yards. Wow! That night, I thought about the mechanics of how difficult it was for everything to go right and make a shot like that. The weather was supposed to
The author and his hunting companion entered the Hannah Bates Memorial Rockchuck Derby and hunted in some rough and rugged and rocky terrain.
but better too much than not enough. We both took our homemade shoot- ing benches, binoculars, and spotting scopes. I brought my Swarovski 1500 laser rangefinder and Quinn brought his Leica 1,600-yard rangefinder. We prob- ably could have left half of the equip- ment at home and not missed anything. We loaded two quads on the back
of the pickup and left Spokane at 11:00 a.m. We got to Bliss, Idaho, at 10:00 p.m. on Tuesday and slept at the park
for the night. The next morning, we drove 10 miles to Hagerman to get our hunting licenses. Nonresident licenses are $35 each and are good from Janu- ary 1 through the end of August. Then we went to Outlaws and Angels, the tavern in Bliss that hosts the Hannah Bates Memorial Rockchuck Derby, a cancer benefit. It was $20 to enter the heaviest two ’chucks you shoot by noon on Sunday.
The author's four-wheeler got him, and the rockchucks he shot, around the very rugged Idaho back country.
Page 162 Spring 2013
We headed out 18 miles to what would be our campsite until Monday afternoon. As soon as we set up camp, we started glassing the ridge to the southwest of camp. We assembled our shooting benches and picked out some ’chucks. It was my turn to shoot first. I got out my Sendero in 25-06 and my ammo box and set them on the bench. We ranged the ridge. It ran from 640 yards to 850 yards. We glassed the ridge until I spotted a ’chuck sunning on a rock on the skyline. He ranged at about 740 yards. I got my scope dialed up 12.5 minutes. I fired three shots, dialed down two clicks, shot to the right 3 or 4 inches, then that ’chuck ran down. We spotted another ’chuck at 716 yards. I fired at him and shot over, then dialed down two clicks to 11.75 and shot under. I dialed up one click and killed the ’chuck on the third shot. I was in the 500 Yard Club! I could hardly believe it – the first afternoon, eighth shot fired, and at 716
be 75 and clear blue skies with very little wind, but Mother Nature had other ideas. It started to rain during the night and rained until after noon. We decided to take the quads and go look for a spot we had heard about to get started shooting ’chucks for the Derby. We both were packing our 220 Swifts. We found the spot and saw a few ’chucks, but the weather was closing in on us. We headed for camp, but not soon enough. It started to rain and the wind was blowing about 20 mph … and then it turned to hail. It was miserable. The road had about an inch of muck on it and we slipped and slid all the way back to camp, wet and frozen. We ate dinner and made plans for the next day. It was supposed to be sunny with a few clouds. I went to bed still thinking about that ’chuck I shot at 716 yards. During the night, I looked out the window at the stars shining. This trip was already worth it.
In the morning, I looked out the
window and it had snowed an inch and was 25 degrees. We sat in the camp trailer all morning talking about the snow and the ’chuck I shot Wednesday afternoon. Around 2:00 p.m. we took the pickup and went lower in elevation. We did manage to find a few ’chucks and shoot them so we had ’chucks to weigh in for the derby.
The next day we finally saw the beautiful blue skies again, no clouds, and not much wind. We had a great day driving the quads and shooting ’chucks back where we had been on Thursday afternoon when we got rained out. In the evening, we got out our homemade shooting benches and found a rock on the rim at about 1,055 yards. Quinn di- aled in on it and shot about 20 rounds with his 30-338 Winchester Magnum. We shot different ranges down to 500 yards until all the good shooting light was gone. It was not like shooting a big bull elk, but we got to do more shooting. It was a perfect day. Sunday, it was time to go to town
and weigh in our ’chucks. We got to Outlaws and Angels before noon. The rumor was that someone had killed a 16-pound ’chuck. We bought t-shirts
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