Wow, nice elk!! I'm also a meat hunter, can't to much with the antlers, and since I also have goats, I have a natural aversion to eating meat that in any way would resemble a stinky "buck". lol!
I'm also in SD, but we are waaaaay east river, about 20 miles south of Sioux Falls. We have a little farm about a mile off the Big Sioux river, so it's normally crawling with whitetails out here. Of course, this year, I totally missed the deadline for tags...I was going to wait to do it online rather than mail the ap in, and totally forgot about it until we were out of town for Labor Day!
But, it was the in-laws to the rescue! They also went elk hunting out west. Not sure where, but they said it was public land, and they stayed in Hill City while they were there. They also got a nice cow, two turkeys, a little fork buck and a young doe. They brought the cow all the way back to a processor near us (they live in Chamberlain, but they swear by this guy, so to them, it's worth the trip), and gave us the two deer!! Needless to say, I was one happy camper! They were frozen solid, so hubby and I brought the first deer down into the basement (we might be rednecks!) to thaw enough for me to skin and butcher. I'll get that done today, and then the buck will be brought in tonight, and by this weekend, we'll have a full freezer again!
Hubby and I are originally from southwestern ND, and every year, we go "home" to visit my parents. I always love driving through the western part of the state - beautiful land, not endlessly developed. Last summer when I went home, I had to stop on the highway as a small group of mule deer walked across the road! If that isn't heaven... However, I have to take issue with SD claiming to be the pheasant capital...it never fails that once I cross the ND/SD border going north to Hettinger, I start seeing hundreds in the fields and ditches! Never fails!
But anyway, my FiL keeps telling me I need to get some west river tags. If anything, I'd really like to try for some pronghorn. I'd tag along with my dad and cousin occasionally, and I'll tell ya, there is an ocean of difference between spotting the herd, and actually managing to get close enough for a shot!!
But the meat was the best I've ever tasted, so I definitly think it would be worth the miles on foot!
But anyway, gotta get downstairs and finish up with that doe. In the meantime, here's the button buck I got last year - the first deer I harvested on my farm! I'm posting a link rather than the actual pic, because it's pretty graphic - we drug it back to the morton shed to gut it, and you know how that goes... You can see the shot was a bit forward in the shoulder, but it was a quick end, can't ask for more than that.
I'm also in SD, but we are waaaaay east river, about 20 miles south of Sioux Falls. We have a little farm about a mile off the Big Sioux river, so it's normally crawling with whitetails out here. Of course, this year, I totally missed the deadline for tags...I was going to wait to do it online rather than mail the ap in, and totally forgot about it until we were out of town for Labor Day!
But, it was the in-laws to the rescue! They also went elk hunting out west. Not sure where, but they said it was public land, and they stayed in Hill City while they were there. They also got a nice cow, two turkeys, a little fork buck and a young doe. They brought the cow all the way back to a processor near us (they live in Chamberlain, but they swear by this guy, so to them, it's worth the trip), and gave us the two deer!! Needless to say, I was one happy camper! They were frozen solid, so hubby and I brought the first deer down into the basement (we might be rednecks!) to thaw enough for me to skin and butcher. I'll get that done today, and then the buck will be brought in tonight, and by this weekend, we'll have a full freezer again!
Hubby and I are originally from southwestern ND, and every year, we go "home" to visit my parents. I always love driving through the western part of the state - beautiful land, not endlessly developed. Last summer when I went home, I had to stop on the highway as a small group of mule deer walked across the road! If that isn't heaven... However, I have to take issue with SD claiming to be the pheasant capital...it never fails that once I cross the ND/SD border going north to Hettinger, I start seeing hundreds in the fields and ditches! Never fails!
But anyway, my FiL keeps telling me I need to get some west river tags. If anything, I'd really like to try for some pronghorn. I'd tag along with my dad and cousin occasionally, and I'll tell ya, there is an ocean of difference between spotting the herd, and actually managing to get close enough for a shot!!
But anyway, gotta get downstairs and finish up with that doe. In the meantime, here's the button buck I got last year - the first deer I harvested on my farm! I'm posting a link rather than the actual pic, because it's pretty graphic - we drug it back to the morton shed to gut it, and you know how that goes... You can see the shot was a bit forward in the shoulder, but it was a quick end, can't ask for more than that.
