A Busy Year of Success/Failures
Contributors to this thread:General Topic
From: TEmbry
25-Dec-18
Sitting here mapping out my calendar for 2019, and it brings back a lot of memories from 2018. This was one of my busiest years yet. I achieved a lot of firsts, and came up short on several other occasions. All said, I got the pleasure of going on hunts in 4 states for 11 species this year. I'll try and post up some highlight pics and brief stories to recap it.
From: TEmbry
25-Dec-18
It started in January, on a Coues Deer hunt with Wards Outfitters down in Arizona. I flew down and met my good buddy Travis at the airport. After a brief pitstop for some whiskey and 2 racks of beer, we were on our way to the Bed and Breakfast home that many of you know well.
From: TEmbry
25-Dec-18
From: Grunter
26-Dec-18
Sweet bring the adventures!!
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
We had a wonderful time, Travis took a great buck mid trip and the following day I got a chance at a nice 4x4 (counting eyeguards). The buck jumped on the shot and my arrow hit a touch back but we still felt confident we would turn the deer up. After an extensive grid search we came up empty and I went home with one less arrow and a bad feeling about how I started my year.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
Steven Ward runs a pretty incredible camp, and for a guy looking to book his first stateside Coues Hunt I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend him. Travis and I almost felt awkward having nice accommodations while hunting, it was my first guided hunt since 2008!
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
I went back home and squeezed in some ice fishing and riding sleds late January/early February.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
I got a last minute invite to tag along on another friends Musk Ox tag he drew for Nunivak Island in western Alaska. I was off work so it was too sweet to pass up. Load up everything warm I own and off we went.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
The musk ox hunt was a terrible/awesome weekend. We caught the stomach flu on the flight over to the island. Weather delays kept us out of the field for two days, and mine didn’t hit until we finally were about 90 miles from the village riding sleds through blizzard conditions. I stopped in a small fishing cabin on the coast to hole up. Brad was able to still arrow an incredible bull, that I just officially scored this weekend less than an inch shy of B&C. All said and done, I had projectile emissions from both ends over 70 times in 24 hours on that hunt and lost 12 lbs that weekend. I’ve never felt worse, and driving a sled 90 miles back to town at 2am was a challenge to say the least.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
One of the neater aspects of a musk ox hunt is meeting the people and seeing how they live their lives in these villages. Mekoryuk has an incredible reindeer operation Abe was nice enough to show us how it all works. His grandson was glued to me at all times in the house, we all figured it was because he had never seen a beard before.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
Partnered up with Baitem 907 for my baits these past few years...
Partnered up with Baitem 907 for my baits these past few years...
I took a month off to replace some flooring in my condo and prep for bear season. Had some visitors from Fairbanks in the meantime for some Kuiu Beer sampling and general shenanigans.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
Got my bear baits put in with the help of a few friends and slowly started getting more and more visitors this spring. The sow brown bear with two adult cubs was a frustrating lady, she bluff charged me several times coming/going from bait and ran off every other bear. She was a terror for a month straight nearly on what is usually my best bait.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
After swearing I’d arrow the first cubless brown bear that gave me a chance (I’d been trying for 3 years)... I went back on my word and passed a young boar early in the season. Just didn’t feel like it was the right time yet, and there were some very large bears from the previous year that hadn’t showed yet.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
The previous summer I picked up a small piece of property near where I bait to start a cabin project. First year was clean up year. We hauled off over 3000 lbs of tires piled up and had a wrecker remove 3 junk cars. Later had a dozer come in and 27 tons of gravel later I have my driveway for this coming summer to continue the project.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
As bear season continued into the second half of season, Travis flew up to join me for a week in bear camp. We had entirely too much alcohol and fun, and Travis took an awesome boar while I was busy battling with that ornery sow a few miles away.
From: Medicinemann
26-Dec-18
Keep it coming!!
