So....
Two of us 50+ year-olds went upland hunting with a barely-30 guy in great shape. I 'thought' I was in good shape.
We walked an amazing distance. Worked some good draws between rugged divides. Harvested a few dove. Jumped a small covey of quail. We all got a few.
My legs are getting tired, and I'm running out of fluids, I'm thinking we're about done, and you guessed it. We found the mother lode of quail in the most rugged draw.
A fresh shot of adrenaline and we're on the hunt again. The quail were most cooperative. They would hold tight until we were right on them. Then they'd flush in waves. You could shoot, reload, and shoot again, all in one place. Then we'd start to move along the draw, walk about 4 feet and another wave would flush behind us!
So we pushed this covey over a mile down this rugged draw, shooting wave after wave. By this time, the dog was getting so tired she would only retreive the easy kills. So the only time we paused was to hike the rugged terrain the fetch a bird that the dog was smart enough to leave.
Us older guys were seriously pushing ourselves to keep up with this young buck and his dog. If we had shot better, we would not have been able to hunt as far...
We finally ran out of ammo long after we ran out of fluids. And, of course, we're another rugged mile farther from the truck.
But what can you do? We sucked it up and tried to keep up with superman.
The dog gets so tired she would just lay down on the trail and not move a few minutes. Under my breath, I blessed her for her sense.
About halfway back, we find a little water hole about a foot deep. The dog gets in and hunkers down so just her ears, eyes and nose are out of the water. Such a look of bliss on her face. I was so jealous.
She drinks about half the hole, then double-times back to the truck, with The Flash right behind her. Me and my seasoned buddy pushed until I was almost ready to call life flight.
But we made it. And quail are in the oven.
And Google Earth tells us we could've taken another road to about half-mile from that draw...
Two of us 50+ year-olds went upland hunting with a barely-30 guy in great shape. I 'thought' I was in good shape.
We walked an amazing distance. Worked some good draws between rugged divides. Harvested a few dove. Jumped a small covey of quail. We all got a few.
My legs are getting tired, and I'm running out of fluids, I'm thinking we're about done, and you guessed it. We found the mother lode of quail in the most rugged draw.
A fresh shot of adrenaline and we're on the hunt again. The quail were most cooperative. They would hold tight until we were right on them. Then they'd flush in waves. You could shoot, reload, and shoot again, all in one place. Then we'd start to move along the draw, walk about 4 feet and another wave would flush behind us!
So we pushed this covey over a mile down this rugged draw, shooting wave after wave. By this time, the dog was getting so tired she would only retreive the easy kills. So the only time we paused was to hike the rugged terrain the fetch a bird that the dog was smart enough to leave.
Us older guys were seriously pushing ourselves to keep up with this young buck and his dog. If we had shot better, we would not have been able to hunt as far...
We finally ran out of ammo long after we ran out of fluids. And, of course, we're another rugged mile farther from the truck.
But what can you do? We sucked it up and tried to keep up with superman.
The dog gets so tired she would just lay down on the trail and not move a few minutes. Under my breath, I blessed her for her sense.
About halfway back, we find a little water hole about a foot deep. The dog gets in and hunkers down so just her ears, eyes and nose are out of the water. Such a look of bliss on her face. I was so jealous.
She drinks about half the hole, then double-times back to the truck, with The Flash right behind her. Me and my seasoned buddy pushed until I was almost ready to call life flight.
But we made it. And quail are in the oven.
And Google Earth tells us we could've taken another road to about half-mile from that draw...
