Dopealopes? Sariah’s Antelope Adventure!

When I drew my 2011 Antelope Doe tag I decided to use the ODFW Youth Mentoring program to take my Granddaughter on her first hunt.  Her Name is Sariah and she is 9 years old (10 in December as I was told at least 1000 times).  She is a smart kid that likes to read Sharon Creech and always read 2 books at a time, I can’t even keep track of 1 book at a time and she doesn’t need any stupid bookmarks she just know where she is at in both books and freely switches between them when bored with one or the other.   I have not spent as much time with my grand kids as I would like to and this was a great chance to get to know the oldest one.

Sariah VS the Hill

We arrived at our camp along the Chewaucan and proceeded to start setting up camp (well unpacking the travel trailer) and Sariah immediately starts playing with Coby (Jacs 12 year old nephew and soon to be Sariahs best friend) and while none of use was watching they immediately where drawn to the short but very steep gravel driveway that led to our camp and just as the adults (boy there’s a loose term) noticed we watched Sariah already on her second run down the hill take a short very wobbly ride that ended in a face plant in the gravel (1 for the hill and 1 for Sariah).  20 minutes in camp and she has already crashed and burned on the hill causing scrapes on her knees, hands and arms.  What draws a kid to a gravel hill?  Don’t know but it looked fun!

Sariah VS the Rifles

I don’t think Sariah had ever shot a rifle before this trip so I took along an old faithful .22 semi and my Remington M7 predator in .243, we started with the .22.  Sariah is small (well she is only 9) so this required the use of shooting sticks and Grandpa holding the rifle to her shoulder but she took to is nicely and was able to sight in and hit every target.  I broke out the .243, I don’t know if any of you have ever tried to explain to a 9yo girl what the difference will be with a .243 compared to the .22? I tried but in the end it just comes down to a warning that it’s going to be louder and its going to kick more.  She lined up the crosshairs of the Nikon Scope to the rock and BAM!  I immediately started singing her praise on the shot hoping to distract her but the shocked look on her face said it all.  Her eyes where opened as wide as can be and she was a little flushed, she just stood up and walked away without saying anything but as she walked we could all tell she was about to cry and then she did.  I was afraid that was the last time I would get her to shoot the .243 and I was unsure what I would do if she couldn’t do it.

Dopealopes and Purple lurples?

The opening day finally arrived and after the rifle shooting incident I didn’t know what to expect so with a bit of worry I woke Sariah at about 5:30am and asked her if she was ready to go hunting and to my surprise she shook her head yes and climbed out of bed.  Today we would be accompanied by Coby (this would be his last time because the road was just too bumpy).  We took off through the desert in search of the Antelope and went to the area that I took my Buck from a couple years ago.  This is a road that wanders through the desert around the Chewaucan marsh, there are spots on this road that I feel stupid for still calling a road and it’s very easy to throw your neck or back out of whack and lose a couple tires in the process.

While traveling across this road Sariah and Coby started a week long giggle fest and in the process taught me about the desert through a child’s eyes.   Did you know that Grasshoppers are really named “Purple Lurples”? Neither did I but Coby and Sariah sure do.  How about Dragon flies?  Yep you guessed it “Dragon Wagons”!  Cows (lots of them) well they are actually called “Stupid Hamburgers”!  Rocks are called “Hards”.

Now to the important stuff, there was a dead buck antelope spotted somewhere along the way so Bucks are called “Ghostalopes” not sure why because we saw Buck Antelope every day and it should have been the does called Ghosts but Nooooo they are called “Dopealopes”

We spent most of the day checking out Ravines and wide open sage brush areas looking for any antelope and all we managed was 2 Ghostalopes and no Dopealopes, this was a reoccurring theme day after day lots of bucks and no does and our came became known as “Camp Nopealope”

Kids are amazing and I will never look at the desert the same way.

The Monster trout

In the middle of the day the heat was oppressive you couldn’t sleep, eat or do anything that didn’t include splashing in the River so we decided to take a trip to one of the local lakes and see if we could find some fish (Sariah had never been fishing).  Day one found us a Campbell lake with a total of 8 trout and day 2 found us at Dead horse Lake where we caught 1 trout that was pushing 20”.