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
A couple nights after Travis’ boar I finally got my chance at a decent brown bear. Not the biggest bear we had on cams but I was just stoked to finally arrow my first, and a P&Y animal at that. I dreamnt of bowhunting the big bears growing up and it was a driving force behind my move to Alaska. Jon and Nick were down from Fairbanks to help me track it and share the experience. I’m not big on taxidermy but I pulled the trigger on this one and will have my first mount since 2010 done w a half body mount.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
Our baits produced a few more bears throughout the season... a couple firsts and second bears. I was completely happy to pass on shooting a blackie this year to let friends have their turns.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
After cleaning up the bait sites summer was in full swing and it was a mad dash to enjoy it while we can up north. Hiking, fishing, and unfortunately work occupied most of my time. I did get some quality time in with family visiting, and got creative with how to deliver a picnic table to bear camp.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
Blink and summer is over and it was time to be off on my solo walk in dall sheep hunt. I took the rifle this year as I was antsy to finally get a ram before buckling down with the bow. I can’t go into a ton of detail since I’m writing an article for the hunt, but it was an awesome adventure cut short from 12 days to 5 with a heavy walk out. I got to really put the new Kifaru Muskeg line to the test this fall and I can’t say enough good things. A huge water resistant bombproof pack, what’s not to love.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
Driving back to town from packing out my ram, Nick calls and says he was going to the haul road for caribou for a long weekend. Perfect! Vacation days won’t be wasted in town. I drive to anchorage, repack my bags, and fly up to Fairbanks to hop in the rig with him and head north. We got two days of hunting in, and they were productive. Nick shot a young meat bull and shortly after I killed my best bull yet, snapping a 5 year dry spell on caribou.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
For a full disclosure post, I also had some incredible stalks on arctic grizzlies that weekend. A combo of bad luck and a poorly placed arrow resulted in not recovering a gorgeous bear. It was a bitter sweet weekend.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
I went back to anchorage for 2 days of work then hopped a plane down to Colorado for a high country mule deer hunt. I spent a day visiting with fellow bowsite regular Jason Zemlicka and his wife before meeting up with otcWill and heading south to my unit. It was great to be in the mountains again with an awesome friend. We glassed up dozens of bucks each day and two days later season began. We had located a stellar buck and moved into rifle range opening day but the wind wasn’t right so we backed out. The next day I moved in on the same bachelor group with a better wind. A long drawn out stalk including getting pelted by hail and I found myself closing in on the buck of my dreams. He fed away behind some buck brush with his little brother and as I rounded the corner they had vanished. My heart sank as I heard a twig snap at 5 yards, I had overshot my approach and walked nearly on top of him. He stepped out at 6 yards broadside but busted me as I came to full draw with little cover. Big learning curve your first time hunting mature bucks in the high country. I still revisit that moment in my mind every single day. I had planned for this trip for 9 years and blew a golden opportunity. Will left for work the next day and I stayed 3 more to try and seal the deal on other bucks. I came close several times but never got it done.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
It’s no secret both Will and I are found of bourbon, so we made sure to bring plenty along to stay hydrated back at camp each night. I had an incredible time, and was so stoked he was able to join me to lend a hand glassing/finding basins bucks were in. This hunt wouldn’t have went nearly as smoothly without him.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
I returned to Anchorage again for 3 days of work this time before flying into the Alaska Range with my buddy Brad to hopefully help him pack out a caribou on his draw tag and attempt to glass up a grizzly while there. We got hammered with poor weather and the caribou were few and far between but it was an amazing few days in the mountains.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
The following week Brad and I were slated to fly west for our moose hunt. We only had 7 days to work with, but seeing 12 bulls on the flight in were confident we could get in done with the bows. We called in a different bull every day to rifle range, but the only bull we got into archery range was a small paddle bull. The big boys were either diverted by a bad wind or other cows with them. It was an awesome action packed week but again no blood drawn. I was hitting a dry spell!
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
I originally had planned to head east for a Mtn Goat Hunt on the coast the first week of October, but a few days before leaving the weather looked absolutely horrible. Chatting with Nick the weather looked amazing up north so I called an audible and again flew up to Fairbanks. We drove up north for a cold, and sparsely populated caribou hunt. We got one “stalk” in but this turned out to be a fun roadtrip, some good beers/story telling/and incredible northern lights viewing trip. My dry streak continues, the Colorado curse had got me!
