ERSF19
Member
- Joined
- Aug 10, 2015
- Messages
- 21
- Reaction score
- 37
Caught this guy migrating through the western portion of the zone this morning.
I was an hour into hiking up a trail working south to north hoping I would catch a migration moving east to west. A doe stepped into my path on the trail crossing about 30 yards ahead of me, startled to see me but not spooked, gingerly kept moving after a moment, then a fawn, then another doe and spike. I knew there would be more as this is classic C4 migration behavior. I shouldered my rifle and sure enough I see antlers above the brush so I knew the buck would be next to cross. He came into view and I shot him behind the shoulder, he jumped up and kicked out so I knew he was hit hard. He jotted off about 20 yards into some trees and was still standing so I gave him one more in the neck to drop him. About 10 other deer scattered in all directions and then ultimately kept to task moving west like they were on a wagon train.
The night before I was in an area to the east and at last light I saw a large group moving west with purpose in a single file line. I’ve been hunting the zone for 40 years and knew they were migrating once I saw them grouped up. So with this mornings forecast set to dip into the mid-30’s I knew the best play was in the western edge of the zone. It wasn’t until this afternoon I got a view of Lassen and saw it was blasted with snow from the storms so it doesn’t surprise me to see they were moving in such a large group.
I was an hour into hiking up a trail working south to north hoping I would catch a migration moving east to west. A doe stepped into my path on the trail crossing about 30 yards ahead of me, startled to see me but not spooked, gingerly kept moving after a moment, then a fawn, then another doe and spike. I knew there would be more as this is classic C4 migration behavior. I shouldered my rifle and sure enough I see antlers above the brush so I knew the buck would be next to cross. He came into view and I shot him behind the shoulder, he jumped up and kicked out so I knew he was hit hard. He jotted off about 20 yards into some trees and was still standing so I gave him one more in the neck to drop him. About 10 other deer scattered in all directions and then ultimately kept to task moving west like they were on a wagon train.
The night before I was in an area to the east and at last light I saw a large group moving west with purpose in a single file line. I’ve been hunting the zone for 40 years and knew they were migrating once I saw them grouped up. So with this mornings forecast set to dip into the mid-30’s I knew the best play was in the western edge of the zone. It wasn’t until this afternoon I got a view of Lassen and saw it was blasted with snow from the storms so it doesn’t surprise me to see they were moving in such a large group.
