Elkhunter24
Well-known member
Good luck and welcome to the forum!
A family man's 2018 season log
- Thread starter jeremy.b
- Start date
jeremy.b
Well-known member
First deer scouting trip is in the books. It was a great trip, and I'll put up a proper summary later this week, but for now, here's a teaser (keep in mind this was a DEER scouting trip!):
Duck-Slayer
Well-known member
I am guessing you have one of the Owyhee unit tags. I will also suggest PM'ing me on which one. I know all 3 of them extensively. Good thread, I will be starting a similar type here shortly. My wife and daughter drew a late Nov. tag down that way and my wife and I drew the early antelope bow tag for down there. I think there are a couple of threads of my wifes, dad's, and 1 of my deer from down there. Mine of coarse is smaller of the 3 we have taken down there. Good luck!
Matt
Matt
jeremy.b
Well-known member
Deer scouting trip #1 report:
My first trip up into my deer unit was going to be pretty simple: put some miles on the truck, establish some access points, burn some boot leather to identify any glassing points or hikeable country, and if lucky maybe see some deer.
To be honest, I didn't have high expectations of seeing many bucks because I wasn't planning to hit the highest elevations hard on this trip. My reasoning was simple: weather, human pressure, and the rut would likely have moved the bucks around come season anyway.
I headed up to Boise Friday morning and picked up a buddy of mine on the way out to the unit. It was a warm one even for Boise!
It took us a couple hours to get into the first part of the unit I wanted to scope out. We kicked out a bachelor herd of bulls (some decent sized too) when we parked (sorry, no pictures though).
We were running short on time to hit a glassing spot I had picked out and in our hurry I neglected to swap to my regular boots, and forgot my headlamp... I figured the boots weren't a big deal (ankle deep moon dust dirt said otherwise!) but the headlamp was a bit of a bummer. Luckily my buddy had his so it wasn't that big of a deal.
On the way up the ridge we picked up a herd of 30-40 cow elk a ridge over from us that were nicely oblivious to our presence.
After making the first ridge we decided to alter plans slightly and hit a closer glassing point to save some time. At around 9:00 PM we got settled in to our spot
My buddy, who is a machine when it comes to picking out animals, immediately spots a bull elk on a ridge ~ 1/2 mile away. With some luck I managed to spot the easy to see doe that was feeding right below him:
Eventually the bull spooked the doe out, but we got a little better look at him:
I grabbed a shot of the sun setting behind a little cloud cover and the smoke that is currently ever-present in the west right now:
My buddy grabbed my attention and just down the ridge 200 yards from us that herd of cows we had seen earlier were cresting the same ridge we were on
At this point I should mention that elk tags in this unit are draw only too so we were really just nature watching the elk at this point
Eventually most of the cows spooked off (the wind was blowing RIGHT to them, not sure how they didn't bust out earlier).
But at the back of the group a little 5x6 bull was trailing the group. I had a couple reeds with me (although I hadn't used them in a while!) and called to him a couple times.
That little bull must have been seriously lonely because here he came, right across that wide open ridge!
I eventually grabbed a little video of him closing the last bit of distance to ~ 40 yards:
[video=youtube_share;TH2fx8RszQ8]https://youtu.be/TH2fx8RszQ8[/video]
After he spooked out, we finished a last little survey of the area and headed down the hill. Made it back to the truck around 10:30 PM and decided to put some more miles on the truck to get closer to the next spot I wanted to hike into.
At around 11:45 PM we located a little side road on BLM ground and found a semi flat spot to crash. My buddy threw up his tent in the faint chance of a storm rolling through and I set up under the stars. I have to say I was glad I had two sleeping pads because we didn't take any time to smooth out the ground for a sleeping spot and the desert isn't exactly a smooth place to sleep on...
Sleep was fitful, but it was enough. At around 5:30 AM we packed it all up and hit the road. We timed it fairly well so we could see the country as we drove to the next spot. We saw a handful of deer on the way, all does and fawns, and some seriously cool country. We hit the spot I wanted to hike in from at around 7:30 AM, parked and headed in. I grabbed a cool sunrise shot:
We covered some decent ground that morning, 9.5 miles to be exact. Along the way we spotted a small band of antelope and stumbled into a few elk sheds:
Not a bad little haul for a deer scouting trip!
After getting back to the truck we started just covering ground on the roads. We eliminated a few spots just because of gated access on private ground. That was is perfectly fine with me too since it makes big country a tiny bit smaller.
There wasn't much more in the way of animals we saw, and all said and done, we put on ~270 miles in our little adventure.
One of the cool results of this trip has been that I now look at google earth WAY differently. Its a lot easier to pin down good looking country now that I've seen parts of it with my own eyes.
That'll be about it for updates for a while as I'll be a bit scarce for a few weeks before my Sept cow hunt. I'm having a little out-patient procedure to prevent baby #4, and will be making sure I heal up well before I head out on in mid September (wish me luck!).
My first trip up into my deer unit was going to be pretty simple: put some miles on the truck, establish some access points, burn some boot leather to identify any glassing points or hikeable country, and if lucky maybe see some deer.
To be honest, I didn't have high expectations of seeing many bucks because I wasn't planning to hit the highest elevations hard on this trip. My reasoning was simple: weather, human pressure, and the rut would likely have moved the bucks around come season anyway.
I headed up to Boise Friday morning and picked up a buddy of mine on the way out to the unit. It was a warm one even for Boise!
It took us a couple hours to get into the first part of the unit I wanted to scope out. We kicked out a bachelor herd of bulls (some decent sized too) when we parked (sorry, no pictures though).
