Alright, I do not actually believe that not getting an animal on the ground means that it was a failure of a hunt. I am simply admitting that I did not even draw back on an antelope. However, it was still alot of fun running around with my dad and brother trying to get within my bow range for a shot.
I got within ~40 yards of the largest buck I have ever seen in season in my area, unfortunately, I need to get to within 30 yards for me to take an ethical shot. We got that close using the terrain and belly-crawling, but we came just short of closing the deal. My brother carried the buck decoy around for me, and walking behind it, we were able to get within ~60 yards of a buck on atleast two different occaisions. For the most part, the antelope seemed to largely ignore us behind the decoy.
We did not see much rut activity yet. We saw one or two bucks rounding up some does, but not much real interest there. It was interesting how actively bucks were avoiding each other. Whenever a new buck would enter an area, either the current buck we were watching or the buck that just showed up would leave almost immediately after they caught sight of each other. Seeing that response made us wish we had a doe decoy instead of a young buck decoy.
I hope I can make it out there atleast one more time before the end of archery season. Sorry I did not take any pictures. I have a bit of a one-track mind. In the mean time, I will continue to be taunted by the memories of that big buck bedded down just out of range.
