Huntguide.Com Prostaff Visits Adventures West
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Shawn Klinger Huntguide Prostaff, Wyoming 2002 |
The process of selecting an outfitter can be a difficult and daunting task. With so many outfitters in the market place today, how do you ensure the outfitter you select will deliver what is promised. Unless you know someone who has first hand experience with an outfitter, the onus is on you to do the homework and find out as much as you can about the outfitter before making any commitment. One way to help improve your odds of selecting a reputable outfitter is to utilize a hunting consultant. The HuntGuide staff recently utilized the services of Adventures West to book a whitetail hunt with an outfitter in Wyoming. As you will see, both Denny and myself successfully harvested two nice western whitetails through the use of a hunting consultant.
Hunting consultants inherently share in the risk. They are in the business of linking hunters with outfitters. Obviously, if they have an outfitter whom consistently fails to deliver for their clients, its not good business for the hunting consultant to continue offering hunts with that outfitter. The hunting consultant builds his reputation on the success of the outfitters through which he offers his hunt packages.
As we finalized the 2002 hunting schedule for the HuntGuide Prostaff, we were looking for a high success whitetail hunt that would allow us to see plenty of whitetails each day. We checked with a few of our hunting consultants who advertise on Huntguide.Com and decided to go with Keith Hartman of Adventures West. Even though Keith is fairly small as far as the number of outfitters he books for, he is very selective. Keith has been a consultant for 2 years, he books for 8 outfitters in 5 different states. His outfitters specialize in mule deer hunts, but also offer high quality elk, whitetail and antelope trips as well. Over the past 20 years he has gone on several hunts for various species of animals. Keith was a successful outfitter operating his own Blacktail Buck business in Northern California. Keith specializes in high quality outfitters who offer a great hunt, with extremely high success rates that are still affordable.
Our outfitter for this whitetail hunt would be Wyoming Wildlife Outfitters, based out of Sheridan, Wyoming. This family owned outfitting business has been guiding hunters for over 40 years. Rob Marosok, the owner of Wyoming Wildlife Outfitters, met us at the Sheridan airport. Rob has been a licensed guide for almost 20 years. The outfitting venture was originally started by Rob’s father and over the years grew into a successful business.
Our package included 1 on 1 guide service for a 4-day hunt, 4 night’s accommodations at a Holiday Inn, noontime lunches, and transportation to and from the field. In order to maintain good quality mature bucks on the leases they hunt, Wyoming Wildlife Outfitters only accepts up to three whitetail hunters per year. Denny and I would be hunting the last week of November, and as we found out, the bucks were still in rut.
On the first day of our hunt, we were picked up at the hotel around 5:30 a.m. by our guides, Travis and Chris Bickel. It took about an hour to drive the 40 miles to where we would be hunting. The terrain was primarily pasture fields and river bottom wood lots surrounded by sagebrush hills. The weather our first day was cold and blustery. In fact, as Chris and I left the truck around 6:30 a.m., I thought to myself this would probably be a long cold day…..boy was I wrong! Denny and Travis were hunting the far end of the property while Chris and I planned to still hunt the side of the sage brush hills overlooking the river bottom wood lots.
As Chris and I worked our way across the open pasture field, Chris spotted several different whitetails moving through the fields around us, but due to the low light, we couldn’t determine if any of them were bucks. Chris suggested we circle around the deer and position ourselves on the sagebrush hills where we could get above the deer for a better look. Chris, a guide with Wyoming Wildlife Outfitters for 4 years, knew we could utilize a large drainage ditch, which ran along the sagebrush hills, to hide our stalk.
After covering about 200 yards in the ditch, we crawled out to start glassing the pasture fields and river bottom. Without even putting the binoculars to my eyes, I immediately spotted a nice buck about 150 yards away. Chris was already checking the buck out when I looked over at him. The buck had 10 points and appeared to be close to a 130 class buck. He was with several doe and was completely unaware of our presence.
As Chris and I watched the 10 point feeding, we saw several other bucks moving around the field. We saw two small bucks, a spike and Y buck, and a nice 8 point. The 8 point had a much higher rack, but not near as wide as the 10 point. After a few minutes of debating, I decided to take a shot at the 10 point. Of course, by the time I decided to shoot, the buck had moved into some thick brush and I had to wait for a clear shot. After what seemed like forever, 5 minutes, the doe which were with the 10 point decided it was time to move elsewhere. As the buck jumped the barbed wire fence to follow, he stopped for a moment and gave me the shot opportunity I was waiting for. One shot from the 300 Win. Magnum ended my hunt.
Dennis Latsha HuntGuide Prostaff
I looked at my watch, and it was 7:15 a.m. My Wyoming whitetail hunt had lasted only 45 minutes. As you can see from the picture, he was hard to pass up.
On the first day of his hunt, Denny saw several nice buck, but none of which he decided to shoot. During the morning, he saw two small buck and one doe while still-hunting the river bottom. Later in the morning, he saw an 8 point with six doe. During the afternoon, Denny and Travis took up a position on the sagebrush hill near where I had killed my buck. While glassing from their elevated position, they spotted a nice 10 point bedded down about 180 yards away in some thick brush. Since there was no rush, they decided to stay in the same position all afternoon to get a better look at the 10 point.
