At the start of 2023 I made it a goal to kill a high country archery mule deer, and I knew I had a lot of work ahead of me going into the summer.

I started my summer scouting around mid-July and was turning up quite a few good bucks in the higher country but was having trouble finding the one that really got me excited. I made multiple trips into the high mountains of Eastern Oregon just hoping I’d come out of there with a target buck in mind for opening day of the season.

It all finally came together on Aug. 8. After glassing into a huge canyon that we knew had big bucks, my buddy and I were making our way down the mountain when we jumped a group of bucks. Right off the bat we could see they were good bucks but we saw nothing giant until the last few ran out.

There was one buck we named “Big Papa.” He was a giant — typical four point that I’m guessing went well over 200 inches — and there were multiple other 180-plus bucks in the group.

We tried to relocate those bucks for multiple days up there and were never able to find them again, but we just hoped that on opening day we would get lucky.

Off to a rough start

Sept. 2 came around, which was the opening day of the season. We had our whole plan lined up how we were going to glass that morning, then head down the ridge through the area where we had seen the big bucks.

After glassing and not turning anything up we made our way into the spot we had seen the big bucks just hoping for that chance again, but it just never came.

I ended up spotting a nice 170-inch class four-point. We waited for a few hours for him to get into a good bedding spot and I decided to make a stalk, which went almost perfectly until I got within 60 yards, when he looked up from the brush and busted me. I was pretty sad because everything went so perfectly on the stalk and I had dropped over 1,000 feet straight down to get onto him just to get busted.

Days went on and on with the season and I made multiple other good stalks on bucks with one being another giant typical that I hunted for multiple days. The closest I got to him was 40 yards when he busted me at full draw about to release a shot.

After that I went to a different unit that I had an elk tag in, figuring I’d get my mind off the muleys for a few days and try to get my first archery bull, which didn’t end up talking long at all. After one morning hunt and missing a bull at 40 yards because of a branch I was able to connect with a nice five-point herd bull that evening.

After that I made my way into this new spot that I never scouted but knew there had to be bucks there. On the first trip up there I found a bachelor group of about eight bucks and they were all 150-plus bucks with two or three well over 180 inches. I hunted that group of deer for multiple days, having multiple close encounters and even one that I got full draw on the group just waiting for them to walk out until my wind switched and couldn’t seal the deal.

Taking a shot in the snow

Until the day it all happened, I was watching the weather and I saw a big snowstorm was going to blow in around midday, so I knew I had to get up there and get those bucks in the snow while everything would be quiet and easy to stalk in.

I made my way up the mountain by myself going in for a solo hunt just hoping I could locate the deer before the thick fog rolled in. As soon as I got up there I started glassing and instantly relocated the bucks and decided it was time to go.

I made my game plan looking at my map and dropped all my stuff and started my stalk down to the deer. I didn’t have super far to go on this stalk, but it was very cold and very slick with the fresh snow on the ground. I got down there and was surprised when I saw a rack at only 75 yards. I pulled my binos up and saw it was the group of bucks I was after, so I dropped to my hands and knees and was trying to get a view on all the bucks and being super careful, knowing this could be my last opportunity on these bucks since it was getting closer to the end of season.

I started inching closer and closer while having to crawl over deadfall and try not to spook the bucks. I got to 55 yards and knew that was the closest I would get before busting them. I leaned up and saw the big three-by-four that I’d seen multiple other times while hunting these bucks. He definitely wasn’t my target buck in this group, but he was a very mature and a heavy-horned buck.

Knowing he wasn’t the biggest in the group but he was an old, mature buck and I was going to be very happy with putting my tag on him, I ranged him just one more time to make sure everything was right and that’s when I drew back to settle in for the shot.

Everything felt good. I wasn’t shaking too badly, and I felt rock-solid with the shot. I slowly pulled my release and I don’t really know what happened from there, but I watched the arrow go through the air in slow motion, it seemed like, and it hit about mid-body.

I knew right there it was a liver hit, but I was hoping it clipped the lungs since it was closer to the front shoulder half of mid-body. I waited for about 2 hours and then walked down to the first blood, which was only five feet from where I shot him, and he was bleeding super-good instantly.

I knew I’d have to start my tracking right then because I forgot my headlight at home and I was losing light fast. I definitely wish I could go back now and decide to just wait longer, knowing the hit was far back, but in the moment my mind told me to just find him.

Disappearing deer

I ended up losing blood at about 150 yards of tracking and at that point I already had my girlfriend and her dad heading up the mountain with lights, so I decided to wait for them to get up there. When they made it we started just gridding around a little bit, trying to find the next blood spot.

It was right at very last light when I saw movement in the brush in front of me. I could just barely see a rack bedded down in the brush and knew it was him still alive.

I ended up kind of panicking for a second before I ranged him at 40 yards and drew back. He wouldn’t stand up forever and I couldn’t get a shot on his body, so I had to make a noise to get him up. That’s when he just jumped up, giving me only a split second to get a shot off, but I couldn’t see my pin well enough since it was too dark and I wasn’t able to make a follow-up shot.

I decided to just come back the next morning with my dad because I knew it would be plenty cold up there overnight and the meat would still be good. The next day was Sept. 21 and we got up there expecting a little bit more snow, but at the top of the mountain there was about 3-4 more inches of snow.

At that point there were no tracks or blood to follow, which definitely gave me a lot less hope and worried me we weren’t going to find this buck. We started gridding and gridding back and forth about 100 yards apart from each other until I walked up onto a thick little group of trees, knowing this was the only actual thick cover in that burn and he would probably be in that.

And there he was, dead, not even 100 yards from where I jumped him the night before.

He was everything I could have wanted in a deer. Super-tall backs with dark antlers — just an old, mature high-country buck.

We got a lot of pictures of the buck and then the work started. We quartered him up and started packing him back to the truck. We had a few miles to pack uphill and it was in the slick snow, which made it pretty brutal, but just all a part of the memories.