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Arizona New Mexico Outfitters and Guides

Coues Deer Hunting Articles

The following is a collection of real life entries as written by the outfitter, guides, and past clients.  Their purpose is to give potential hunters an idea of our hunts.

   

 The Last Day Coues Deer  

by Pat Feldt

 

Big Coues buck with Pat Feldt when he was a kidThere was not a Coues buck in sight.  I had glassed the opposite canyon five times over and had only seen six Coues white-tailed deer does.  It was the last day of the 1991 December coues whitetail hunt and I had not yet tagged my yearly buck.  Twenty-eight Coues deer bucks were “passed-up” during the season but none of them was what I was looking for.  The hike back to my brother was going to be a long and depressing one.  A feeling I had felt a couple times before.  Ryan was glassing another ridge closer to the truck and I could only hope he had found a good buck for me to shoot. 

An hour later, I approached my brother’s glassing spot and sat down with disappointment.  “Well, what ‘ya see?” we both asked.  “Just a small 8-point, a fork and a few does,” my brother replied.  He was packed-up and ready to leave due to the uneventful morning, but I said, “Since this area is so big, let’s just glass it one more time to see if something was missed.”  

The area we were hunting was vast.  The canyon was more than 1200 yards across at some points with other distant ridges being over one mile.  I set up my 12x50 Docter Binoculars on the tripod and began to scan the area.  With much amazement, I spotted what seemed to be a buck sparring with a tree.  I had not glassed more than five fields of view before spotting him.  This deer had to be over a mile away.  I had no spotting scope with me and could not make out the antler size of this rutting deer through the 12 power binoculars.  Ryan suggested I set up the gun on the bipod and view him through the Leupold scope cranked-up to 20X.  After I found the buck on 20x, there was no mistaking him.  It was the buck we were after, an estimated 105 Coues whitetail buck we had seen the month before while guiding a friend.  He had been seen during the November hunt traversing some cliffs, which didn't leave us much chance for a shot.  Now, he was preoccupied wrestling with a mesquite tree, trying to impress the two does next to him.  It was quite interesting watching as branches were literally being torn off and thrown into the air.  

Knowing he would be there and busy for a while with these females, we decided to go for it.  The approach was going to be a tough one.  We estimated he was 1 ¼ miles away from our vantage point but mostly uphill.  We thought we had better hurry before he topped the mountain and we would never see him again! 

Forty-five minutes later found us on the opposite ridge of the big Coues buck, but there was a problem.  He was above a 200 ft. cliff and silhouetted on the skyline.  There was no way to get closer.  The best bet was to set-up the gun where we were or not ever see this deer again. 

The rangefinder read 525 yards, but the angle was so drastic, probably 60 degrees uphill, that the ballistics were going to be different.  I lay down, flipped-out the Harris bipod and adjusted the target turrets on the 20X Leupold for 6 minutes of angle, a minute less than if there was no uphill rise.  My brother replied, “You better hurry, he’s about to follow the does over the mountain.”  So, nestled behind my Remington 700 BDL chambered in .300 Winch. Mag., I held the crosshairs behind the shoulder of the Coues deer’s chest and slowly squeezed-off a round.  The shot felt good. 

“He’s down,” replied my brother with amazement.  Not being confident of the shot with all the rushing and uphill angles involved, I said, “Are you sure?”  “He dropped like a rock” was his reply.  I let out a great roar of joy!  

The next two hours found us climbing the steep cliff walls in order to reach the old Coues deer buck.  It was worth all the trouble.  He was a nice-racked 8-point that ended up grossing 102" and netting 101 5/8 B&C.  An excellent deer in any Coues deer hunter’s book!

 

 

 

My Quest For a Coues with a Handgun

By

Anthony Ransom of California

This article appeared in SIX GUNNER MAGAZINE

Anthony Ransom took this buck at 276 yards with a pistol! Well after a spectacular year hunting in CA I had decided to head to AZ for my fourth leg of the deer slam with a pistol. Yep, I wanted to put a coues on my wall. Being a hand gunner, a book buck was not necessary; rather a respectable mature male would suffice. I have hunted coues with a bow (to no avail). This would be my first time to handgun the very wary coues deer… Much more elusive than the Mulies and the Black tails that I hunt every year. And certainly more so than the Eastern whitetail species that I have harvested. Anyway, the trip was planned and booked with “Arizona Guided Hunts.” I was to leave for a week in November to chase Coues whitetail.

Upon arriving I met up with the outfitter in Tucson. Pat Feldt is the Owner and one of the guides for AGH. I hunted Javalina and coues with a bow with Pat prior to this hunt. Pat runs a first class operation. Nothing for the hunter to do except bring your gun, your sleeping bag and hunt. Arizona is very open in the areas we hunted. First class glasses are a must here. Don’t take your daddies little 8x 42’s because the terrain is vast.  They will not suffice. I took my Swarovski 15x56’s and my Leica spotter. Pat carries 15x60 Docters and a Leupold spotting scope, which both mount on a tripod for better stability in finding Coues at long range. These deer are a bit small. The Big bucks might go 90+ pounds. Many deer are much smaller than that. I took two guns for the hunt. One was my Remington xp 100 pistol chambered for 338-350 Mag. This gun was to play second fiddle and only be used if something went wrong with my other gun. I get ¾ groups at 100 with this gun. The chosen load for it was the Nosler BT 200grain. The gun does 2700 fps with my hunting loads. Earlier this year it took a great Black Tail at 435 yards (another story though). My Other Gun would be my 257 JDJ Thompson Pistol. I had not yet taken game with this one. It really shines at the range with the 100 gr. Nosler BT. I have been shooting AA 2520 at 2600 fps and getting sub 1 inch groups with this combo. I figured the 257 JDJ and the Coues deer to be a match for success.

