Kodiak Part 3: Just Another Day on the Ayakulak

On day three of our Kodiak adventure I awoke quite stiff and sore. Upon our return to camp on day two, Rob had wrapped his deer in a plastic bag and buried it in the dirt a few yards from our tent to keep the bears from it.

Wrong! When Rob checked on it in the morning it was entirely gone. No sign of anything. At that point we knew we were in for a difficult fight for our deer meat.

I loaded my gear onto the pack frame and headed up the mountain, with rifle in hand, to retrieve my deer. Rob stayed in camp to rest up and make a short trip to the opposite site of the valley to see what he could find in the way of deer there.

My climb was uneventful and I was eager to retrieve my buck. As I approached, I was careful to watch out for grizzlies. Sure enough, as I approached the site of my kill, I could see that it would be a difficult retrieval.

A large grizzly was laid out flat on top of my deer - asleep.

What to do now? I stopped about 100 yards away from the bear-on-top-of-blacktail pile and shouldered my rifle. Maybe a shot over his head would send him packing.

Boom. The great bear stood and hunched his back with hair on end. Not a good sign.

I knew that shooting the bear was no option and apparently he was ready to do battle to defend the large food supply beneath him.

After a few minutes I concluded that retreat was the only option. The score was now grizzlies two and Fletchers zero.

The buck we didn’t recover.

It has been a long hike to the buck and the deer herd seemed to have moved out of the area. Not only that but I was in no mood to shoot, clean and haul another buck on this day.

I couldn’t even recover my antlers which included my deer tag. Oh well, at least I had another.

I retreated back to camp and reported the situation to Rob. We concluded that we’d fish on Thursday and then I’d go after another buck on Friday, the day before our departure. That way we’d only have to figure out how to keep the bears away for one night.

We were short on ideas, but we’d figure something out.

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Mick and Rich at Webb Tract

Mick Dover and I hunted geese on Webb tract Jan 14th and it was a nice day. Ususally warm weather makes goose and duck hunting tough, but yesterday it didn’t matter.

A ground fog greeted us in the morning but burned off about 10 AM. Although we shot a spec and pintail in the fog, the best action was during the afternoon.

Here are our hero shots:

Lola had a pretty good day. She made a 200 yard unassisted retrieve on one of Mick’s snow geese. I’m glad I didn’t have to wade out after that one.

Note the ghillie suit. Cover is space at our place and the ghillie suit makes a difference.

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Kodiak Part 1: Blacktails, Silver Salmon and Grizzlies on Kodiak Island

One of the top hunting trips of my life took place about ten years ago in Alaska. The original trip was based upon a caribou hunt I purchased at the MDF Convention in Sacramento.

Ironically, it was the self-guided blacktail hunt on Kodiak Island (which  followed the caribou hunt) that topped the list for excitement.

We arranged for a float plane to fly us from Kodiak (on the Island’s east end) to the Ayakulik River on the Islands west end. The plane, a Grummon Beaver, was quite loaded with our gear as we climbed over mountain tops of the central island and then landed on the river at a remote location.

Although we were not alone (a fishing guide occasionally drifted past us while guiding salmon and steelhead fishermen and one other camper joined us for a few days) most of our company was grizzlies, silver salmon and blacktail deer.

We spent the first day of the trip hunkered down in our tent as 50 mph winds battered our site. It was a good thing that we were prepared and had “tarped” our tent down in case of bad weather. After many games of cribbage,  the weather finally settled enough to allow us ta catch a couple silvers in the afternoon.

Note the well worn trail in this photo. It was made primarily by grizzlies not humans.

On day three we used our small raft to cross the river and climbed the ridge to the west of our camp. Although we spotted no deer from camp, we were surprised that the ridge top was well stocked with sitka blacktail bucks – and also grizzly bears.

More on the deer and the bears later, but here are a couple fishing photos. We were using nine weight fly rods and steelhead flies. It took twenty to thirty minutes to land each fish as they were fresh and strong combining their efforts with the current of the powerful river.

Day three produced blacktails like the one below. But there’s much more to the story.

