Back at the hotel, I helped bring down a cooler of food to the lobby for dinner. We cooked salmon and sweet potatoes at home, and then re-heated them in the microwave in the hotel's lobby. It was a bland dinner, but I was too hungry to care about the taste of my food. My grandpa pulled out a deck of cards from his jacket pocket, and challenged me to a game of cards. I gladly took up the challenge, and for nearly an hour, we played until my grandma reminded us that we needed to get ready for bed. Our alarm was set to go off at 5:00 AM, and we needed to be at the hunting grounds by 6:15 AM.
My grandparents had the king bed while I slept on the pull-out couch. I could hardly sleep. Whenever I closed my eyes, I was back on the hunting grounds, tracking and chasing the pronghorn across the golden plains. My dreams felt long and vivid, though I woke up nearly every hour in the night to check the time. Finally, at 4:45 AM, I decided I slept long enough, though I didn't want to wake up my grandparents by starting my treatments right away. For the longest 15 minutes of my life, I stayed down and just stared into the darkness, thinking of all the possible adventures the day had to offer.
As soon as their alarm sounded at 5:00 AM, I snapped out of bed and immediately threw on my vest treatment. The mini-fridge and counter with my nebulizers were not far from my vest, so I was able to set myself up with that while the vest ran. Meanwhile, my grandparents took turns showering and dressing, and once my vest stopped, I got dressed while my grandparents snacked on some fruit we brought from home.
I dressed in specific layers so I could stay warm but not get so warm that I'd sweat, and so that my clothes would block any wind and rain from freezing me to death. I contemplated on just throwing on my hunting clothes over my PJs. I didn’t have any down feather camo coats, but I had enough camo hoodies to keep me warm. I quickly realized that throwing my hunting clothes over my baggy PJs would be very uncomfortable, so I decided I could withstand the cold without my cozy flannel PJs. I threw on a motocross jersey over my T-shirt, and heavy, weatherproof camo overalls over my jeans. I pulled on several hoodies, two layers of socks, two layers of gloves, two bandannas, an orange hunting vest, my cowboy boots, and finally, an orange hunting cap. It was supposed to be about 45 degrees that day, but with a steady 15-30 mile per hour wind, almost no sunshine, and a good chance of precipitation, I knew it would feel much colder. I didn’t look very heavily dressed, but I certainly felt heavier, so I was confident that I would survive the day on the wide open plains as long as I kept moving.
As soon as I was dressed, I bolted out of the bathroom to find my wallet, hunting tag, pocketknife, a box of bullets, and most importantly, my Ruger .243 bolt action rifle. The night before, I put everything in one place so they were easy to find. Once I gathered my things, I met my grandparents in the hotel lobby where breakfast was just beginning to be served. I didn’t bother to sit down and eat. Instead, I just grabbed a bagel and a banana, and then charged outside to our vehicle with my grandparents just behind me.
It was very cold that morning. A few flakes of snow fell from the pitch dark sky. I didn’t notice any wind, but I assumed it would come when the sun came up and began to heat the earth.
On the 30 minute drive to the hunting grounds, I kept myself busy by listening to motivating music on my phone, while my grandparents talked. I slowly chewed on my food, and watched the road ahead of us pass by in our headlights. For a long time, we were surrounded by darkness, only occasionally seeing another driver on the highway. We took the Carr exit and followed the same backcountry roads we had followed the evening before, and finally found the Outdoor Buddies campsite which was much bigger and busier than before.
There were a lot of people at the campsite, but thankfully, the line into the check-in tent wasn’t too long. I was immediately chilled when I stepped outside. The sun was just beginning to rise, painting the cloudy sky a deep, ocean blue. I shivered as I waited my turn to get into the tent. It was so cold that I couldn’t feel my fingers by the time I actually got to go inside. My grandparents accompanied me in the tent where we waited next to a propane heater for our chance to sign in. Once we signed in, we’d be assigned a hunting guide, which could take anywhere from a few minutes to nearly an hour. Fortunately, we didn’t wait long.
