Oklahoma Pronghorns

[RedTape]

#3023

My Dad and I are leaving this morning to chase OK pronghorns for a few days. Should be interesting since the landowner farms rather than running cattle, so there really aren’t any waterholes. Spot and stalk it is. Should be…..um challenging. Haha.

[David Petersen]

#15777

Red — where in OK are there pronghorns? When did they reintroduce them? How hard to get a tag. I recall out in western OK, between Cheyenne and the Panhandle, is an area called the Antelope Hills. I hope they’ve returned the namesake animals. Good luck. dave

[RedTape]

#19828

David Petersen wrote: Red — where in OK are there pronghorns? When did they reintroduce them? How hard to get a tag. I recall out in western OK, between Cheyenne and the Panhandle, is an area called the Antelope Hills. I hope they’ve returned the namesake animals. Good luck. dave

Dave, over-the-counter archery tags have been available for (I believe) two years now. Open areas include Cimarron and that portion of Texas County west of Hwy 136 (basically west of Guymon). I’m not sure of the exact dates, but I believe the wildlife department started reintroducing them in the early 80s.

Unfortunately the hunt didn’t work out. We got out to the area and were unable to contact the landowner…I still haven’t heard back from him (you are required to carry written landowner permission to hunt antelope in OK). We took the opportunity to do some scouting for a controlled tag I drew for Oct. We counted 47 antelope on or near the landowner’s property, including some fantastic bucks. Most of the landowner’s property is farmed with very little cover to provide a stalk, so bowhunting would have been tough, however we might be getting some land farther west, closer to Black Mesa, to hunt on next year. The terrain is better for stalking and the water is more spread out making a blind a good option.

I’ll try to post a couple pictures this weekend.

[TradRag]

#29112

Best of Luck! I know a few other Okies heading that way soon too. Keep us posted.

[David Petersen]

#29629

I would think with o/c tags there would be hunters thick as ants out there! No public land either, I guess. My father was born and raised in the Dust Bowl near Rankin, now Reydon, north of Cheyenne, near the site of the Black Kettle massacre (Custer’s final cowardly slaughter of innocents before his karma caught up with him at the Little Big Horn. Sure would be a hoot to hunt that area for something other than jackrabbits, which are what I started on there as a kid and nothing else left. Made a couple of pheasant hunts out there as a kid also, but like elsewhere they ran in the corn stubble and nenver got up, as I had no dog. If they’re not already it’s just a matter of time before blood-sucking leach outfitters lease the best lands to sell to the highest and most inept bidders, leaving the rest of us as usual, locked out. All high praise to public lands! dp

[RedTape]

#30110

Headed out today with my doe tag. Sadly, the archery season is closed and I have to use a rifle (to add insult to injury, my Shiloh sharps isn’t here so I have to use a bolt-action). I really wish you had the option to use a bow during the controlled hunts.

Should be fun though. Plenty of open country, prairie dogs, coyotes, pheasants and….pronghorns, to keep me occupied. And I think I have a spot for next bow season! I’ll post some pictures later.

[David Petersen]

#32554

Red — Please do post photos of that landscape as it looks today, thanks. I’d return there in a minute to bowhunt prongy if I had a place to hunt and could draw a tag. Fat chance of either! And good luck to you. dave

[RedTape]

#38607

Well the hunt went great. The rut was in full swing out there and the antelope were extremely skittish. As it turned out, I worked harder for this doe than ANY animal I’ve ever shot.

I hunted two days and put a stalk on a group each day, but was never able to get within range.

On the third day I found a group out in a field and quickly got permission to hunt on that section. The wind was blowing about 30 mph from the south, but after suveying the area there was no good way to approach from the north. I came at them from the west. After 1 hour 45 min. of crawling (about 800 yards) and wearing the skin off my elbow I got within 200 yards and got the shot. I’m amazed at the pronghorn’s ability to detect danger. We spotted groups running from us nearly a mile away! I am extremely grateful for having harvested this animal and can’t imagine what it would be like to get one with a bow! Hopefully I can make that happen someday.

Dave: This is the second year archery tags have been available over-the-counter for OK pronghorns. Unfortunantly, the cost for a tag for out-of-state hunters is $306. However if you want to give it a shot let me know, I have a few places we can hunt…including a section that is on the old Sante Fe Trail.

The terrain is either open grass/CRP field or farm land. The anteloope are thick in the crop fields but they are very hard to hunt with bow. Here’s some photos that show the different terrain.

[David Petersen]

#38643

Congrats on your goat, Jason! And thanks for posting these pictures. That little rocky canyon looks huntable, but the rest … oooh! That last photo of the buck — he’s a dandy! What county is this? Can’t beat that prongy doe meat. dave

[RedTape]

#38796

Thanks Dave! There are a lot of canyons in that area on private land, and most of the people up there HATE the goats. They want you to kill them all. Other than finding a water hole, stalking one with a bow would be tough, possible with the sage and yuccas but tough nonetheless. And yes, there are some fantasic bucks up there. Since there are a limited number of tags given each year, and the only other way to hunt them is with bow, the bucks can get big.

This was in Cimarron Co. We hunted from the Texas Co. line west until just a few miles from New Mexico. In fact standing in the Sante Fe Trail we could see NM and CO.

Can’t wait to get the meat. Steaks, summer sausage and jalapeno/chedder brats are just a month away!

[Author]

Posts