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Written by Carrie Zylka
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Sunday, 10 January 2010 |
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Another year come and gone, 2009 flew by like a Full Metal Jacket shot with a 90 pound Elite GT500. What a whirlwind year. How many of us got involved with BowCast in 2009, whether its staff, sponsors, and of course the all important BowCast nation? How many new friends did we make, and how much have we all learned? 
New techniques, new contacts, new friends, new places to hunt, new species, new events.... I thought I'd take this opportunity to highlight a few of my favorite things from 2009... 1) My First Bow - Parker Wildfire XP A single-cam, 31" axle to axle, 300 fps, 80% let-off, 27" draw length fine piece of machinery! The package included the Hostage arrow rest, Montana Black Gold fiber-optic pin sight, Parker one-piece quiver, a braided sling, angled peep sight, and the Sims String Leeches. I was in heaven! 2) BowCast at the Bird The most amazing outdoor related 3 days! Mountains, mule deer, moose, and spas. Dixon & Roney, Cima & Amaro, Burrows & Hoag, Jason & Launch Monsen, Thelissa, Jacqueline and Emily, and about 100 other BowCasters I had the pleasure of meeting! Don't forget Curt Wells, South Cox and Charlie Owens... And the gear...oh the gear....Elite bows, Easton arrows, Rhinehart targets, Nikon optics, Montana Decoys, Realtree and Addiction tee shirts...a girl could spend an awful lot of money in one afternoon up on SnowBird mountain! 10, 40, 90, 120 yard shots, uphill, downhill, over a creek, under some logs, through the brush and where the heck are the little orange markers? 3) Firsts - My first 3D shoot, Opening day of deer archery season and my first blind - a big oops and a lesson learned, I have since purchase a larger blind! 4) 5 of my Favorite Blog Entries! 5) Top 10 Forum Posts: 6) Top 5 Favorite Podcast Episodes. Even thought I didn't kill anything with my bow in 2009, I figured a lot of stuff out and learned a ton, here's to being confident next year is just as good if not better, and of course, meeting the rest of you at BATB 2010. So tell me...what were your favorite BowCast experiences of 2009? |
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Last Updated ( Sunday, 10 January 2010 )
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Written by Jason Amaro
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Saturday, 09 January 2010 |
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Perspective - - The ability to perceive things in their actual interrelations or comparative importance: tried to keep my perspective throughout the crisis.
If you guys have been tracking some of the events that have been going on in my life over on Facebook you will have noticed that I haven’t really had a chance to hunt like I would like to, but in the in grand scheme of life it is no big deal. I am just glad my mom is doing better and that she is going in the right direction. Before my mom got sick, I was able to get out twice. The plan was to sit a nice scrape line that I had found in some really thick cover. This spot was tight and the shots were going to be close and quick. Below is a picture from my ground blind. The blind itself isn’t anything special just a bunch of juniper and mountain mahogany branches cut and placed in a semi-circle. Some people like to build small fortresses when they make blinds but I like to let my camo work. These deer really pick-up on when there habitat has been altered. When you hunt country like this you just need to really be on your game and alert… These little deer just show up… No warning, If you are lucky you will catch the flicker of the ear or maybe a tip of an antler. 
You can’t really see it in the picture but there are three scrapes under that little alligator spruces in the center of the picture. So how did it go? Pretty well, I had 4 deer come thru, 2 bucks and 2 does. The bucks were little forky’s, could I have killed them? Yeah probably, but it just wasn’t there day to take a ride in the back of my truck. Overall, it was a good hunt. This is a little spot that I will return to. DAY 2 I usually don’t like to hunt the same place two days in a row so I decided to sit a water tank that I had a nice deer coming into. A few days before the season I went in there to pull the card from my camera and I found that the tank was iced over… Brrrr… Poor animals couldn’t really get a good drink of water. So I opened up the ice, DANG it was cold. 
This spot isn’t too far off the road but it is really tricky to find. So I like to get there just at sun-up so I don’t make too much noise. Below is a neat little picture that my trail camera picked up of me breaking the ice. 
I look like Harry Potter with a wand… This is what my spot looked like once I got settled in. 
