January Fishing Bug

Middle of January and still little snow for central Colorado. This fact induced a fishing bug we had to cure, so we headed north to the Yampa River Tailwater. The section of the Yampa that we fished flows out of Stagecoach Reservoir. Being a tailwater it stays open year round, has lots of fish and lots of food for the fish. The road is closed due to the nearby elk winter range, so we rode our bikes in. Some people also hike in. The weather was beautiful, no wind, and temps in the upper 30's. With waders and down jackets we stayed plenty warm to fish the whole day. Hot flies for the day were small WD-40's, any black midge, Barr's emergers and of course eggs. These fish see pressure daily so 6x tippet was the ticket.

Monster Coues Buck footage

Here is a video clip taken by Amanda Moors, founder of Coueswhitetail.com, she sent me this clip. I think this is some of the best video taken of a big coues deer buck! More at COUESWHITETAIL.COM

Tips from Randy Ulmer 2

Tips from Randy Ulmer

Rimsza's Mexico Hunt

Check out the Rimsza clan stacking up some Sonoran critters.

Check out this great coaching and perfect shot!

Well most of you know I left for Mexico on January 11th so I did not get this picture out. On January 10th Jay and I took Nicole out pig hunt along with TJ and his father. I spotted the pigs about an hour and half after sun up. Once I spotted the pigs Jay and Tj came over to keep an eye on them while we made our move. Oh, and by the way if any of you want to know how to glass while puking just ask Jay. Nicole and I were able to close the distance to 40 yards of the heard and we were hoping that one of the pigs would wonder a little closer because 40 yards is Nicole's maximum distance. The pigs just would not close the gap and we had a big boar at 40 yards quartering away. I gave Nicole the go-ahead and she drew and made a perfect 40 yard shot. We watched the pig run into a thicket and he never made it out of the thicket. This is Nicole's first bow kill. It was awesome to watch her make a perfect shot. I hope you enjoy the photos we truly had a agreat time. Special thanks to Jay, TJ and TJ's dad.

Coues Hunting

Team Fast and Dangerous Daniel Franco, Jay Lewis and Craig Blackburn sent these photos to me.  They had a good week in Sonora.  Daniel had a great week despite losing his razor and sock.

2010 Mexico Hunt Part 2

Darr, Steve and I hunted a high risk high reward mountain ranch in Mexico and di not find the reward.  We had a great time but did not find any good bucks.  We were huntign a very low density ranch that a friend of ours had seen a big buck on last year.  That buck was never seen by us in six days of looking high and low for him.  Well, that is why they call it hunting!  We are heading to a new destination this coming week and hope to connect with a big boy.  I took one of the ranch kids with me the last morning and he wanted to carry my pack with the 40X's so I let him do so.  He also got to drive the Rhino which was a proud moment for him.  Steve Whinnery shot the biggest buck we saw on the last day.  Darr had seen him several times earlier in the week so we went back and Steve managed to get him.  It is always great to experience God's awesome sunrises and sunsets in Sonora!

Giant Sonoran Coues Buck

I don't know anything about this buck but it was too big not to post.

Winter Fly Fishing on Colorado and Roaring Fork Rivers

The snow is still thin in central Colorado. With warm temps and lack of precipitation it's been hard to motivate to go skiing. On the other hand, the weather is quite nice for a day of fishing if you can find some open water. We headed down to Glenwood Springs to investigate the Lower Colorado river and the Roaring Fork River. The day was sunny with a high around 38 degrees. Not normal for the middle of January in the mountains. Without much wind, we were able to fish the middle part of the day and never had to wear gloves and stocking hats. The best fishing was about 1pm to 3pm. There were a few midges buzzing about, but no real hatch to speak of. We caught all of our fish nymphing, mostly near the bottom. The top flies for the day were the Prince in various sizes, many different black midge patterns, and the egg. We caught a nice mix of Browns and Rainbows. Enjoy the pictures!Anyone interested in winter fly fishing in the Vail or Aspen area can contact Alpine River Outfitters for further information.

