finally turned direction toward me and began to act kind of spookish. I decided to try my call, and gave out a few, seperated "I guess you would call them coughs, or nasal mews" but "antelope calls", and thats when it hit the fan. The does or the buck I couldn't tell began making these weird noises that surprisingly sounded alot like my call. And the does began moving closer to me. The adrenaline kicked in and I was really starting to get excited. Well, the does kept inching closer to me, but the buck went about feeding about 60-70 yards out, not seeming to care. I quit calling for awhile and the buck became more curious when I guess he realized he was losing a potential girlfriend, so he ambled on over towards me and stopped broadside at about 50 yards. I knew I could hit fairly well at 50 yards, but I wasn't confident enough to get up and take a shot like that, even though the conditions were perfect. I decided to hold off on the shot and try to get within my effective shooting range, about 25-30 yards. SO, I had the does, one about 15 yards from me, looking for the ghost antelope, and the book feeding contently at about 50 yards. I waited for about another half hour for the does to calm down and start feeding again, then I inched away from the does and towards the buck, I continued this for an additional hour, when finally, UNBELIEVABLY, I was within 30 yards of him! The antelope by then were grazing their way parallel and slightly away from me, and I didn't want them to run away when I got up to shoot, or get out of my range. So, I attached my release and slowly got up, all of a sudden their heads jerked up and they all stared straight at me, I was moving in slow motion but it wasn't good enough because one of the does began to jog away flashing her butt at me, I knew I only had a few more seconds, so I let out a call, and stopped them all in their tracks. The buck was broadside, at 30 yards, I slowly pulled back my 50 lb spoiler plus with thunderhead 100 gr. broadheads but not discretely enough because as I reached my anchor point off they went, and I passed up the running shot of course. So with that, you could say I blew it, but I say I did the impossible, I stalked within bow range of an antelope with no decoy, so I'm very satisfied and I'll be out there next weekend looking for him again. If I don't get him in bow season, then hopefully he's mine in rifle season. NOW, the funny thing about this whole episode is my friends side of the story. He was about 70 yards back from me the whole time, watching it all, and at one point a small buck came over to investigate from behind us and noticed evan, trying to figure out what he was, it snuck up within 10-15 yards of him, and didn't seem to want to leave. Also, that 15 incher we had stalked earlier in the day with the decoy, well I guess he had come by for a visit and for about a half hour, he was standing about 20 yards behind me trying to figure out who was calling. Well, I never did see the buck behind because I never turned around, but after looking at footprints when it was all over I saw just how close I was. Well thats my hunting story for this weekend, and hopefully I've got one to match it next weekend. I will be hunting every weekend and any day off school for the next 3 months until DEC 15, or when the ice freezes and the geese are gone. Good luck to everyone else, and you can bet there will be a follow up story.