Antelope Season, I haven't been to excited this year, mostly because I haven't seen anything to get excited about on the Antelope side of things.  I try not to shoot anything unless it betters the one I shot the year before.  Last year my buddy Chief (pictured above) helped me get the goat of my dreams, so this year it was my turn to help him.  I'd been watching this buck for about 2 weeks thinking that he would be what Chief needed, I'd like to get him something bigger but there just hasn't been anything around lately, I think the drought has run them off, there has been a lot of rain to the north of us, and that seems to be where the large herds are hanging around.  So on opening day of South Dakota's 2nd Antelope season, Chief came out, I made him work cattle until about noon and then we hit the hills.  I thought we would make a spot and stalk from somewhere on the north side of the ranch, but the Antelope spotted us first and having already survived one week of Hunting Season, they didn't want anything to do with us.  They went up to a high ridge about 600 yards above us, and watched us pretty closeley.  After talking about it a little I knew those goats were watching the pickup so I told Chief to get out and I would pull away.  Our first thought was to have him climb up to them, but as I surveyed the situation, I told him to walk down to the bottoms away from the herd.  It was my thinking that the goats would circle away from the pickup and then try to make it back to the hills where there was protection from the front moving in.  As he headed down a blind draw to my South, I pulled the pickup up on a high ridge even with the animals.  Sure enough they circled to my West and then to my South.  A problem then presented itself, from my view high on the ridge it looked like they herd was going to move to far south for Chief to get a look at them, the next glipse I got of him he was running down hill, and the Antelope were out of my sight.  Then I saw them crossing the same draw Chief was in, he stopped as one by one they crossed the draw, the buck staying way to the back.  The buck then stopped just over the hill from Chief, I knew Chief couldn't see him rubbing on a sage brush but he held still waiting.  The Buck then crossed, I had my binos out and saw the whole thing, the Buck crossed 300 yards down the draw and directly down wind from Chief.  I knew he was going to have to shoot quick or get winded, I didn't hear the shot (I was listening to Texas - Oklahoma on the radio) but I saw the Buck kick, and then drop.  A great shot on a great day, and Chief's biggest buck to date.  I hope we get some rain to bring the antelope back next year, but if not we will still set up a stalk on something because hunting season is the best time of the year to be with friends.

If you have pictures and stories you would like us to post, just send them to stories@sodakadventure.com and for more pictures of antelope including 2 bonified Boone & Crockett club animals click on the Antelope link to your right.