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
A few weeks later it was time for Travis, Brian, and I to leave for Kodiak. Travis had a family emergency come up and had to bail last minute... but Brian and I decided to go on without. We had a brand new pack raft to try out for crossing the lake, and I had an itchy trigger finger on my release hand. We had an epic trip. Brian got his first archery blacktail, and I took my biggest. We had dozens of other close stalks, and Brian had a few misses. I was being more selective this trip after last years hunt of taking 9 bucks. My brand new raft was destroyed by a bear in camp mid week, I never even got the chance to inflate it once! The same bear (ended up being a big ass sow with two cubs) raised Brian’s meat cache in some nearby willows.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
I spent the bulk of November trying to get caught up with backlog of ABA treasurer duties and scoring animals for friends. Sidebar here, I totally blanked earlier in the thread on thanking Ed and Eli for working with me to bring a P&Y Measurers course to Anchorage so we could add some more scorers up north. It was an awesome class, and great weekend overall. The final night Jack Frost invited us all over to his trophy room for pizza and story telling.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
The last weekend of November I flew down to Missoula and met up with Huntman for a southern Idaho late season mule deer hunt. We got hammered with heavy snow conditions and tough hunting but still managed to glass up some good bucks. Nick joined for the weekend and it was a fun get together. Since that hunt had a thread of its own I’ll spare the pictures here.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
I flew back to Anchorage for a week of work and to clean up from the earthquake damage that I missed (my place came out okay overall) a lot of broken glass but no foundation cracks and all my mounts fell yet survived.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
This road was 2 miles from my place, overall our city got extremely lucky for a 7.0 quake to have as little overall damage as we did and zero deaths.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
Room service seemed to like Travis more than me apparently
Room service seemed to like Travis more than me apparently
After a chaotic week I again returned to Idaho for my last hunt of 2018. Travis flew up and met me in Boise and we had 5 days to chase Mtn lions around with his buddy who runs hounds. I had a great week and was hopeful after the early snow conditions but conditions worsened as I arrived with snow icing over/disappearing daily. We never ended up turning up a single track the entire trip with multiple people out looking. We did have one crazy encounter though. Travis and I came up on a dead lion. Not sure if poachers abandoned it since it was a small cat, or a bigger lion got it. Weird way to walk up on a dead lion on your lion hunt though.
From: TEmbry
26-Dec-18
Overall it would be a toss up between 2017 and 2018 for which was a better year. Had more bloody arrows in 17 but a lot more new experiences and time afield with friends in 18. Incredible how a website like Bowsite can allow you to meet like minded people you call friends the rest of your life. Already looking forward to 2019, should be the best year yet :)
From: tkjwonta
26-Dec-18
Incredible year Trevor, thanks for sharing. It will be tough to top in 2019, but I'm confident you'll give it a darn good effort.
From: BULELK1
26-Dec-18
Very Kool thread T
Good luck, Robb
From: nogutsnostory
26-Dec-18
Congrats on your 2018 adventures!!
From: Treeline
26-Dec-18
Great adventures and several great animals for ‘18! Congratulations Trevor! Hope you have an awesome 2019!
From: Bowboy
26-Dec-18
You had quite the year congrats!
From: Buffalo1
26-Dec-18
An action packed year to say the least. Congrats on some nice trophies and some fun adventures.
Hope your 2019 will be a great one !!
From: kota-man
26-Dec-18
Livin the dream...Congrats on a great year!
From: EmbryOklahoma
26-Dec-18
Congrats, Trevor! Surely 2019 will be even more successful. Thanks for sharing!
From: Beav
26-Dec-18
What a year of great adventures and some awesome trophies! Sounds like everyone of your hunts was a great success!!
From: HUNT MAN
26-Dec-18
Thanks for the recap Tetter. Can’t wait for the next one
From: OFFHNTN
26-Dec-18
Great year, congrats! Thanks for sharing!
From: Ambush
26-Dec-18
When you're smiling big on both successes and "failures" you know you truly love it! Congrats on an another awesome season!
From: T Mac
26-Dec-18
Wow what a year of great adventures! Thanks for sharing.
From: Amoebus
26-Dec-18
The pictures seem to get more topsy-turvy as more bourbon is consumed ...
Sounds like a fun year.