My grandpa noticed a man sitting next to the sign-in desk with a grouse feather in his cap, and commented on it. They got to talking. The man with the grouse feather in his cap introduced himself as Mike, and said he was a volunteer hunting guide. My grandpa asked if he had been assigned a hunter yet, and Mike shook his head. Then, my grandpa suggested that he’d be our hunting guide. Mike instantly agreed, but said he needed to call his dad first, so his truck could be assigned a number. In order to ensure that every vehicle on those 30,000 acres of land was authorized and associated with the hunt, Outdoor Buddies gave the drivers a large magnetic sign with their logo and a number on it, to stick to the side of their vehicles. Mike and his dad came to the campsite a few minutes before we did, but Mike’s dad forgot something at his house and sped to go grab it. Since Mike and his dad had me to guide around on the hunt, Mike wanted to make sure his dad hurried up and got back to the hunting grounds as soon as possible. It wouldn’t be legal to shoot the pronghorn until the sun had fully risen, but the earlier we got out of the camp and onto the actual hunting grounds, the better.
Mike’s dad arrived in a red diesel truck, and introduced himself as Tom. I found it interesting that once again, I had a hunting guide called Tom. This Tom wasn’t the same Tom from my turkey hunt. Instead of helping me hunt for turkeys, that guy was gonna help me hunt a pronghorn. Tom agreed to drive us around, while Mike decided to lead me around on foot whenever we stepped out of the truck. We were allowed to drive around the ranchlands and scout for pronghorn, just as long as I got out and away from the truck before I shot anything. My grandparents agreed to stay seated in the back for almost the entire hunt to keep Tom company when me and Mike left the truck to search for pronghorn.
As soon as Tom was finished shaking our hands and making sure my pronghorn tag was valid, we packed in the truck and headed on our way. Mike took the front passenger seat, while I sat in the back with my grandparents holding my unloaded rifle with the chamber open and empty. I kept the loaded magazine in my front hoodie pocket, while I kept everything else in inner hoodie pockets so nothing could fall out unless I dug for it.
There were already a lot of hunters wandering around the plains in search of pronghorn by the time we got onto the hunting grounds, and as soon as the sun had fully risen, I heard two distant shots sound from either side of us. Already, hunters were filling their tags, and the day only started a few minutes before. I was worried that all of those hunters would scare off the pronghorn and kill my chances of successfully filling my tag. But, I assumed that the traffic was heavy simply because we were still within a mile of the camp, and we’d eventually find a pronghorn to shoot if we just ventured out far enough.
After about 20 minutes of driving slowly through the ranchlands, as curious and playful cattle surrounded us the whole way. Many of the steers would false-charge our truck but dart away at the last second, while the rest of the herd followed us wherever we went. We finally decided to get out and trudge to the top of a large plateau, in hopes of getting a bird’s-eye view of the southern ranchlands. Perhaps then, we could spot some distant pronghorn and head their way.
We parked just below a rusty abandoned windmill, and together, me and Mike slowly stepped out. We closed the truck doors as slowly and quietly as possible, and then turned to face the plateau, which towered over us. I loaded the magazine into my rifle, loaded a round into the chamber, and flicked on the safety. Mike led me up the side of the plateau, showing me how to plant my boots sideways so I could get up the plateau without slipping.
The side of the plateau was made up of eroded rocks, loose sand, grass, cacti, and sagebrush, which made it very slippery. I hardly had any traction with my cowboy boots if I stepped sideways, so I had to dig my toes into the soil and use the butt of my rifle like a walking stick. I felt comfortable doing this, since my rifle's safety was on, my fingers were nowhere near the trigger, there wasn't any foliage tall or strong enough to put pressure on the trigger, and I kept the barrel of my rifle pointed in a safe direction the whole time. Meanwhile, Mike crept up the plateau just ahead of me, staying low as to not spook any possible pronghorn that may be hiding on just the other side.