2010 ISE Show Denver, CO

Scott Graham from Alpine River Outfitters at Eastman's Muley display

The snow is thin in the mountains so I went to Denver on Sat. to check out the International Sportsman's Expo. This was my first time to one of these shows and was worth the price of admission. Lot's of Outfitters, Lodges, and Shops but not enough actual gear companies. I was excited to touch some new stuff, but those guys didn't show. I saw lots of great Mounts including Mule deer, Whitetail deer, Elk and lots of little critters that the CO DOW had on display. The DOW also had a Live raptor display which had a Golden Eagle and a couple of owls. The Golden is an awesome bird! Other highlights of the show were the seminars from Guy Eastman, Cameron Hanes and the Elk calling competition. There were some real pros calling and it was good to hear those guys live and pick up a couple tips. The ISE has upcoming dates in Salt Lake City, Utah and Phoenix, AZ. If you have a free weekend, I'd recommend checking it out.

Female Golden Eagle, look at those eyes!

Cameron Hanes talking Bowhunting Gear

Mexico Coues Deer Hunt 2010

We are preparing for departure to Sonora on Tuesday morning.  The rut should be getting underway and we are hoping for some good action.  Here are a couple of photos from my previous scouting trip.  The moon is dark and the weather looks decent so it is game on!!

WMAT Giant Coues Deer

I think my heart just skipped a beat....Amanda at coueswhitetail.com just sent me this pic, click here for more on the giant coues buck.  Oh my goodness what a pig of a buck!  Congrats to the hunter!

Nice Rams

I wanted to give a shout out to all of the visitors on this blog that are logging on from overseas. Believe it or not there is a wide variety of regular visitors from all over the world, including, England, Ireland, Australia, Iraq, New Zealand, Thailand, Malaysia, India, Nigeria, Spain and many others. Welcome and thanks for your support and emails. We also have regulars that check in from every state in the U.S. From Darr, Janis and I welcome! Here are a couple still photos off my video camera of some nice desert rams. Enjoy!

Extreme Bulls 6

Our friend Steve Chappell, of Chappell Hunting Productions, has done it again. He has just come out with Extreme Bulls 6. Most of you are familiar with the big bull action of the Extreme Bulls series 1-5 and I am sure number 6 will not dissapoint. You can pre order now for only $10.95 by clicking here, order dvd, looks like it will be shipping Feb. 15th! Can't wait to see it!

Elk Breakfast Sausage

I decided to give sausage making a go for the second year now. I used to be intimidated by this, but with a little bit of practice it's become fairly easy. I finally bought a grinder, and grinding the meat myself is a lot easier and faster than I expected. I like knowing exactly the path my game has taken from field to fry pan. I used a basic recipe I found online and then tweaked it to my liking. Sausage making is not an exact science, and the recipes can be altered to suit all taste buds.

I started by course grinding 35 lbs. of elk and 15 lbs. of pork shoulder. I then covered my kitchen table with Butcher paper and spread the meat out evenly. I sprinkled all the seasonings over the meat and thoroughly worked them in by hand. I ran the seasoned meat through the grinder one more time to evenly mix everything and then let the sausage sit overnight. I believe this helps the meat soak up the seasonings. In the morning, I made a patty and tested my flavors. Happy with the result, I packaged it into half pound packages and sent it to the freezer. I froze it all in bulk, meaning I did not make any links.

Next year I'm buying casing and will try breakfast links as well as Bratwurst. Last year I used the same recipe but did not add the pork. It tasted like breakfast sausage, but every time I ate it, I felt like it was missing something. I think that something was a little pork and pork fat. Even with the amount of pork I added the sausage is not greasy a bit! Enjoy!

Here are my ingredients:

35 lbs. elk

15 lbs. pork shoulder

1/2 lb. kosher salt

2 oz. ground sage

2 tsp. red pepper

2 Tb. fresh ground black pepper

1 cup honey

2 tsp. ground ginger

2009 Favorite Pics