Our Busy Weekend

[Circle C]

Saturday morning Mandi and I headed out. Our plan was for her to go to her sheep dog trial in Brenham, I was heading to Leakey/Mountain Home area to hunt an Axis buck. Then we were going to meet in Flatonia that evening and run the dogs with Clay, Stacy, Adam, Jason and Laura. Then run them again Sunday AM.

Here are the pictures and the stories...

First up, the sheep dog trials. This is our pup Palin, she is a little under 6 months of age, and earned her first title this weekend, at her first sheep dog trial.




Next is my Axis hunt turned Aoudad hunt
I met with Will of www.wcoutfitters.com at his ranch about 4:00pm, we went and did a few chores then headed to the spot he has been seeing the axis buck that I came out to hunt. Things are greening up out there, and he just filled the protein feeders a few days before, so the deer were not as quick to come when the feeder went off. A short time later we had 12 turkey hens, 2 toms, 4 fallow, 4 aoudad, and about a dozen nice axis bucks. My buck still hadn't shown up, but there were more deer still filing in from the brush toward the feeder.  I am not sure what happened next, but either they busted us, or something else spooked them, but everything took off. Feeder went off one more time about 30 minutes later,and the fallow, turkey, 1 huge axis buck, and one aoudad came back. Then 3 more aoudad. We spotted a couple of nice ones in the group, one was a definite shooter. Dark was coming on and the axis bucks were not coming back in. I made the decision to take an aoudad, as I have yet to shoot one. Will mentioned that after I shot mine, he was going for another himself, as he does not want the aoudad out there eating all the protein. I shot mine in the shoulder with my 308 and he went about 50 yards then dropped, the other 3 headed out. Will nailed one, then told me to take another. I shot it, then he shot the 4th one. In a matter of seconds we had 4 aoudad on the ground. Having the aoudad show up was a blessing in disguise, now I get to go back to Will's ranch this coming weekend and hunt for my axis buck again...

Here are the pictures of them, one is being shoulder mounted, the other good one will be a euro mount.






While I was away in the hill country, Mandi, Clay, Stacy, Adam, Jason and Laura turned the dogs out near Flatonia. They ended up with a nice boar about 125-150#, never seen a hog so pissed at the world as this one.  One of the hunters will have to tell you the story, as I was not there.
He is the boar on the left




Sunday AM we met with the ranch manager at about 7:00 and turned out again.Went to a little creek bottom and Buck went out about 500 yards, Clay spotted the hogs in an open field about the same time we heard Buck open up. We sent a few more dogs to help him out, and we heard them catch. The rest of the hogs broke and head every direction. On our way to the bay, we saw one in an open field and cut Stacy's catch dog Law loose on it. Law caught up with the hog, but wasn't able to get a good hold on it, then the hog turned on the afterburners and left the country real quick like.  Mandi, the ranch manager, and myself went to the caught hog( maybe 75# sow), gathered the dogs, and met back up with Clay, Stacy and Adam.  We then headed North to an oat patch and feeder they have been hitting lately. Buck rolled out again, and had one bayed, when the other dogs got there, the bay broke. He ended up .6 miles to the North, and we had Coal and Clay's Mandi dog a mile to our South.  We went and picked them up, then headed back in the direction Buck was at when we left. We found him bayed in a creek bed, the other dogs got to him, and Mandi sent in Meathead to catch. Ended up with another nice boar about 125#

Here is Law trying one out


Here is Adam and Peaches with the boar.

[HIPOCKETS]

Sounds like yall had a heck of a time ,,glad to see the dogs working the way you want ,,Sound like yall had fun ,,but as luck goes ,, strike dogs splitting in part of the game ,,lol
LAVON

[Rowdy]

nice job heck of a weekend

[catchrcall]

your gonna have to go back to work to recover from the weekend!  That Palin is a sharp looking dog.  I like the pictures.

[Gangly]

Nice Hunt.  Glad to see your Axis Deer Hunt turned into a good Audad hunt.  Where the dogs riding on the rig when they caught scent or running the ground?  Congrats for the herding competition.

[uglydog]

Congarts to Mandi and Palin! those are pretty cool pictures!

Thank You for the meat by the way, don't know if I told you or not, The dogs had a major feast last night!