Within 5 minutes, we made it to the top of the plateau, which towered over the rest of the prairie. I held down my hat as strong gusts brushed passed us, and Mike slowly gazed over the land with his binoculars. With just my eyes, I couldn’t see any pronghorn. I could see a few vehicles slowly driving around on the plains, as well as herds of black and red cattle drifting across the endless sea of grass. To the west, the golden plains rushed up against deep blue and purple plateaus and mountains. To the east, the prairie flattened out and eventually blended into the silver sky, but was split in half by the busy I-25, which ran north-to-south less than 5 miles away from us. To the south, there was a large power plant on the plains, and to the north was even more endless prairie and the Wyoming state border. From what I could see, there were less than 10 trees, and the tallest things besides the plateaus were the windmill water pumps scattered around the ranchlands.
Suddenly, Mike stopped and gasped, “There’s some! Just a little over a mile to the west of us, trotting away. Looks like there’s around 5 does being pushed by a single buck.”
Mike paused as he continued to stare at the pronghorn through his binoculars.
“I don’t think we can get to them in time.” Mike sighed, “They’re headed towards a group of hunters on that road. But let’s keep going. We’ll find ourselves a pronghorn eventually.”
We practically slid down the plateau on our asses. I was careful since there were plenty of small and incredibly spiky cacti sticking out of the sandy soil, but Mike seemed a lot less worried about the cacti. Once I got down to the truck, I popped out the loaded magazine, and ejected the round in the chamber of my rifle into my hand. I got in the truck, held the rifle upright between my knees, and slid the round I had ejected from the chamber back into the magazine. Mike instructed Tom to keep moving south until we reached the north side of some railroad tracks where there was another tall plateau. Mike planned on leading me up that second plateau in search of pronghorn.
Halfway there, we came to a gate where there were two vans parked and a few guys standing around. Judging by their body language, they were concerned and desperately looking for something. We stopped, and Mike got out of the truck to see what was up. A few minutes later, Mike returned snickering, and explained to us that those men were guides for a severely handicapped hunter. They let the hunter loose in a motorized off-road wheelchair, and somehow lost sight of him. They had no way of contacting the guy, since there was no cell service anywhere on the hunting grounds, and told Mike to keep an eye out for the missing hunter. They weren’t concerned for the guy’s safety. He was confined to a single section of the ranch by barbed-wire fences and would be found eventually. But they worried about the possibility of being in serious trouble if the CEO of Outdoor Buddies found out they lost their hunter, and wanted to find him before anyone else did.
For the next 15 minutes, we did nothing but crack jokes about the disabled hunter as we continued our journey in the truck across the ranch. Our jokes weren’t aimed at the guy specifically, but more towards the ridiculousness of the situation. Out of all of the things I thought I’d hear about in the world, a missing hunter chasing after pronghorn in an off-road wheelchair wasn’t one of them.
Eventually, we came to the plateau Mike was referring to earlier, and like last time, we carefully stepped out of the truck and I loaded my firearm. This plateau was much larger than the one we had ascended before, but at least it wasn’t such a steep climb to the top.
We got to the top and wandered past a squeaky windmill towards the other side of the plateau, facing east. Mike scanned the prairie with his binoculars while I did the same with my naked eyes. I couldn’t see anything that even remotely resembled a pronghorn, and judging by his silence, neither did Mike.
“You see any pronghorn?” I asked in a low whisper.
“Nope.” Mike mumbled.
“What about Stephen Hawking?”
Mike stifled a laugh and shook his head, while I held my free hand against my face to muffle my giggling.
Unfortunately, there was nothing but grass and cows on the eastern ranchlands as far as we could tell, so we turned around and headed back towards Tom and my grandparents in the red diesel truck. Like always, I unloaded my firearm before I got in, and pocketed the loaded magazine.
We checked the time, and I was shocked to find out that it was almost mid-morning. It didn’t even feel like a full hour had passed by, let alone four hours! We decided that we spent enough time scouring the southern ranchlands for pronghorn, and we ought to give the north ranchlands a shot. But before we did, Mike pointed out one last place for us to try out.
We parked at the base of a tall hill, got out, loaded my firearm, and together, me and Mike slowly crept up towards the crest. Mike was just ahead of me, and as soon as he could see over the other side, he signaled me to drop down to my belly. He slowly removed his backpack as I army-crawled next to him, making sure my rifle was on safety, my fingers were nowhere near the trigger, and the barrel was pointed in a safe direction. He signaled me to pause as he poked at something just in front of the backpack. It was a frozen cow pie. Since it was old and frozen, Mike figured it was safe for me to lay down on it, so I did without a second thought.
