2020 Idaho elk w/Pack Goats

[Duck-Slayer]

 

[Duck-Slayer]

Day 6, we slept in a little. It was moving camp day. Wanted to let the sun dry everything pretty good, don’t like packing wet stuff. We rolled out about 11am, hunted our way down the mountain so we were about halfway back to a different trailhead than what we came in on. Stopped about 3pm. I’m going to hang out at camp this evening with the goats. Need a little bit more rest, these 5-8 mile days are catching up with me. Feet are doing pretty good, my heel I had surgery on last summer is doing pretty good some swelling and some pain nothing a 1kmg Tylenol can’t fix lol. Just got camp setup and had Mark haul 8L of water up from the creek in the Katadyn 10L basecamp bag. Don’t think we’re going to hunt this evening unless one walks by camp. Which is totally possible.
Matt

 

[Duck-Slayer]

Day 7, worked the North slope that is full of dead fall again this morning. Nothing to report as far as encounters. We than stopped at 11am for a snack. Had to drop down to the creek to get water after that. We concurred that we officially pushed these elk somewhere else... so we decided to move down below our new camp in the afternoon and wait till the thermals switched and hunt our way back to camp. Found a nice widish spot with a meadow on either side. Picked a dry creek bed on the one side of an opening so we could glass the other from about 215 yards away. It was about 2 o’clock, nothing like waiting in the sun and drying the socks and boots out! At about 5 o’clock I put the socks and boots on, stood up and looked across to the other meadow ELK!!! Ducked down and grabbed my binos and counted 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 cows, I was just waiting for the bull to step out but notta! Surprising for the 21st of September. I got Marks attention and we made a game plan to quickly tie the goats up and for Mark to move through the trees, cross the creek and get ahead of these elk and try and get a shot. I watched from our chilling spot. Wasn’t a few minutes after he left the lead cow decided she wanted to go up hill like she had a hot date! Was weird because they had no idea we were there. Just up and decided she wanted to walk up the hill. By the time Mark crossed the creek a peeked over the bank the last cow spotted him, they were still 100 yards up the hill. He slowly crouched down, they didn’t seem to spook. He hustled 100 yards down the creek bed and booked it up the mountain side. Got settled and waited. By this time I had been calling for about 10 minutes trying to get those cows to turn around and come my way. To no avail.... Mark waited a bit and heard something coming from down wind, another hunter...... apparently my calling, called him in. Mark chatted a bit and than met back up with me. We hunted our way back to camp with no other sightings. Bummer, fun day on our public lands!
Matt

 

[Duck-Slayer]

Day 8, we decided when we woke up it was pack out day. We both needed a shower! A quick pack up of camp and we were off. We were going to hunt our way out. In advance I want to say I’ve never been out this particular drainage. The ensuing 4 hrs and 4 miles was the hardest I have ever done in my life! Between the impassable blow downs, cliffs, rock slides, and utterly nastiness it was one I will never forget and never do again. Finally got back to base camp for some much needed refreshments and to swap stories with Jake who had been hunting solo the past 2-3 days. We than felt good enough to go wash 8 days of from off! Let’s say I slept really well!
Matt

 

[Duck-Slayer]

Day 9, Rest day for the goats and I. Body is feeling it after yesterday’s crappy decent off the mountain. Nothing to report from Mark and Jake. Tomorrow will be there last day of hunting. On a side note, on the way in, the other side of the trailer leaf spring broke about a mile before the trailhead. Come along and chain I made it. So today was also rigging it so I can make it home. The new axle is supposed to be here September 28th fingers . I loosened the plates that the spring is sandwiched in and slid the two halves back in, righted them back down than wrapped wire in front and behind the bracket to the other lower spring. Put a chain around the axle and secured to front of trailer to hopefully keep it together if it decides to come undone.
Matt

 

[Duck-Slayer]

Day 10, my Wisconsin buddies decided to go home this day. Sore, tired, and this would have been there last day to hunt. Till next year boy’s!!! I drove home and welded up the spring and repacked all my Gear. I will be headed back for the last 3 days of the season. So stay tuned for more live updates.
Matt

 

[Sytes]

A hellofa trek so far! Best to your final three!
You Gimping back with the MacGyver rig or swapping the 28th receipt of the axle? Some work ahead.

Rootin' for ya! You hear Bob Marshall whispering? Haha!

 

[BAKPAKR]

A hellofa trek so far! Best to your final three!
You Gimping back with the MacGyver rig or swapping the 28th receipt of the axle? Some work ahead.

Rootin' for ya! You hear Bob Marshall whispering? Haha!

Next year, I bet he says the heck with the goats and takes a sled.

 

[Duck-Slayer]

A hellofa trek so far! Best to your final three!
You Gimping back with the MacGyver rig or swapping the 28th receipt of the axle? Some work ahead.

Rootin' for ya! You hear Bob Marshall whispering? Haha!