Around 2:00 p.m., two doe came out into the field and started feeding. At 4:00 p.m., an 8 point joined the doe in the field. Although the 8 point was a nice deer, Denny decided to wait for a better buck. A little later, around 4:30 p.m., the bedded 10 point joined the group and started sparring with the 8 point only 70 yards away from Denny and Travis. Again, Denny and Travis felt they could do better than the 10 point since this was the first day, so they decided to pass on him as well. As they walked back to the truck, they saw yet another 8 point at only 40 yards away, but again, decided to pass.
We started the second day where we ended the first. This time, however, Denny had three guides to help him locate a deer. Denny, Travis and I set up on the sagebrush hill again overlooking the river bottom wood lots. Chris hiked over the backside of the sagebrush hill to glass some fields on the other side. Around 7:30 a.m., an 8 point caught our attention about 150 yards away. The rack was high and symmetrical. After a little discussion, we opted to pass on the 8 point. As each decision needed to be made, it was becoming increasingly harder for Denny to keep passing these nice bucks up. I wasn’t sure how many more Denny could pass on!
We spent the rest of the morning hunting the sagebrush hills for whitetails. I almost felt like we were mule deer hunting, but believe it or not, the whitetails were bedded down and milling around in the hills along with the mule deer. We saw several nice buck and Denny was able to stalk to within 70 yards of a bedded 4 X 3 whitetail, but once again, not quite the caliber buck Denny was looking to harvest.
After eating lunch, we decided to return to where we hunted the morning. We made one mistake walking back to our location. Instead of walking in the drainage ditch to hide our approach, we assumed no deer would be in the fields feeding at 1:00 p.m. and so we walked on the topside of the ditch. As we neared our destination, we spotted two deer watching our approach 200 yards away. A closer inspection revealed it was the same 8 point from that morning. After taking another look at this deer, Denny decided the buck was better than he thought. By the time Denny got positioned for the shot, the buck had moved into the brush and the opportunity was gone.
We decided to setup and wait to see if the buck would show himself again. It wasn’t until 4:30 p.m. until we saw movement in the brush. It was the 8 point and he was hanging tight with a doe. It was clear to see this buck was still acting a little rut crazy. We watched the buck through the trees and it seemed like he was very hesitant to move into the open. He was still 200 yards away, so Denny had to very selective with his shot placement and wait for the right opportunity. Finally, after 15 minutes of waiting, he started to move into open ground. Just as Denny was seconds from taking the shot, the buck suddenly turned and bolted back into the brush. So ended the second day of the hunt. All told, we saw around seven different buck throughout the day and close to twenty doe.
We decided to start our third day by hunting the same location where we left the 8 point the day before. This time, however, we used the drainage ditch to conceal our movement until we reached our location. We reached our position around 7:00 a.m. and began glassing. Almost immediately, Travis located an 8 point moving our direction. Unbelievably, it was the same 8 point from the day before. By the time Denny readied for the shot, the buck had moved from 150 yards away to within 50 yards. In fact, because of the angle of the deer to our position on the hill, Denny had to belly crawl over a muddy mound of dirt to reposition for the shot. One shot from Denny’s 300 Weatherby Magnum and the HuntGuide Staff went 2 for 2 on this hunt!
Our experience with Wyoming Wildlife Outfitters was excellent. Our guides, Travis and Chris Bickel, were extremely knowledgeable regarding the area we were hunting and they both had an extremely good knack for picking out deer. Travis has been guiding with Wyoming Wildlife Outfitters for seven years and Chris has been guiding for four years. Although they were guiding us on a whitetail hunt, a majority of their time is spent guiding mule deer and antelope hunters. During the time they have been guiding, Travis has only had two clients who did not kill a mule deer, and Chris has only had one. Both Denny and I were very happy with the Bickel brothers as our guides.
Wyoming Wildlife Outfitters offers a variety of hunts. Their most popular hunts are mule deer and antelope. They typically guide between 30 and 40 mule deer hunters each year. This year, they had 30 mule deer hunters with 28 of them killing a deer. The picture of the mule deer in this article was taken during the 2002 season. The average mule deer harvested has a 20 to 22 inch spread. Wyoming Wildlife Outfitters typically guides 12 to 15 antelope hunters each year. For the 2002 season, they guided 14 hunters and enjoyed a 95% success rate. The average antelope buck runs in the 12 ½ to 13 ½ inch range. Hunting is conducted on 7 to 8 leases, which encompass approximately 70,000 acres of hunting ground. They offer both archery and rifle hunts.
In addition to mule deer and antelope, they also offer mountain lion hunts. They only accept 1 to 3 hunters per year and success is usually high, depending on snowfall. Since lion hunting depends on snow, they prefer if a hunter can be on-call for these types of hunts, as weather is hard to predict.
And of course, if your interested in a whitetail hunt, they limit the number of hunters to 3 per year. They currently have 2 to 3 leases they hunt depending on which areas are open to whitetail hunting each year. Whitetail hunts are conducted in November and typically coincide with the rut. The average whitetail you can expect to see will be around 130 class, but opportunities exist to take larger class bucks in the 140 and 150 class range. To date, they have had 100% success on whitetail hunts for the past several years. While 90% of their hunts are 2 hunters to 1 guide, they do offer 1 on 1 guide service. Also, keep in mind that 50% of their hunters rebook the following year.
Remember, most license applications for western big game hunts need to be submitted to the appropriate state agency by February or March if you’re planning a hunt for 2003. If you would like to book a hunt with Wyoming Wildlife Outfitters or you would like information on Keith’s other high quality, high success hunts, be sure to visit the Adventures West web site at www.adventureswestrecreation.com or contact Keith Hartman at (805) 237-1254.
Shawn Klinger
HuntGuide.Com ProStaff
