HuntingNet.com Forums - Final bow kill of the year for me! (pic)

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Final bow kill of the year for me! (pic)

I finally got back home so I can post the picture of my final bowkill of the year. I took this young bull from 30 yards on the 2nd of November. It was wide open country, so I couldn't get any closer than a couple hundred yards by belly crawling towards them. There was a small herd of about 10 animals, most bedded down, about a half mile out, so I decided what the heck, lets give it a go. There was only an hour to an hour and a half of daylight left, so I hurried out there, but the caribou started getting suspicious of the noise since the snow was so crunchy. I got a couple hundred yards away and set up behind a small dirt clump, but you can see by the photo that it was pretty much wide open and flat out there. There was one younger bull, but respectable size, and the rest appeared to be cows. The bull got up and started chasing the cows around, sticking his nose in their rears and running them till they would lay down. I figured right then I didn't want a thing to do with that bull if he came into range since he was rutting up, and rutted up bull caribou are not good eating at all. Cow season opened up on the 1st of October, so I figured I'd take one of them if I got the chance.

The bull ran after a cow for a little while, and she circled around back into the herd and layed down. Another caribou stood up and the bull darted right for it, and stuck his nose in its rear. They both started running almost simotaniously, and right in my direction! I quickly got an arrow nocked, and about 40 yards out, the big bull slowed up, but the smaller caribou kept running right past me, and stopped at 30 yards. The other bull was within 30 yards as well, but I had the angle on the smaller bou, so I slowly drew back, sat up and put the pin right behind its shoulder. 30 yards in the wide open out there seems a lot closer! I watched the arrow sail right through the sweet spot, and the bou bucked up, took about 12 steps and fell over dead! Holy Cow, that was quick! The larger bull quickly sped off back to the other caribou, and they ran off a few hundred yards and started feeding.

I thought this caribou was a cow at first, but it ended up having a small package underneath that would indicate otherwise. Good thing it was a young bull, and the meat on him has been excellent. I gave most of it to my buddies SEAK and Phish On (west forum) since neither of them got out caribou hunting this year, and this was my second bull of the year, and the fifth for the family, and I just topped the freezer off with a couple hundred pounds of elk meat. I am going to have leather made out of the hide, and give it to SEAK's girlfriend, junogrl, as a late Christmas present since she is into making crafts and such with wild game parts.