Axle won’t be here till the 30th I guess, so I just welded up the spring to the current axle and put the chain and come along back on just in case, lol

Yes I’ve been researching the BoB the past 2 years for deer.
Matt

 

[Duck-Slayer]

Day 11, got up early at the house and left at daylight. Made it to a trailhead about 1 or so. Got the goats unloaded from trailer. Loaded them up with the necessities and I was off. My destination wasn’t real far, only about 2 miles from the trailhead. I was here 4-5 years ago and figured I would give it another go. Found a decent flat spot for the big Nemo 4 person Dark Timber tent. Hung out for the afternoon, made an early supper about 5pm. Than I headed out. Heard a bugle not 1/2 from camp, awesome . Ended up going up the wrong side of creek from where the bugles were. Which ended up being ok cause I ran into a cow, a tag, and 2 spikes. Could never get more than 80 yards from them.... ran out of light, bummer deal!
Matt

 

[Duck-Slayer]

Day 12, got up early and headed out to where I ran into that group of elk the previous evening. There is a small water hole above where they were. Made my way up the elk trail, come to find out there is a nice pinch point between some rocky cliffs there. Great spot to mark with OnX! Continued to the water and checked it out, good water source. Meanwhile there was at least 4 bulls bugling there heads off over across the creek, same spot as last evening. Found another pinch point with a trail on the far side of the water! Good to know, I chilled a bit and let the goats feed until the thermals switched to uphill. Worked my way back to camp for lunch and needed to filter water. Nap time . This would be my last evening/day hunting, so the plan was to make a play for the “herd” cause if I blew them out no big deal. Whole reason I didn’t do this before. I knew from the previous evening that they started bugling about 5:30 and the thermals switched to down hill shortly after. I left camp around 4:45. I was almost 2 miles from the elk spot and it’s all steep uphill . Well it went exactly how it did the evening before, they started bugling about 5:30 and I just quietly followed the sounds of the 4-5 bulls going back and forth. Made it to a severe uphill incline that went up to a bench. Goats got all perky eared, I look up on the lip of the bench, 2 spikes! They were checking out the goats, I made a couple soft cow calls, that way I could confuse these young elk so they would not blow out. They did not, they slowly fed away. At this point I was trying to get closer, unfortunately I only got 79 yards from them. This is when I noticed a branch antlered elk up and to my right, where a spring was coming out of the steep steep slope. Kept some trees between him and I, ended up getting 78 yards from him until he fed away from the lip and I was to close to the steep incline to see him. Goats and I slowly scaled this 120 yard high steep embankment. Followed the spring uphill, goats liked this, eating all the green grass along it. Got to the top of the lip so I could just see over and I saw cow elk filing/feeding through the timber about 100 yards away. At this point I had an arrow nocked and release attached. It was a little too open to get any closer. So I set my bow down and took some video and pictures with my phone. I just happened to catch movement out of my left eye 👁. Looked, holy crap there’s a bull standing 35 yards away looking at the goats !!!! I dropped my phone, picked up my bow, guessed 35 yards, drew my bow, settled my 30 yard pin just inside his right side shoulder (quartering to me) and let it fly. I watched the arrow arc and I couldn’t have walked up and place the arrow any better, it smoked him!!! Watched him run 80 yards, I quickly grabbed my phone of the ground and put on video just as he rolled down the hill!!!! Wahoo, finally after a 4 year drought of not getting an elk with my bow!
This elk walked up a small side cut where I couldn’t see. I believe this was the branch antlered bull I saw. He’s a small 5 point. Never shot a 5 point before. Well I got busy taking a couple pictures. I wanted to get at least half the elk boned before it got dark, knowing it was going to be a really late night. Got back to camp at 11:30, ate supper at midnight and crashed!
Matt

 

[Duck-Slayer]

Day 13, slept in till 8am, after a super long day yesterday. Woke up and crawled out of the tent and had a moose standing 50 yards from camp, little 2x2 bull! Good sign I take it. He wandered off after a short video and pictures. Going to try and get everything back in 1 trip. Only a short 2 miles uphill back to the truck/trailhead. Loaded the 4 goats with 50lbs each, I took 25lbs plus the head. Took 2 hrs to make it the 2 miles back to camp! Man that was awesome, great adventure these past 14 days!
Matt

 

[npaden]

Congrats! We need to see some pictures of those goats loaded down with meat!

 

[Sytes]

Badass! Grats on a determined hunt!

 

[Duck-Slayer]

Congrats! We need to see some pictures of those goats loaded down with meat!

Well, did not get any. Being dark and all.... the next day I didn’t because I wore just my long johns out because my pants were bloody/dirty. So I packed the phone away
Matt

 

[mdeerjunkie]

Congrats! Great write up and awesome hunt!

 

[WNC2500]

Enjoyed following along with that. You were persistent! Congrats!

 

[Pucky Freak]

Nice! Great ending to a long hunt. Congrats

 

[vanish]

Hooray! Way to go Duck.

 

[ashersdad]

Great adventure! Thanks for taking us along. Glad it all came together in the end.