Antelope heresy: hunting skill—not high-performance hardware—is the secret to success on pronghorns

Guns Magazine, Nov, 2002 by Dave Anderson

Pronghorn antelope are always shot at long range. Their superb vision, and the flat terrain on which they live, make it impossible to get close. Therefore the pronghorn rifle must be an extremely accurate, flat-shooting long range wonder with a scope to match.

Heard that before?

Well, it's bunk.

The reason hunters shoot at antelope from long range is because they can. The distinctive markings of pronghorns, especially the bright white rump patch, make them easy to spot. And since getting close seems too difficult, the temptation is to treat pronghorns like oversize prairie dogs and let drive from long range.

Hunting As It Should Be

In fact both the game and the country they inhabit are well suited to stalking. The pronghorn's vision is truly incredible, but they can't see through hills or rocks. Antelope country might look flat from an airplane at 35,000 feet but it really isn't.

It has rolling hills, valleys, ravines and coulees, ideal for stalking. And stalking--spotting the quarry from a distance and then taking advantage of terrain and wind to get close--is the cream of all hunting.

Under the right circumstances, I suppose most any game animal can provide an opportunity for stalking. But most North American hunting is done by other methods such as using tree stands or blinds, driving, calling or still-hunting. Only a few species of our North American big game lend themselves to spot and stalk hunting.

Sheep are the classic example, but how many of us can afford to hunt sheep even once, much less regularly? In terms of game that most of us actually have the opportunity to hunt, antelope, mule deer, and under some circumstances elk, provide the best opportunities for stalking.

My purpose is not to start an argument with long-range shooters. I have no enemies among those who hunt legally and ethically, even if they choose a different method. There are enough real enemies to worry about. Rather, I'd like to persuade hunters that long range shooting deprives them of the opportunity for the most exciting, memorable and addictive type of hunting there is.

Long-range target shooting is a wonderful challenge, and it's fun to get into a good prairie-dog town a couple of times a year and warm up a barrel or two. But long range shooting at big game doesn't have much allure. The shot itself in a big game hunt just means the hunt is over.

What Fun Would That Be?

I don't follow spectator sports much, but a close friend who is a football addict explained its appeal to me. He likes keeping tabs on the strengths and weaknesses of his team and the opposition, getting together with friends before each game for a barbecue, cheering on the team with fellow season-ticket holders, appreciating the strategy and skill with which the game is played, analyzing the highs and lows after the game.

Suppose, though, instead of actually playing the game the two teams marched onto the field, the team captains called the coin toss, the winner of the toss was declared winner of the game, the teams went back to the dressing room, and the fans all went home.

There would still be a winner and a loser, but would there be anything memorable, anything exciting or dramatic other than the few instants in which the coin is in the air?

That's how I feel about hunting. The preparation and anticipation is fun, and so is the remembering, but the actual hunting is the best part. Going out just to see how quickly you can get back doesn't make a lot of sense.

I had hunted for eight or 10 years, and shot quite a bit of game before I ever tried stalking. Hunting mostly wooded country, friends and I generally used two basic methods. One way was to sit in wait for whitetails on well-traveled runways, for elk and moose by watching over cut lines and trails, and for black bear as they came out to feed on fall oat fields.

The second method was to use small 3 to 4 man drives, posting a couple of hunters in likely spots while the others moved around and got the game moving. When I first hunted mule deer I collected a couple using the same methods -- having one hunter sit on a ridge while another pushed the willows and scrub brush of the valley bottom, or throwing rocks into the bush to get the deer moving, then taking them on the run.

Early Experience

My first pronghorn antelope hunt was in the early 1970s. In many ways I was about as unprepared as a hunter could be, starting with the fact that I had seen exactly two live antelope in my life.

Everything I had read told me that pronghorns weren't really hunted at all. You just drove your pickup around the plains until you spotted a band, took a rest with your long-range rifle and picked off the best head at 400 yards or more. It bothered me a little that I didn't have a pickup, and I couldn't see doing much off road driving with my Mustang fastback. But I was by gosh going to have the right rifle.

A 1962 article by Jack O'Connor entitled Those Faraway Antelope considerably influenced my thinking. O'Connor described how one of his hunting companions, famed riflemaker Al Biesen, killed his antelope with a "brilliant shot" at 425 paces with a .25-'06, at that time a wildcat. Remington made it a factory round in 1969.