By now my Daughter Cami and her family had arrived and the adults where baiting and handing off rods to the little kids in hopes that they all could catch at least 1 apiece and this worked out very good, first it was Sariahs big one,

Then Cameron landed a nice one about 16”,

Next was Brocky’s trout,

Then Coby got one,

All was great until the last one, Ayden hadn’t caught a trout yet and even though he was fishing next to Grandpa and waiting very patiently in reality he was fishing with 5 rods because we wanted to leave and everyone was intent on getting him a fish, well it never happened but he did a great job netting the fish we caught and then he opted for swimming in the river instead.

We also had with us Bailey the Amazing river diving Lab, she is Cami and Jason’s

Timber the Not so good swimmer but has alot of heart German Shephard, he is Micky and Kyle’s dog

Duke the Big old black guy that just lumbers around the camp, He is Jim and Marie’s dog

Finally Dopealopes

On Sunday we decided to take a short drive to a location that we have shot Antelope in before and see if there was anything there, as we approached the upper waterhole I could barely see the lower waterhole and right at the edge where two dopealopes, finally!  I pulled the truck back and parked, got Sariah out and packed all the gear and headed to the edge of the damn at the first waterhole.  I peered over the edge and at about 150 yards the two dopealopes where still at there and feeding.  I set up the shooting sticks and got the rifle ready while Sariah put in her earplugs, when she was done she slowly creped over to take her shot, but just as she raised her head to aim we got busted and the dopealopes showed Sariah how fast they could run!  We watched as they first ran hard for a hundred yards or so, then as they slowed and began to meander while feeding up the old dirt road.  They fed over the hill and out of site and we just set and watched to see where they would go as you could see all exit points from our vantage point.  After about 45 minute I decided since they never left out of the little draw they fed into they must still be there so we decided to hike over and see.

We hiked about a mile and as we approached the top of the hill that we last saw the two does on I started looking through the sagebrush and spotted them about 50 yards from us feeding and clueless to our presence, I got very excited and hated the “youth mentor program” because it took all I had not to pull up and shoot the big one right in front of me.

I told Sariah they are right there be very quiet and move slowly, she immediately started to put her earplugs in and dropped one which was followed by a noise that only an 9yo girl can make, it was kind of a shocked squeal mixed with an excited weeee, but what it really was is a noise that the dopealopes didn’t recognize and they were now clued to our presence, we froze and they stared for a long time before they decided nothing was there and they started feeding again.

Once the dopealopes settled down I tried to point out to Sariah where they were at but the sagebrush was to tall and she could not see over it or through it and locate them, and after about 5 minutes I decided this might be our only chance to get one this trip so I told her that I was going to shoot one.  Well this was not in the books because as soon as I got that out of my mouth Sariah’s shoulders dropped and she got this disgustingly disappointed look on her face and said “it’s up to you grandpa” Well that was all it took for me to no longer care if we got one or not and I there was no way I could shoot.

I told Sariah ok we have to figure out how to get you to a spot where you can see the Does and get a shot, Sariahs comeback to this was to look me in the eyes and jump in the air to get a good look over the sagebrush.  Well I am not totally sure if it was the Squeel of dropping her earplug or the sight of a 9yo girl jumping in the air but the dopealopes decided that was enough and headed west at mach 10, the last we saw of them where 2 white dots headed up a sagebrush draw at about 500 yards.

We sat down right there in the middle of the Sagebrush and talked about the chances of actually taking a dopealope and that hunting was not all about harvesting and Sariah said “I don’t care if I shoot one Grandpa, I am here with you!” (well thats the way I heard it anyway!).

So in the end Camp Nopealope held its name in total we had 4 doe tags and when we left we still had 4 doe tags and I would not change the outcome of this hunt for anything, I learned about hunting and the desert from young eyes and I had forgotten about how much fun a kid can have with just some imagination and just how good it sounds to have giggling kids in your hunting camp.  I dare you to look at a Doe Antelope and not think of it as a “Dopealope”.

One more thing anyone that has the means to take a kid hunting should use this great program that the ODFW has, the youth mentoring program is a great way to spend time with a kid in the wild and to introduce them to something other than a TV or a Computer.