I like those Audad, never seen one up that close to realize how big they are, Thomas started talking about getting one for our wall too, Gee Thanks Chris!

[Circle C]

Krystal,

     I am going back this weekend, maybe Thomas should hitch a ride with us. Kailey (our 8y/o) is hunting for her first axis, and I am going for the elusive one.

Gangly,
 
     Sunday am the dogs were on the ground. I did not take Jeckyl with us on this hunt.

[aladatrot]

Krystal you can start worrying when Thomas starts talking about needing a Cape Buffalo for yall's wall....

Cheers
M

ps thanks for the congrats on Palin. She's a lot of fun, but a little hard to get close to sometimes. She's not mean or antisocial, just a "distant" sort of dog.

m

[Gangly]

Nice, congrats again!

[kp]

I don't know what you shot, or what you fed Krystal's dogs...but the Aoudad that Marty and I shot last spring were DEE-licious!!!  We both killed some young ewe's, and I can't describe how good that backstrap was.  Congrats!

kp

[BMichalak]

That does looks liek a busy weekend! Hey Circle C where at was that sheep dog contest at in brenham? and if you dont mind who was putting that on? Cuz I am from brenham and i didnt know that was going on? be interesting to find out

[BoarBuster67]

Man,what a weekend. Both hunts turned out awesome. Nice Aoudad. Mandy teach you to shoot,lol

[Circle C]

KP,

  All four aoudad shot were rams, however none of them had a rank smell that I am told they often have. 3 of them were used to bait hog traps, the 4th was fed to uglydogs. I must say that you and Marty are the only two people I have ever heard that like aoudad

Brent,

  The dog trial was at Carver Cutting Horses, between Brenham and Somerville. Mandi drives out there 3-4 times a month to work her dogs and get lessons from Terri Carver.


Harry,
   
    No question that Mandi can shoot,,,but she likes to shoot little guns. 22, 22 hornet, and 223.  One thing that made this hunt so much fun was the opportunity to do some instinct shooting. First shot I took my time. Next two shots were quick, and deadly. You may remember the Ruger #1, 308 single shot from the last time you were here. That is the rifle I used.

[Texas_Cur]

We caught the boar Saturday night about 11pm.  We heard the dogs strike up a group of hogs, the dogs got em bayed a couple of times but each time the bay broke.  Well it got real quiet and we could hear a lot of running.  Next thing you know my BMC pup Peachez opened up about 150 yards from us.  Stacy cut her pit Law loose and you could hear her hit but no squeal.  When I jumped the fence and turned my light on the hog I could see the hog with a pit and a half a dozen curs hanging off it.  I legged it and Clay came in and hobbled it.  This wasn't the biggest hog but boy he was mean, he never let out even the smallest squeal.  The thing I enjoyed most about it was watching Jason's kiddos go from sound asleep to bright eyed and bushy tailed the second the action started.

Thanks again for the invite guys, I had a great time!  I got to see some great dogs work in Buck, Bo and Mandy  The only disappointment was no McDonald's Sunday morning    

[madshark]

Harry,
   
    No question that Mandi can shoot,,,but she likes to shoot little guns. 22, 22 hornet, and 223.  One thing that made this hunt so much fun was the opportunity to do some instinct shooting. First shot I took my time. Next two shots were quick, and deadly. You may remember the Ruger #1, 308 single shot from the last time you were here. That is the rifle I used.

If she likes small calibers, try a 17 Mach II.  I set one up on 10/22, Bull Barrel and thumbhole stock.  The thing cuts one ragged hole at 50 yds.

[ESTEBAN_B]

nice pics chris!

[jhy]

Sounds like a great weekend.  I am jealous for sure.  Dont know much about those Aoudad, but they dont look like they would taste very good at all!

Mandi,

Awesome job with the pup and congrats on the title. 

Joey

[OutdoorGirl]

Of course... what another great weekend, hogs, dogs, and friends. Chris and Mandi, I sure love the this pic of law chasing that hog. She sure tried but man did that hog take off. Texas_Cur, I think that we all were disappointed about McDonalds. Hope we can do it soon again.

[nate]

Great stories. Nice looking yellow dog too.

[de_moon]

Nice auodad Dude!!  Sounds like a good weekend.  Good luck with the axis hunt!!