Rossi Rifleman

I started hunting Wednesday on the Chaparral Wildlife Management Area, this a draw hunt on a very good chunk of South Texas. Yesterday evening as the sun hit the horizon this large 8 point came running to Wildlife Research's Special Golden Estrus scent.



He came out of the brush straight into the wind toward the scent stick. As he got out in the open he became nervous and headed back to brush. I figured he would hold up at the brush line and he did to look back. I "bleated" at him, he spun broadside, and the shot from the Rem 600 chambered in 35 Rem was out. The tail came, he was slow to accelerate, and was quickly out of sight but I heard loud crash of breaking wood.

I went down in the dark and I could not find any blood but I did see where he had jump through a burnt mesquite and broke all the charred limbs off. With no blood, I thought he had kept on going and decided it best to come back in the morning to look. I was worried about the coyotes finding him but knew I would never find him if he got back up in the dark.

I checked the rifle this morning at the WMA Headquarter's range and it was good to go, I shouldn't have missed the near 100 yard shot. I went out where I shot him with a TPWD employee. Where he jumped, I found two pin heads of blood and a few more where he landed. As I mentioned the blood, the fellow I was with said "there he is". After jumping the ravine through the mesquite, he had rolled down into the tight gully. He had landed belly up so the coyotes had opened him up but all they did was make gutting him easier. They couldn't get to anything else.

The shot was perfect with the Speer 180-grain bullet going across the top of the heart and bottom of both lungs. I guess in the 35 yards he traveled he just had not been pumping any blood.

Still have a day and a half of hunting left and another buck to take.

Very nice! and lucky I may say. I've never used a 35 Rem, but one of my complaints with the 30-30 was the lack of blood trail. The 44 Mag hollow points make tons of blood on the ground. Do you think that another type of bullet would have produced a different result?

dvw86 wrote:blood on the ground. Do you think that another type of bullet would have produced a different result?

No. If the heart is not pumping & the lungs gone and if it doesn't leak out there is not much that can be done. I think it is conditional, entirely left to the given circumstance, whether you have a blood trail or not or the . I've shot dozens of deer with the 44 Mag, and hogs as well, and not all leave a blood trail. It just depends.

This 35 Rem is not really my granddad's 35 Rem. The 180-grain Speer leaves the barrel at 2365 FPS. Hunting with the 300 Savage today.

Nice work great trophy

Well done! Love the rifle!

Magnificent!

Finished up the hunt without the 300 Savage or R92 357 Mag getting a chance to take another deer. Thus ends my hunting season; two nice deer counting the desert mule deer I killed in December.

Nice deer. And good for you to follow the next morning. Glad you got the meat.
Dave

I thought I would add a few pictures of of hunting South Texas.



Texas is the land of the high fence, especially South Texas. Probably 90% of the fences are in place to keep outsiders out; fence line hunters, illegals, deer, hogs, and exotics. I would suspect that there are now more high fenced ranches than their are low fenced ranches. This 15,200 acre Wildlife Management Area is high fenced into three main pastures but there are two smaller pastures. As a single drawn hunter, I was given the the northwest most pasture of 685 acres. From the WMA headquarters, it was 7 1/2 miles to the gate.



This is a good view of what the thorn brush looks like. It is slightly higher than my truck and goes for miles in all directions. The only openings are the senderos which are ranch roads, pipelines, seismic lines, etc.

This is a very controlled high fenced pasture with a known quantity of deer within. Elevated blinds are available but you are cautioned about using them as the deer are reminded quickly once hunting season starts that they are being hunted. It was suggested that you use a small popup to hide in within the blind which I did just to see if it fit. I did not see a deer within 300 yards of a fixed stand.



More of the horizon. I'm actually on a mesa that is 100' above the plain so the horizon is 12 to 13 miles out. The gas compressor station is out of the pasture.



While eating lunch at my truck, these fellows popped out of the brush. Javelina are trapped in this pasture to repopulate their native ranges. They are only being released on other WMA properties.



Finally, why you always carry a bore snake or similar with you. I was done hunting for the morning but when I opened up my portable popup, the wind caught it and dumped the barrel of my Rem 721 300 Savage right into the moist dirt. I used a small stiff twig to loosen the dirt so that the 30 caliber snake could be send through. I was back up in minutes. Never had that happen in 55 years of hunting.

That is a great deer RD. Congratulation on getting drawn for the WMA, I sure the odds on that are like winning the Powerball!