MIKE'S 2018 FALL HUNT
We had a fantastic and not so fantastic hunting season this
past fall 2018. Our moose hunts were the highlight of the year
with 100% kill success on the rifle moose,
22 bulls for 22 hunters and another 4 bulls were taken for the
archery moose guys and 2 more moose were bowkilled by guides
Josh and Gerard. Our archery elk hunts were also really good
with lots of bugling action and 3 out of 4 hunters shooting
elk. The mule deer bowhunts were also great
with daily stalks on Poper bucks and three big 180 plus
score deer being killed. You can see our full bowhunt
report on our website. The not so great parts of the season
were the rifle mule deer hunts where we only managed to kill
one buck scoring over 180 when last year we took 6 over 180.
Warm, windy weather in the November muley rut hunts just killed
us, never seen it like that before. We just couldn't dig up the
big bucks we had seen in scouting and bow season. But the real
low was the rifle elk hunts where we didn't kill a bull,
despite no shortage of elk. Last year we
killed 5 bulls for 6 hunters, the year before we killed 5 elk
for 7 guys along with two under 100 yard misses, basically 100%
success. This year we had one 100 yard miss on opening day and
then the bugling just shut down giving us zero kills,
unbelievable, maybe it was because of all the September rain
and standing farm crops which meant no concentration of elk and
no active rutting? Who knows, but I've seen it like this once
before eight years ago and then the next year was awesome with
the better bull survival.
As for some of the details of the hunts, Eugene
Lawson killed the best rifle muley of the year on a
September hunt with a 183 score clean typical.
He also booked a couple of rifle mule deer hunts for his sons
in November 2020 and a 2020 moose hunt for himself. Opening
week of our moose hunts this year was with four hunters in our
south zone where we focus on walking and stopping to call in
rutting bulls. Billand Eric
Axlund took a big 42 inch bull and a 32 incher.
Richard Wooster and Dave
Kennedy also shot nice bulls. Then we did the rest of
the rut moose hunts in our home zone in the last two weeks in
October when the moose are transitioning into feeding in the
farm fields and breeding the last of the cows. It was fantastic
hunting especially as we got later in October. The last
week of October hunters said they saw over 200 moose in 3
trucks in 3 days! Most guys only had a one or two day
hunt!! All the bulls ranged in size from small but good eating
25 inchers up to big paddled 40 plus inchers. Kevin and
Joe Campbell got their moose on the first morning in the same
field. Joe's 42 inch bull had incredible fronts. The
November moose hunts went equally well with 8 hunters taking 8
bulls, several solid 40 inchers were killed by Harlan
Wilson, Noah Fessler and
Lonnie Manalia.
We conduct the November mule deer ruts from Nov 8 to 30th and
the best muleys were taken by Dennis Sharp
with a cool looking drop tine deer, Eric
Vaillancourt with a matching flyers 174 score buck and
Dale Wheeler with a heavy 175 incher. Eric
and Dale were both repeat hunters along with Jimmy
Green who had a great combo hunt
taking a good mule deer and a 151
score, 10 point whitetail. I personally dedicated
myself to the whitetail scouting from Oct 15th to Nov 30th
hiking well over two hundred miles setting and checking a
couple dozen trail cameras. I got over 20 different mature
whitetail bucks in daylight on cameras scattered throughout our
home zone plus pictures of many more up-and-comers. We took 4
whitetail bucks for the 5 hunters and guides Kyle Mudge and
Josh Harb also killed nice whitetails with Josh's 320
lb deer scoring 150 non typical. You can see the trail
camera pictures on our website in the photo gallery along with
all the hero shots of our happy hunters!
Guide Gerard Van Den Boogaard ran our first ever Winter
Wolf hunts in December for just 2 hunters and even
though they had to deal with warm, windy weather, hunter
Brian Kitzul from BC killed 2 wolves! The mild
December weather has really allowed the bucks to recover from
the rut and get to the best wintering grounds. 2019
really should be a great year! We are almost totally
full for our 2019 hunts, 3/4 full for 2020 and even have
several 2021 bookings. We do hunt in a Big Game
Hunter's Paradise with the best guides in the hunting world!
Thanks to all of our Fall 2018 hunters!! Feel free to contact
me about any of our hunts. Thanks!
Give me a call at 780-864-3770 or send me an email to book a hunt with Mike's Outfitting in Alberta, Canada.
Printable Hunt Report
Aaron Austin
Eric Vaillancourt
Lucas White
Dennis Sharp
Dale Wheeler
Bill Axlund
Flint Jensen
Joe Campbell
Les Swick
Noah Fessler
Harlan Wilson
Blaine Kitzul
Lonnie Manalia
.JPG)
Jimmy Green
Eugene Lawson
Josh Harb
Jimmy Green