The other side of the hill was actually a steep, roughly 40 foot drop to the grassland below. Just below us was a single small doe being pushed around by a large buck. Mike used his rangefinder scope to determine the yardage of the doe. She was roughly 100 yards away, and my gun could easily bring down a pronghorn from up to 400 yards away, so I gently placed the barrel of my gun on Mike’s backpack and sighted the doe in. I flicked off the safety and waited for the right moment to shoot. Everything had to be perfect. The doe had to be stopped broadside to me long enough for me to steady the crosshairs just behind her shoulder, and the buck needed to be away from the doe completely before I could safely shoot. I waited for her to stop so I could take her out, but unfortunately she wouldn’t stop for the buck. Plus, she was hardly older than a juvenile pronghorn, and I wanted to hunt something much bigger and older than her. I probably would’ve taken the shot if she just stopped broadside to me for a few seconds, but she would’ve only given me 30 pounds of meat at best.
For several minutes, I watched in silence through the scope of my rifle as the doe and the buck circled around each other. Neither of them noticed that we were watching them, and the whole display was very fascinating to me. A few times, the buck tried to force the doe to stop by getting on his hind legs and trying to walk upright towards her rear. But each time he tried, she’d turn towards him to block his attempts. He got more and more desperate each time she rejected him, and started stepping in front of the doe to make her stop so he could try to make a fast move. Just as we thought the buck would successfully breed with her, the doe suddenly bolted towards a far eastern hill with the buck hot on her tail, and within just a few seconds, both pronghorn disappeared.
For a minute or so, Mike and I just stared out towards the plains with open smiles. We made eye contact and mumbled under our breaths about just how cool that was, and figured we better get going so we wouldn’t lose another second of daylight.
Before we could travel to the northern ranchlands, my grandparents and Tom needed to stretch out their legs and use the restroom, so we stopped at camp for them. My bodily functions ceased during the hunt, but I still made myself eat a handful of grapes and chug down a bottle of water to make sure I stayed hydrated and energized. As great as I felt with adrenaline pumping through my veins, I understood that I needed to eat and drink something so I wouldn’t crash so hard when the adrenaline wore off.
Once everyone was done using the restroom and stretching their legs, Tom had us gather around while we talked about where to go next. The northern ranchlands, much like the southern ranchlands, was divided up into multiple sections. We had a lot of land to cover, and less than 7 hours of daylight left. As far as we knew, the northern ranchlands were less populated with pronghorn than the southern ranchlands. However, we were unsuccessful in the southern ranchlands, and it was very possible that the high hunter activity in the south was pushing the pronghorn north. But there was also a chance that there would be close to no pronghorn to the north. We figured it was best if we took the risk and headed north, away from most of the other hunters.
For the first mile or so, we drove nonstop, past parts of the western hunting grounds, where no pronghorn were. Then, as we ascended a hill, Mike asked us to stop. There was a narrow cattle trail that led along a ridge overlooking the western ranchlands and part of the northern ranchlands. Mike wanted to see if he could locate any pronghorn from there. Like always, I accompanied Mike to the ridge to look for pronghorn.
The view from that ridge was impressive. The trail Mike led me down was less than 4 feet wide, with a steep incline behind us and a steep ridge just ahead of us, which dropped about 100 feet to a rocky bowl below. Just beyond that bowl was a pond with a single huge oak tree growing nearby, and at least a hundred cattle standing under it. Many of the cattle were looking up at us, while we gazed down on them. Beyond them, the rolling golden plains slowly merged with the distance purple plateaus and mountains to the far west. Grey and blue clouds shrouded the mountain peaks and plateau tops in sheets of sleet and snow. The weather was getting colder by the hour, and I could smell a subtle scent of rain on the wind. Mike, like always, scanned the wilderness with his binoculars, while I looked around with only my eyes. Suddenly, I saw movement about a mile west of us. Their white butts seemed unmistakable!