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Badger Fight

On a trip to the ranch, Rob came upon these two badgers fighting in the middle of the road. They were so busy fighting that they paid no attention to him as he approached. Unfortunately they wouldn’t hold still long enough for a clear photo, but he did get a few photos like the one above. He says the sounds of the fight were unreal.

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Fishing at Joe’s Salmon Lodge, British Columbia

The lodge is tucked away in an Island Cove just off the coast of northern BC and seaward of the inland passage. Although protected and calm, it’s only about a mile run to the surf and maybe 10 miles to actual deep water fishing for halibut.

Each group of two fishermen received use of a 16 foot Boston Whaler that appeared to be brand new and each was powered by a 50 horse Yamaha outboard. We were led to the fishing grounds by the fish-master each day and had a lot of freedom to do as we pleased.

We were provided box lunches so we could fish all day or we could choose to return to the lodge for lunch. Food was very good and ample.

The salmon fishing was very good and we landed several nice salmon each day including sockeye, king and silvers. The largest king we landed was about 25 pounds and the silvers ran in the eight pound range. The sockeye were the smallest of the group.

The key to success seemed to be locating fish (boats were equipped with fish finders) and determining the best depth to keep you bait. We fished mooching rigs and most of our salmon were caught at around 25 to 30 feet.

On one occasion we followed the fish-master out to sea a few miles in heavy swells (about ten footers) to fish for halibut. The halibut fishing was pretty good and we caught our three-fish per person limits rather quickly, but none were large fish with the best one in the ten pound class. After about an hour of halibut fishing in the heavy water we were ready to head in.

The three-day stay was too short for us and we would have been happy to stay a few days longer. This is a good trip for hard core fishermen.

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A Great Year for Goose Hunting

 Whitefront White-front geese (specs) covered the sand hills at our delta club when we arrived.

It wasn’t long  before they were airborne.

White front, snow, Aleutian and cackling geese are swarming the Delta. With the goose limit at a record 8 – of which four can be white fronts, our goose hunting has been excellent and it looks like it might even get better.

Goose hunting is very weather dependent. On clear days they have a way of avoiding hunters, but in thick fog they are very vulnerable.

Lola with a couple “specs” and a mallard taken last weekend.

The geese are so thick that they have already begun to arrive at Mayberry Farms where they typically don’t arrive until January. Looks like the geese might be eating themselves out of food.

If that’s the case, we may see quite a few heavy straps of eight geese in the near future.

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East Bay Tule Elk

The rut is long over and the bulls of San Antonio Reservoir have banded together for the winter. We often see them on the ridges near our ranch.

The bulls are shy, but they will hang around for a few minutes before they disappear over the ridge. We found this bull herd last week and they couldn’t seem to decide which way to go and we had several minutes to take photos.

We actually got a little closer as they moved parallel to the road. This herd is made up of mature bulls, mostly 6×6. If you look closely you can see that tynes have been broken off from fighting.

In springtime, we occationally find their shed antlers. The herd is unmanaged and unhunted.

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When Your Dog Doesn’t Retrieve

Duck hunting has been on the poor side this so far this season, but we know that it always seems to average out and that’s what seems to be taking place. This weekend was pretty good hunting and three of us bagged a dozen mallards and a honker on Saturday – and that was the afternoon shoot. We even shot a couple banded greenheads.

So things are looks up and we even knocked down a couple roosters on Sunday morning. Pheasants are scarce these days. A decline in habitat combined with terrible spring weather the last few years has reduced pheasant harvest dramatically.

But the big news this weekend was my lab pup’s failure to retrieve. I can’t figure it out, but she would rather lick ducks than retrieve them. She seems to have a thing for duck blood. If there’s any blood on a bird she immediately starts licking and unfortunately that’s usually the case.

I’ve started working with her at home, trying to get her to retrieve dead ducks, but she isn’t making great progress. She loves to retrieve ball, bumpers…you name it, but not ducks.

Frustrating, but I’ll just have to keep working. Hope I don’t have to find another dog. Two dogs is one too many as I learned over the last couple years, but it’s tough not having a reliable duck dog. Oh well.

Lola looking good, but not retrieving.

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Late Season Nevada Mule Deer Hunt

The late season finally arrived and four of us set out with high hopes for bagging a monster Nevada mule deer. The country was wide open and the mountains steep. We were prepared with spotting scopes, ATVs, backpacks and good attitudes.

