"Colorado Muley Success"
Written by Jeremy Quintana

After four years of applying, I finally drew a buck tag for southern Colorado. I had high hopes of taking a good mature buck, after all the bucks we had seen on summer scouting trips. My dad was lucky enough to take a huge 231-inch non-typical last year, so I was very excited for opening day to come.

When opening morning finally arrived, my dad was unable to go with me, so my father-in-law, Greg, accompanied me. We left town at 4:30am to get on the mountain before daylight. We hiked to a spot that usually holds a lot of deer. As the sun came up, we immediately spotted deer, but nothing that caught my eye.

We glassed the ridges and canyons for a couple of hours, but still saw nothing worth going after. We headed back to the truck to get some lunch. On our way, we spotted six bucks on a ridge about 300 yards away. As we glassed the bucks, we saw there was one that I would be happy to put my tag on.

Jeremy with his son Jace

My father-in-law told me to take my time and make a good shot, but I was so excited that I missed. After the shot, the bucks went over the ridge and we never saw them again. We walked over to where they were just to make sure, but it was a clean miss. We headed back to the truck and I was pretty disappointed that I had missed, but I knew I still had time.

On the walk back to the truck, I tripped and dropped my gun barrel first into the snow. To say I was frustrated would be an understatement. Once back to the truck, we made our way to another area to hunt. While driving, we spotted three bucks about 400 yards away. We did not waste time glassing the bucks because we knew they were all shooters without even looking through the big glass.

We quickly parked the truck and a grabbed my father-in-laws .270 weatherby rifle, as mine was still full of dirt and snow, and we were off. At 120 yards, I found a good rest and took the shot. The biggest of the three bucks dropped in his tracks.

There was no ground shrinkage with this buck. He turned out to be a 28-inch wide buck that grosses just under 180. Even though I did not get the huge buck like my dad did last year, I was still very happy with my first mule deer buck.