From: Brotsky
26-Dec-18
Cory said it best, you're living the dream for sure Trevor! Congrats on a great 2018! Thanks for taking the time to share it with us!
From: sticksender
26-Dec-18
Wow what a great year.....excellent write-up!
From: njbuck
26-Dec-18
You had a hell of a year with some great adventures. Best of luck up 19'!!
From: Oryx35
26-Dec-18
That's awesome...congrats!
From: SBH
26-Dec-18
Well told! Thanks for the recap. You had a great year, like you said, the arrows don't always hit exactly right but thats not the end all of everything. Lots of adventure and learning. Your due for a few good breaks in 2019!!
From: otcWill
26-Dec-18
Disclaimer: yes it's happy hour but it's a day (or 2) before season
Disclaimer: yes it's happy hour but it's a day (or 2) before season
Had as much fun chasing deer and the dragon with you in Aug as I've had since last Halloween. Good stuff brother! See you in September
From: Nick Muche
26-Dec-18
Muy Bueno willy! We had some good times for sure, can't wait for winter to be over so we can do it all again.
From: IdyllwildArcher
26-Dec-18
Man, this thread makes me want to go hunting. Can’t wait to hear and see next year’s Trevor.
From: Trial153
26-Dec-18
Great tread, glad to see you doing well!
From: Bowfreak
26-Dec-18
Awesome thread. The Lt. Dangle outfit hero shot is priceless. LOL!
From: Marty
26-Dec-18
Wow, awesome year!
From: TravisScott
26-Dec-18
What an awesome year man!!! Can’t wait to keep the train going!
From: BOWUNTR
26-Dec-18
You're a bad ass... period. Thanks for sharing. 2019 is gonna top all years for you... Ed F
From: bowhunter24
27-Dec-18
Thanks for taking us along looking forward to 2019!
From: Slate
27-Dec-18
Congrats good for you. Only one life to live I hope you inspire others
From: TEmbry
27-Dec-18
Thanks guys! Always fun to put the year on a timeline and relive the adventures. I also posted to show it’s not always bloody arrows every single time out, certainly not in my case. I have just as much fun hunting/learning all the same and hanging out with good buddies. Hope everyone has a killer 2019 lined up, I know I certainly do :)
From: Willieboat
27-Dec-18
Thanks for sharing !
From: CK
28-Dec-18
Incredible year! You've got it figured out.
From: BOWNBIRDHNTR
28-Dec-18
Awesome right up, thanks for sharing. I've sat in that same seat at the Dream Catcher in Arizona....not really roughing it on that trip! Can't wait to see what 2019 brings for you!!
From: Scott/IL
28-Dec-18
Bad ass year again Trevor!
From: Paul@thefort
28-Dec-18
And I thought I hunted a lot. Nicely done. my best, Paul
From: WV Mountaineer
28-Dec-18
Good stuff man. Sounds like a great time had by all.
From: drycreek
28-Dec-18
I love a good picture thread, and this is one of the best. Congrats on a good year and hopes for a better one in 2019 !
From: BIG BEAR
28-Dec-18
Holy crap man.... what do you do for a living ?? Maybe it’s not too late for me to change careers to be able to afford that life !! You’re living the dream !!!
From: Scar Finga
28-Dec-18
Busy Busy Year Man, it's looks successful all the way around! Congratulations!
From: TEmbry
28-Dec-18
Haha I’m just a pharmacist man. Not rich by any stretch of the imagination. It’s amazing how many hunts you can squeeze in for $10k when you go DIY and get creative with planning.
From: BIG BEAR
28-Dec-18
Good for you man !! Are you up in Fairbanks?? Is that how you know Nick ?? I wish I had contacted you guys when I was up there at the tail end of our family cruise vacation, to buy you guys a beer or 2..... We spent the last day in Fairbanks and didn’t do much there.... We ran into Stan Zuray from Yukon Men on our flight from Fairbanks to Anchorage.......
Keep living the dream !!!
From: Julius Koenig
28-Dec-18
Congrats on a great year Trevor. Looking forward to seeing what next year provides ya.
From: midwest
28-Dec-18
Great year, Trevor! Hope to be on that same Colorado mountain in 2020!
From: BigOk
29-Dec-18
Congrats!!