So how did it go? Well, I got a nice tan.. NOTHING came in. Pretty rough but I am not ready to give up on this spot, bucks are going to need to water and this is a great little spot. So, I might visit it later but it just wasn’t meant to be on this trip. What are my plans now? Well, I am going to be pressed for time but there is a another ridge line that I might hunt. I just need to put in my time and get lucky. The good thing is that I am not seeing a ton of mule deer and I think that the rut is a little late in my area. I just need to put myself in the position to succeed… That means putting in my time. STAY TUNED… J |
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Last Updated ( Saturday, 09 January 2010 )
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Written by Jason Amaro
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Tuesday, 05 January 2010 |
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If you guys have been tracking my blog will have probably noticed that for me the best part of Coues deer hunting isn’t the killing of the deer but the process of trying to get close to North America’s toughest animal to kill with a bow. This year I spent over 60 days running around the mountains and my GPS tells me that I have covered over 300 miles on foot. If you want to be a successful Coues deer hunter those miles are all part of the process. I have often said that bow hunting has saved my life, it has given me a reason to be able to get off the couch, on my feet and out the door. I know and old man that we call, “The White Rat”, that has probably killed more Elk in Northern New Mexico than anybody else. I once asked him how he was always able to find animals, he would always laugh and say that the “They are where they are”. As a young fly fishing guide I never really knew what he meant but as a get older it all starts to make since. What he was trying to say is that when we scour maps, we spend hours climbing mountains and try to find the best habitat but when it comes right down to it animals don’t really care about that stuff. As along as their needs are met they have no need to move. If you want to be a successful hunter you need to figure out where the animals are during the season. Last year I made mistake by scouting like a mad man during the summer and the fall but once the “whitetail lull” and the rut kicked in I lost all of the big deer that I was tracking. It was a real eye-opener, I was two steps behind the deer. The last day of the hunt I picked up, headed into the high-country and I found deer. I passed on 3 smaller deer. This year I spent a lot of time learning new country but I knew that it was just fun and games because the real scouting would start a week before the hunt. So what happened? Well, I found a spot early in the summer that I was really looking forward to hunting but there is way too much snow back there, to get in there safely. I might take the 4 wheeler in one of these days during the hunt just to see what is going on. Who knows it just might be worth it. To get to the area it is about a 45 min drive from the house, then a 45 4 wheeler drive and then a 30 min hike. It is a lot of work to get in there but I am sure that there are a pocket of deer in there that die of old age. So before the season a good buddy suggested that I look at a spot that he had seen deer before and that he felt might have a good pocket of deer. Given the chance to learn a new spot I was all over it… Like usual, I downloaded every map I could find and I started downloading waypoints to my GPS. The race was on. I like to start by looking for water sources then I look for likely travel routes from the water sources to bedding areas. So I hung a few cameras to see what I would pick up. If you scroll down thru some of my previous posts you will see some of the deer that I have picked up, but this is the buck that I would really like to kill. He probably goes low-90’s. 
What you can’t see in this picture is that he is with a doe. If I dont’ get a chance at that buck I might see if I can stick this buck that is coming to water. I cropped the picture alot because this spot has some real potential and I don’t want a million hunters in the area. 
The above buck is a little busted on the right side but that is okay…. I like his frame… Sooo… What am I going to do the first morning? Well, I am going to hit that spot that has a ton of scrapes… I just want to see what is happening in that area… So cross your fingers and stay tuned… J .
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Last Updated ( Tuesday, 05 January 2010 )
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Written by Jason Amaro
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Tuesday, 29 December 2009 |
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As I type this we are gettign with a ton of snow…. They think we are going to get another 6 inches in the lower country. To be honest, as long as I can get to my hunting spots I really don’t mind the snow…. I really try to refine my clothing selection so I can stay warm and dry during the hunt. This year I wearing some stuff from Buckwear and StormKloth. So far so good, for me the the key is not getting too hot while walking into the stand. Some of my spots are pretty far in and you can really work up a sweat so I need to make sure that I don’t start the hike with too much clothing. If case you are wondering Max-1 is the camo I usually wear…. I trust it. So what have I been seeing out there??? Well, there is alot of snow and all the water sources are frozen. The deer are also starting to scrape pretty heavily. I found what looks like an old mining road that has about 8 scrapes in about a 200 yard line. I think that is going to be my Number 1 spot. It is on the top of a little knob…. The Road and a Glove…  
A Scrape 
Scrapes in a bedding area 
I also found a pretty cool little Corral in a different area that has a little spring next to it…. I put a camera in this spot… Hopefully something shows up…. The Corral 
The Spring 
How about a mule deer that I picked up on camera??? 
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Written by Carrie Zylka
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Wednesday, 23 December 2009 |
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Santa baby, slip a Spot Hogg under the tree,
For me.
been an awful good girl,
Santa baby, so hurry down the chimney tonight.
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 31 December 2009 )
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