The first day out proved to be uneventful. With the windy conditions Pat and I felt it would be best to use the 338. The weather was warm and the wind blew 25 mph. Gust had to be much higher. We spotted many deer and covered lots of territory, but no biggins were found. Most of the hunting involves hiking to high vantage points and setting up your glass and scouring the canyons for deer. The terrain is steep, rough, and featureless. Just Cactus and rock populated the terrain. Not much else. We stayed out all day the first day of the hunt to no avail (slump). There was another hunter in camp. Chris and Guide, Bryan, managed to get a decent 80 incher the first day. He used a 300 ultra mag and after an all day stalk got his chance at 350 yards. It was a big uplift of spirits that night to see a good deer in camp. I was very excited.

The next day out Pat and I tried a different ridge. We glassed till lunch and went back to camp. Camp is a large wall tent with all the accommodations one needs. Cots to sleep on, a wood stove for heat and all the other amenities you would expect from a good outfitter. After lunch we headed out to do some more glassing. About an hour before dark Pat managed to glass a couple of decent bucks feeding two ridges over. We did not have much day left, but decided to try a stalk anyway. We got where we needed to be, but ran out of light before we could find the bucks. We made a plan to try again for the bucks at first light.

The next morning we found ourselves close to where we had seen the bucks the day before. Pat glassed them up feeding in the same spot as the evening before. I slid in behind a rock and set up my .338 pistol on a rock and bipod. Pat let me know which one to take. I got the cross hairs steady and squeezed one off. After the recoil I lost sight of everything. Pat said I missed, I WAS SHOCKED. The distance was only two hundred yards…what happened? The bucks were looking around trying to figure out what had happened. I set up again and squeezed another off. Missed…Pat mentioned I was shooting high. The bucks were on the move now. One slowed at about 300. I got set and tried a snap shot…Ya I missed again. I was thoroughly disappointed at this point. I was not sure what to do. Pat said it happens, followed by "there is always next year!" I was starting to think he was right. Disgusted, we packed up and headed back to camp. The other guys all tried to convince me to take Pats rifle out and try again. NO WAY. After lunch and much contemplation, I decided to set up a target at 200 yards and see what was going on. I fired three shots at the target. The group was less than 2 inches. Good group for shooting off of an ice chest. I had only brought ten rounds of 338 for the trip. The only thing that was wrong is that the group was over a FOOT off of my aim. I am not sure where the scope got so far off, but it was. Winds gusting like they were made me a bit skeptical of the 257 jdj, but that was my only other option for handguns. The rifle comments came from the peanut gallery again. NOPE, I'm not going to get my deer slam with a rifle!

That afternoon the successful hunter left. Pat, Bryan, and I went out early in the afternoon in a completely different area. We split up and kept in contact via two-way radios. Pat called me after about ten minutes. He had found a buck bedded down. I worked my way to Pat and we discussed it. He was bedded behind a Mesquite tree facing away from us 900 yards across the canyon. Pat would stay there and guide me via radio. I worked my way down into the gorge and then up a knoll approaching the bedded deer. It only took about an hour to close within 300 yards. At that point the wind was good, coming into me and not that strong. Since the ground was so crunchy, I slipped off my shoes and eased closer, a trick I learned from bowhunting. I was so excited and focused on being quiet that I didn’t notice all the cactus I was walking through. There was a large flat rock on the knoll I needed to get to. The buck was behind the Mesquite tree still. As I moved closer to the rock the deer got up to stretch and then bedded up again. I got to the rock, set up my tripod-mounted binoculars and ranged him. Only 276 yards. Perfect. I put my bench bipod on, and set the gun up on the deer. Now I just had to wait, control myself, and make sure I had my hold-over right. My gun was dead on at 100. I figured that at a bit downhill angle, I would need to hold about 2” over the back. I waited and listened to Bryan and Pat on the Radio. I heard Lots of comments about Rifles and "maybe next year." They are quite comical.  I disserved the ribbing. We waited for a couple hours (it seemed) for the buck to get up and offer a shot. Eventually he did. The buck got up and turned and got on a trail coming to me. I let him take about three steps. I was ready and the gun was steady on him, I let it fly. Before I recovered from the shot, Pat radioed "Great shot." I looked through my Binos and he was down on the trail. I was elated. After gathering up my gear I headed back to my shoes, now I noticed all the cactus around me and in my FEET. What a painful trek back to my shoes. I picked out what thorns I could, put my boots back on and headed to my Prize. I got to the buck and was pleasantly surprised. This was the best buck we had seen on the trip.

Pat and I took pictures and then began the chores of quartering the buck for packing out. Missing the other buck was now a good thing. This buck was a nice 8-point and Pat scored it at 90 inches; a pretty good  Coues with a Pistol. All in all it was a great trip. I am glad I persevered and got to use my 257 JDJ. The Nosler 100 BT performed great. It broke the front shoulder and I found the bullet just under the hide on the off side. Thanks JD for a great Gun and Arizona Guided Hunts for a great hunt!

 

Sincerely,

Anthony D Ransom (Pistolhntr@aol.com)

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