“Hey! I see some pronghorn!” I practically shouted under my breath as I pointed towards the movement.
“Those ain’t pronghorn.” Mike mumbled, “Those are mule deer. There’s about 15 of them, all bucks in a single-file line, and they are on the move.”
I could see their white markings charging through the valley easily with my unaided eyes. At first, I was in a bit of disbelief, because I learned that mule deer bucks only group together in bachelor herds outside of rutting season. Yet, right in front of my eyes, there were 15 bucks running together, all bearing impressive racks, during the beginning of deer rutting season.
The bucks came to a barbed wire fence, which split the western ranchlands from the northern ranchlands. Without even slowing down, each buck gracefully leapt over the fence, one by one, and followed the lead buck down a draw and out of sight. Mike slowly let down his binoculars, and once again, we shared a moment of awe. We forgot about being quiet, especially when Mike looked down and pointed out the cows, which were all inching closer to the base of the ridge we were standing on, gazing up at us like dogs begging for food. A few cows appeared to be trotting towards the southern base of the ridge where the trail began, perhaps to harass us much more up-close and personal. We laughed loudly at the cows. There was no point in staying quiet. Over cover was blown, and there were still no signs of pronghorn. We just turned around and headed back to the truck to continue our long, slow journey across the plains to the northern ranchlands.
We came to the far northwestern edge of the hunting grounds. From our place in the truck on the trail, we could clearly see I-25 and the Wyoming border, which were less than a few miles away. We didn’t spot any wildlife outside of the hunting grounds, which could’ve been a really good sign or a really bad sign, depending on one’s perspective. But inside the hunting grounds, to our south, we spotted several pronghorn standing on top of a high plateau with their heads and ears perked up in all directions. Tom threw the truck into park, and Mike led me up the plateau towards the pronghorn.
When we got to the top, we saw the pronghorn slowly wandering away towards a valley. We paused as the pronghorn walked down into the valley, and ascended the hill on the other side. If we approached them slowly and quietly enough, Mike was sure I’d have a chance at another shot. As far as we could tell, there were no other hunters nearby, and the pronghorn were slowing down to graze.
We crossed over several gullies filled with rocks and a few sunbleached cattle bones, through pockets of sagebrush and cacti, and over the crests of windy ridges and flat plateau tops in search of the pronghorn. But unfortunately, we found nothing. The pronghorn we were tracking had suddenly disappeared, and we had no idea where they went. It was almost as if we were seeing things that were never there. We stood on top of a plateau and spun around on our heels, hoping to see some signs of life, but there was nothing. The plains were empty and silent, except for the wind whistling under the scope of my rifle which I cradled against my shoulder, and the golden grass and silver sage which waved and twitched in the wind. It was beautiful and definitely worth the walk. I would've stayed there for a long time if we had daylight to spend, but we had a pronghorn to kill. Mike looked down at me and I shrugged, signalling that I was ready to return to the truck.
To make things easier for us, Tom tracked us on our walk and drove to meet us a half-mile away.
Tom drove us around for a few more miles, hoping to come across more pronghorn does, but all we saw were bucks. Mike had the brilliant idea to follow a few of the bucks, hoping they’d lead us to the does. The first buck we tracked was about as interested in us as we were in him. He was a young buck, with a crimson tint to his tan fur. He was very curious of us, and slowly crept closer while me and Mike walked parallel to him.
Pronghorn are naturally curious, which is their biggest flaw. Plains indians who hunted the pronghorn would attach a small piece of ribbon or leather to the end of a stick, and flick it around as they hid behind a sagebrush or a rock. They couldn’t chase down the pronghorn due to their speed and agility, like they often could with bison and deer. But the indians could easily take advantage of the pronghorn’s fatal curiosity, to draw it within range of their arrows and spears.
This natural sense of curiosity, coupled with the rutting season, turned many of the pronghorn bucks stupid. The young red buck we interacted with came within 15 yards of us at one point. We didn’t attempt to scare it off, since pronghorn only average about 100 pounds, and he wasn't threatening to attack us. But if he had been an elk or a moose, he would’ve been way too close for comfort, regardless of his body language. Mike expressed just how lucky that young buck was. If I had a pronghorn buck tag, he would’ve been on the grill that night!