We were especially pumped after visiting a neighboring rancher and viewing his collection of wall hanger bucks. But, reality would arrive after a few days of climbing, glassing and hunting.

We still hunted, we glassed we climbed but the monster bucks didn’t appear. On day one, I had a chance at a nice 4×4 buck in the low twenty inch wide class. He was a big boddied buck and was tending a group of does, but he didn’t quite fit the order.

The weather started out warm the first half of the trip – could have hunted in shorts. But the second half of the trip was completely different. By the seventh day I was ready to close the deal on a good buck and surprisingly that’s what happened. Putting down an ATV trail in a deep canyon, a large buck climbed out of the canyon and stopped overlooking me at 130 yards.

His antlers were medium size and his body appeared huge. I decided that this mature buck would be appropriate. I held on him off hand and hit him with the first shot from my model 70 Winchester in .300 WSM. He didn’t go down so I fired again and this time he took a few steps before falling.

The others were holding out for bigger bucks and I wondered if I had made a mistake. I had a bit of buyer’s remorse at first, but by the next day I resolved the fact that he was a good buck for me. I spent quite of bit of time dressing, boning and caping the buck. I’ll decide later whether he will make the wall, but he’s the largest buck I’ve ever taken. Hopefully I’ll get a chance to upgrade next year.

The others continued to look for a large buck and on the last day two of my partners shot bucks, but not the wallhangers we were all looking for. It was a great trip with all the aspects of mule deer hunting that make it so attractive to me.

The rut started during the last few days of the hunt and most of the does were courted by some type of buck, many of them impressive in size, but not quite big enough for our fouth hunter who held out to the end and went home without filling his tag.

We were amazed by the numbers of wild horses that roamed the hills with the mule deer. The are nice to look at, but compete with native wildlife like deer and I wonder at the decision land managers have made to let them remain.

This was the third filled rifle deer tag of 2008 for me and each was different from the others. Having been an archery hunter most of my life, filling more than one deer tag in a season was almost unheard of. My late-in-life switch to rifle hunting has been very interesting and now I understand how people bag those big bucks during the rut.

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New Zealand – Hunting and other Fun Stuff to do

We stayed in the Chalets, lined up on the left of the photo an and ate meals in the building in the background.

Red stags were pretty easy to find. The hunting took place inside a four thousand acre enclosure. I’m not sure what the density of stags was, but there were plenty.

On my second day of hunting, I wounded this stag with my bow and arrow. I was successful with a follow-up shot from the guide’s 7 mm mag and finished him off from 200 yards. I was disappointed that I flubbed the shot, but happy to bring home the trophy. The trophy fee for this silver medal stag was $3,000. Although he may have scored in the gold metal category, the guide told me he was silver before I shot him and he stood by that fee.

Keeping price in mind, I passed up a chance at a chamois and also a fallow deer with trophy fees of $2,000 each and settled for this feral goat which cost only $500. After repairing my bow, I still hunted for this goat and stayed within my budget. I’ll have to find a chamios and fallow deer someplace else. Maybe they’ll be in my budget next year.

The paradise duck is a very common native to New Zealand. These two were resting in the sun at the pond where I fly fished for trout.

During our stay, six of us spend a week in this nearly new Queenstown home. The view of the city and surrounding area was beautiful. The weather was mild and sunny.

Left to right: Our group included Pat and Jerry Lowery, myself and my wife Linda as well as Linda and Hal Stauff. Here we ready oruselves for a jetboat ride up a small river. Linda also parasailed from a nearby mountain.

 In this case, the photo explains more than I can say about the beauty of these mountains, called the New Zealand alps.

Milford Sound is located on the west coast of New Zealand’s South Island and is reachable in one day from Queenstown by small plane or bus. It’s a popular destination for tourists visiting Queenstown or other southern New Zealand resorts.

Although I caught no fish, this pond was a very nice place to fish. Linda took the photo while she observed from shore.

As we had done in Queenstown, we decided to tour the North Island by air. It was worth the cost.

These islands were located on the East Coast of the North Island in and area called The Bay of Islands. We spent a couple days at a bed and breakfast nearby.

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