The challenge of hunting the fastest land animal in North America...on a pool table...
Within these pages we will attempt to explain our Pronghorn hunting experiences in hopes of helping anyone with the drive & motivation to give Pronghorn hunting a "shot!"
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While we began as total novices in the fall of 2011, we have learned many valuable lessons. Most of these were learned the hard way of studying, discussions, and actually doing. We've tried many different methods in Colorado - all on public land and DiY hunts. We did try different Game Management Units (GMUs) while trying on various types of terrain.
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After some studying and trial by error, we tried the ambush method of sitting behind huge Yucca plants, drive and spot, dropping shooters off at different points, and even spot and stalk (actually ended up being spot and crawl)!
Our first Pronghorn Hunt in October 2011. We hunted the Comanche National Grasslands just outside of LaJunta, Colorado during the first part of the hunt and then switched to Hugo State Wildlife Area for the last few days. Since the hunting area is so close to town, we stayed at the KOA in an RV and spoiled ourselves! We had conducted a recon prior to the opener and found a deep old river bed that ran throughout the area. We estimated the time and distance to a spot in the middle of the grid and away from the numerous "road hunters." We arrived early, parked in a dip along the road and headed into the gully. Our pace count/map guy, who only hunted with us this one time, kept saying "further, further." We quickly realized he was way off as we could just see the darkness turn to daybreak. We had no choice but to pop up out of the gully, grab a Yucca, and begin glassing. The hunt ended up successful as one of the party (and our pace count guy!) got a very nice buck at just over 100 yards with his .308. We dragged him for over a mile and had to skin him quickly as the temperature, even at this time of year, quickly rose above 50 degrees by mid-morning. What was daunting was the amount of shooting from near by parked trucks that spooked the antelope enough that it began to look like the middle of a pool table after a hard break. Hunting these "speed goats" is far harder than we initially thought. You have to factor in the terrain, possible long range shooting techniques, heavily hunted public land, and their eyesight! We gained valuable experience and stuck to this spot for many years.
Our second Pronghorn Hunt in GMU 144 in Baca County during December 2013. We hunted the Comanche National Grasslands and also had the late Plains Whitetail tags which are fairly easy to get in Colorado. Our good friend, Jon, joined us for his first hunt for a couple days. He bought a .300 Win Mag and we all had a great time on the range just prior to the opener. We were also joined by some other friends and decided to set up base camp at the Carbizo camp site which had an enclosed toilet, picnic tables, and a shelter. We learned some valuable lessons about pounding tent stakes into rocky terrain! As with many Pronghorn hunts, we spotted by slowly driving in a grid pattern. Some grids were approximately one mile square. We spotted a small herd in one grid corner so continued driving over a terrain feature, of which there weren't many. We dropped off a buddy who basically high crawled from Yucca to Yucca until he was in range. As he was about to take the shot, a red truck drove by, slammed his brakes, leaned out his open window and shot the nice buck. We couldn't believe it and continued to watch him drag, load the illegally taken buck, and scoop snow over it. We called the Game Warden for the area who we'd met a couple nights prior to report details. He was a ways off so we followed the red truck while calling in the location. After a few minutes, we watched the Warden make the stop. We talked to him later and relayed the story. He was very grateful and put us onto some other small herd locations. We hunted for many, many miles in various terrain but just could not get a shot. We learned some valuable lessons about spotting and stalking, though!