About an hour later, the sun came out, and I found myself standing next to Mike on yet another high plateau, looking over the northeastern ranchlands. Because of the sun, the wind picked up exponentially, making it feel colder than it was when it was cloudy. I used Mike as a windbreak while we stood on the exposed plateau, gazing over the gleaming landscape in search of more pronghorn.
On a plateau just across the valley from us, a large, mature pronghorn buck came trotting up towards us. He was broadside to us at first, and stood proudly on the plateau facing towards the north. But when he turned around and started heading south, we noticed that one of his horns had grown down over his eye, and then straightened out parallel to his face. He was an old buck, judging by the size of his horns and the way he interacted with his environment. Unlike the younger bucks, he wasn’t nearly as jittery or quick. He took his time to descend the plateau and out of sight from us, and seemed to walk with a limp. If predators, disease, and winter weather hadn’t taken him out yet, age was clearly catching up to him, and I doubted he’d survive another long winter. However, age made him beautiful, and his deformed horn made it easy to identify him when we spotted him a few more times during the rest of the day.
On our drive east towards one final cattle pen to look for pronghorn, we had to stop due to a large herd of cattle standing in the middle of the trail. They were all standing in a circle, with their butts towards the outside. Tom crawled forward, practically nudging the cows closest to us with the front bumper. Just as Tom was about to press the bumper against a few of the cows, the cows moved away to reveal a pronghorn gut pile left behind by a hunter. The pronghorn had been properly field dressed, with all of the edible meat and the hide taken away, leaving behind barren bones and inedible guts for the wilderness to take care of. To everyone’s astonishment, the cows on the other side of the gut pile from us were chewing, and even more amazingly, a cow stuck her nose right into the gut pile and pulled back a stringy chunk of meat to chew on. If that wasn’t mind-boggling enough, as soon as we drove by, the cows we pushed out of the way came rushing back to the pronghorn with their noses to the ground.
None of us really knew what to do with the event we just witnessed. We all just glanced at each other, slack-jawed and speechless. Later on, my grandpa argued that those cows were just curiously smelling the meat, but we all knew that wasn’t what was happening. Turns out, this behavior isn’t that uncommon among herbivores. While the vast majority of a herbivore’s diet consists of plants, if meat is available, they will eat it. I later discovered countless videos on the internet of herbivores eating meat while I was researching this phenomenon. And, I have to admit, to a beef cow on a diet of stubby fall grass, I bet that fresh pronghorn tasted pretty damn good!
Still stunned by what we saw, we continued to drive around the eastern ranchlands as the weather moved in. There were no signs of life except for a few tight herds of cattle, with their butts to the strengthening wind ahead of a storm. The weather was getting to the point that I didn’t want to go outside unless there were pronghorn doe that I could see. The wind was at its strongest and coldest, and sleet drizzled from the darkening clouds. To the west, the sun was setting, and within a half-hour, it would be dark and the first day of pronghorn hunting season would be over.
We drove around the southern ranchlands one final time, coming across no wildlife. Just as the last rays of sunshine hid behind the western mountains, we called it a day. I was going to the hotel empty-handed, but Tom and Mike reminded me that I still had the next day to hunt with them, and that night’s storm was likely to force a lot of the pronghorn out of the mountains and into the plains below.
I wasn’t disappointed that I didn’t fill my tag the first day. I expected it to be a very hard hunt, especially with so many hunters and so few does. What I didn’t expect however, was to learn so much in under 12 hours. All of my previous perceptions I had about the nature of the wilderness, wildlife, and even cattle were challenged, and it took me a few weeks to fully digest what I had witnessed. Pretty much everything I had been taught about the wilderness before, through books, articles, school, and nature documentaries, had been disproved by my own interactions with it that day. I witnessed things that I once thought were just fiction, as well as other amazing displays of wildlife I once only saw on TV.
Perhaps that’s why science is never 100% certain. For all we know, things will start falling upwards one day. If cows eat meat and mule deer bucks can make peace during rutting season, basically anything is possible.
