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Antelope / Mule deer

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My cousin and I went to Wyoming twice hunting pronghorns. Its been a couple years, but I remember reading that WY had more pronghorns than all the other states that had them combined, or something like that. At any rate, theres plenty of them there. If you get on their website you should be able to pull up some pretty good info such as draw odds and harvest success rates on each unit. Then we contacted a couple CO's and biologists in those areas to see what we could expect for numbers and size of bucks, they were very helpful.
Once you narrow it down to a couple units you can order BLM or USFWS maps which show you what is public and what is private. We didnt have much trouble getting access since the ranchers get part of your tag which they can turn in for cash.
We both killed bucks in the 14"+ range on the 1st day on both trips (rifle hunts), and saw literally hundreds of antelope. Spent some time hunting yotes after that, their everywhere out there. Saw a couple nice muley bucks too, didnt have a tag though.
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Antelope is a pretty easily doable DIY trip, IMO. They are fun to hunt, just remember that if you find a local who wants some of the meat, give him a BUNCH! They aint exactly corn fed beef.

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Looks like i should investigate going to Wyoming!
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I heard the hunting is pretty good in South Dakota also. The only draw back i can see to going to Wyoming is there are way to many big game to hunt!
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The horns are actually shed and hollow on the inside. They are made of hair like material. When you cape one out you will notice that the hair grows into and around the based of the horn.

If you shoot one, make sure you take off the horns by boiling them from the skull plate because their is a cartilage membrane underneath the horn base and it will stink real bad if you do not do this. Once the horns are removed from the skull plate, two small devilish lookin bony spikes are present that is attached to the horn/skull plate. The hollow horn sits on these two bony structures.

As far as hunting goes if you bow hunt it is going to be a spot and stalk hunt or sittin on a water hole all day. Both are challenging and require patience.

Gun hunting is pretty much a 100 gaurenteed harvest. For the most part you can stalk within rifle range fairly easy on goats but stalking into bow range in the open country is the utlimate western hunting challenge.

Good Luck
 
After umpteen years I drew a pronghorn tag here in Okla. Once in your life. I've hunted them once before in Wy. and got a nice one with my bow. Can't wait for Sept now. I'm taking my rifle.We have a real high sucess rate too, Almost 100 %
 
I've hunted both pronghorn and mule deer here in SD... pronghorn hunting is amazing! they are incredibly smart, and have the best eyes of any animal I've hunted. They are very hard to field judge... when I first saw my goat at 300 yards we thought he had 16" horns on him... it wasn't until after I shot him that we realized his horns didn't hook in like they are supposed to and were only 13" with small prongs.

I've measured hundreds from here in SD... including the current state record and the state record before that. Nothing like a pronghorn with 17" horns, 7" prongs and big mass!!

And as far as them being antelope... you will hear everyone here call them that, even know they are kind of on their own - even our Game, Fish and Parks call them antelope.
 
Pronghorns are truely a unique big game animal. From "Antelope Country" by Valerius Geist (and Michael Francis): "Genetically, the pronghorn is not an antelope, but the very last of an old All-American family of ruminants, or cud chewers. It is also the last species of American large mammals that lived on the prairie to survive the great extinction that befell North America's big creatures at the end of the last ice age. It is truly the last of the Americans. Without the pronghorn, the open prairie would today be without a plains-adapted big-game species."

Later on in the book Geist writes: "The eyes of the pronghorn are a puzzle. They are larger than those of an elephant. They match in size the eyes of a horse, which has the largest eyes among four-legged beasts. ...The orbits are largest in their verticle dimension, as if allowing the eye some movement up and down to see better in the sky above. And that was indeed necessary, for unlike today's skies, those of the past ice ages in North America were filled with many species of huge, but now extinct birds of prey."

One last tidbit. From "Pronghorn: North America's Unique Antelope" by Charles Cadieux---"Although they race across rough land, across rolling rocks and sliding gravel, they almost never break a leg. Those fragile leg bones have been laboratory tested, and it takes 45,300 pounds of pressure to crush them!"

Enjoy your hunt. They are most definitely a unique and beautiful species.
 
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I know there are a lot of you that have gone on hunts for other game then Whitetail. I was thinking of broadening my hunting horizon and maybe trying to tag a Antelope or Mule deer in the next couple of years. Any advice on how to go about planning a trip like this?

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Since when did i ask what there real name was, and were they came from!
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They might not break their legs... but funny as heck to watch them try to cross a good fence - most of the time they will do a belly-flop at full speed to dive under a barb wire fence... but I've never seen one jump a fence.
 
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I watched alot of Marty Stouffer's Wild America as a kid. Now the reruns are on every Sat. morning here and I TIVO them and make my son watch them with me.
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Probably my favorite show ever, next to Andy and Barn
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I am right there with you with Barney n' Andy. I was under the impression that Marty Stouffer was antihunting. Is this true?
 
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I am right there with you with Barney n' Andy. I was under the impression that Marty Stouffer was antihunting. Is this true?

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Well, I would say he is not PRO hunting, but many of the episodes I have seen he speaks of and understands the need for wildlife management in the form of hunting. He does like to get in his jabs at the way we hunted and trapped nearly every species in America into extinction in the past. I have never read any official statements he has made on the subject, but I would say he is definitely NOT a crazy anti, but I could be wrong. Either way, his shows are very entertaining and educational.
 
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