Reader-Submitted Story
Luck of the Irish!
by Ireland Knox of Edmonton
My parents named me Ireland, and they often tease me about having the luck of the Irish. Still, I blinked in surprise at the AlbertaRELM website, which indicated that I was AWARDED a bison tag for the December 1, 2025 to February 28, 2026 season!
After the initial surprise wore off, the gravity of the situation kicked in. I had just three weeks before opening day to figure out days off, accommodations, food, fuel, hunting rifle, ammunition, hunting buddies, transportation, and emergency supplies. At this point, I was having trouble sleeping, and everything I ate tasted like cardboard. I considered a guided hunt to streamline many of the hunting logistics, but the hefty guiding fee was out of my budget. A do-it-yourself bison hunt was my only option.
I set up a FaceTime call with family friends Tony and Brian from Grande Prairie. They recommended hunting as early in the season as possible, mainly because snow accumulation can reduce truck access and impede game removal. (I recalled a hunt south of Grand Prairie in late November a couple of years ago, when I shot a bull moose in an old forestry cutblock. The waist-deep snow made it impossible for me to retrieve the moose. I had to phone back to Grande Prairie to get rescued by some hunters that had a snowmobile and a flat deck.) I took their sage advice and traded some shifts at work to get nine days off in early December.
The Zone 1 bison hunting area is huge, and I had no idea where to start looking. Brian conducted research and found numerous locations near Zama City where bison blood samples were collected. On short notice, the Noralta Inn Open Camp at Zama City could provide accommodations and food. As a bonus, the Camp would allow us to use their fuel card to access the local card lock facility. My Tikka 7mm–08 and ammunition setup did not meet the minimum calibre size and bullet weight specified in the AlbertaRELM information package. I needed an equipment upgrade. Tony checked out his gun locker and suggested a 9.3x62mm calibre. The rifle that he loaned me was a Tikka with the same magazine, trigger, and safety systems as mine. A super bright Swarovski scope, Barnes 250-grain handloads and a set of shooting sticks rounded out my new hunting package.
Kelly, my dad, was as excited about bison hunting as I was, and he cleared his schedule to join me on my adventure. He would provide the game sled, chainsaws, axes, bone saws, game bags, loading ramp, jerry cans, emergency sleeping gear, and a 4x4 truck. The pieces of my hunting trip were quickly falling into place, I was starting to sleep better, and my appetite returned.
The start of my hunting trip arrived. Kelly picked me up in Edmonton, and the drive to Zama City was slow going on snow and ice-covered roads. After eleven hours of driving and seeing millions of trees, we checked into the Camp. A gourmet meal awaited us, and we were soon dreaming of bison!
Acting on a tip from one of Brian’s trapping buddies, we hunted southward from Zama City to Chateh on the second day. There were snow-covered bison tracks in a couple of spots, and we walked in these areas trying to find fresh sign. December hunting days are short north of the 59th parallel, with sunrise at 930 am and sunset at 4 pm.
Back in the dining hall at the Camp, one guest said that two weeks earlier there was no snow in Zama City, so any bison tracks that we found would be relatively fresh. Another guest provided detailed directions to an area where a herd of bison were seen in recent weeks.
The next day, we followed these directions north of Zama City. There was a dusting of snow overnight, so any tracks would be very fresh. We found tracks from a pack of wolves, a lynx, a snowshoe hare, and a willow ptarmigan. Eventually, we came across a large area that was pockmarked with snow-covered bison tracks.
It was minus 37 as we walked in the old cutblocks trying to find fresher tracks. We made slow, noisy progress through the thick regrowth and stumbled over the tangle of dead trees and branches hidden under the knee-deep snow. The bison were definitely in this area, but finding, shooting, and retrieving one in the cutblocks would be very difficult. The ideal scenario would be to find bison in an opening or along a logging trail.
Back at the Camp, the weather station confirmed our fears. The Yukon blizzard we had been monitoring was about to hit, with 10 to 12 inches of snow and temperatures between minus 35 and minus 40 degrees.
On the fourth day, we drove back to the bison hotspot after a hearty breakfast. Just before noon, we spotted a herd of bison feeding in a reclaimed oil well site. The bison were big and black against a background of snow and frozen aspens. I closed the distance to seventy yards on foot, set up the shooting sticks and got away three quick broadside shots before my bison staggered and fell! I was surprised by what happened next. The shooting did not frighten the remaining bison. Instead, they circled the downed bison, raised their tails, and then began snorting loudly. We cautiously approached the herd, which finally stampeded when we were only thirty yards away.
We took numerous photos and collected blood samples and the incisor bar, as requested by the government. Then the heavy work began. The temperatures dropped by the hour, and we worked fast to keep warm. It was dark before we got the bison skinned, broken down into several pieces, and loaded into the truck. We left very little at the well site for the circling ravens.
Back at the Camp, my exciting news traveled fast. I received numerous congratulations and requests to see photos. That night, I had the best sleep in a month.
The next morning, we got an early start for the drive home. As we made fresh tracks eastbound through four inches of champagne powder, I thought about how lucky I had been—lucky to draw a bison tag, lucky to pull together a hunt of a lifetime in three weeks, lucky to harvest a bison, lucky to have shared the experience with my dad, and lucky to be heading home ahead of the Yukon blizzard.
When I returned home, my luck held, and I found a large freezer on sale.
For the previous Reader Story, click here.