We were running short on time to hit a glassing spot I had picked out and in our hurry I neglected to swap to my regular boots, and forgot my headlamp... I figured the boots weren't a big deal (ankle deep moon dust dirt said otherwise!) but the headlamp was a bit of a bummer. Luckily my buddy had his so it wasn't that big of a deal.
On the way up the ridge we picked up a herd of 30-40 cow elk a ridge over from us that were nicely oblivious to our presence.
After making the first ridge we decided to alter plans slightly and hit a closer glassing point to save some time. At around 9:00 PM we got settled in to our spot
My buddy, who is a machine when it comes to picking out animals, immediately spots a bull elk on a ridge ~ 1/2 mile away. With some luck I managed to spot the easy to see doe that was feeding right below him:
Eventually the bull spooked the doe out, but we got a little better look at him:
I grabbed a shot of the sun setting behind a little cloud cover and the smoke that is currently ever-present in the west right now:
My buddy grabbed my attention and just down the ridge 200 yards from us that herd of cows we had seen earlier were cresting the same ridge we were on
At this point I should mention that elk tags in this unit are draw only too so we were really just nature watching the elk at this point
Eventually most of the cows spooked off (the wind was blowing RIGHT to them, not sure how they didn't bust out earlier).
But at the back of the group a little 5x6 bull was trailing the group. I had a couple reeds with me (although I hadn't used them in a while!) and called to him a couple times.
That little bull must have been seriously lonely because here he came, right across that wide open ridge!
I eventually grabbed a little video of him closing the last bit of distance to ~ 40 yards:
[video=youtube_share;TH2fx8RszQ8]https://youtu.be/TH2fx8RszQ8[/video]
After he spooked out, we finished a last little survey of the area and headed down the hill. Made it back to the truck around 10:30 PM and decided to put some more miles on the truck to get closer to the next spot I wanted to hike into.
At around 11:45 PM we located a little side road on BLM ground and found a semi flat spot to crash. My buddy threw up his tent in the faint chance of a storm rolling through and I set up under the stars. I have to say I was glad I had two sleeping pads because we didn't take any time to smooth out the ground for a sleeping spot and the desert isn't exactly a smooth place to sleep on...
Sleep was fitful, but it was enough. At around 5:30 AM we packed it all up and hit the road. We timed it fairly well so we could see the country as we drove to the next spot. We saw a handful of deer on the way, all does and fawns, and some seriously cool country. We hit the spot I wanted to hike in from at around 7:30 AM, parked and headed in. I grabbed a cool sunrise shot:
We covered some decent ground that morning, 9.5 miles to be exact. Along the way we spotted a small band of antelope and stumbled into a few elk sheds:
Not a bad little haul for a deer scouting trip!
After getting back to the truck we started just covering ground on the roads. We eliminated a few spots just because of gated access on private ground. That was is perfectly fine with me too since it makes big country a tiny bit smaller.
There wasn't much more in the way of animals we saw, and all said and done, we put on ~270 miles in our little adventure.
One of the cool results of this trip has been that I now look at google earth WAY differently. Its a lot easier to pin down good looking country now that I've seen parts of it with my own eyes.
That'll be about it for updates for a while as I'll be a bit scarce for a few weeks before my Sept cow hunt. I'm having a little out-patient procedure to prevent baby #4, and will be making sure I heal up well before I head out on in mid September (wish me luck!).
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Crossbowguy
Well-known member
Very nice haul of bone over the shoulder! You must be in a good spot or someone else would have picked those up!
jeremy.b
Well-known member
Update time!
So, funny story, I get a call from the DR's office 5 days before my "procedure" and it turns out the urologist apparently had to have some kind of emergency surgery and was going to be out for 2+ months.... No idea what happened to the doc, but my best wishes with his recovery! Since it would have been pretty impossible to get re-scheduled with a new doc in time to recover before season my wife and I agreed to just postpone and reschedule sometime in Dec.
That left me with a bunch of extra time that I didn't think I'd have!
I've had a few extra shooting sessions and the muzzleloader is very well dialed in at this point. If I do my part I can break clays out to 140+ yards now. The key is the dirt-to-trigger interface working right
.
Getting off the bench and simulating some hunting scenarios has also been a good teacher and I've learned some fun lessons!
Along with my muzzleloader prep I was SORELY tempted to head back up to Idaho to scout my deer unit some more. To see if it was in the cards, I got all caught up on our budget and, well, lets just say the purchase of the new Metcalf+spotter+tripod+normal pre-season restocking of gear pretty well shut that down.
I almost had enough for the trip, but I've been needing new boots too and wouldn't you know it, there was a decent sale on some Scarpa Kenisis Pros' I couldn't pass up. So that was the last nail in the coffin on an extra scouting trip!
Speaking of new boots, going on two back-to-back 5 mile 1000+ vertical hikes (with only 15-25 lbs in my pack of course) in brand new, STIFF boots is not the wisest choice.... No real blisters or major hot spots, but my feet are NOT used to stiff boots right now and they very much let me know about it on that 2nd hike!
A couple weeks back we also got in a little 3 mile family hike to a near-by lake to celebrate my wife's birthday:
Everyone did great! I knew my 5-yr old could do the distance no problem (provided he was properly motivated) but I was REALLY impressed with the 3-yr old. He held his own just fine and in the attitude department did better than his older brother! I'll be taking him out on his first solo hike tomorrow so we'll see how he does without the "brotherly competition" that they had on our family hike.
Moving forward, my cow season opens tomorrow, but I won't be heading out for a while yet. When I do go I have up to 9 days I can hunt if needed, but I'm REALLY hoping I can get a cow down early and maybe scoot back to my deer unit to scout for an extra day or so AND get back home before the kids drive my bride completely bonkers. The one good thing is the two older ones are in school part-time now, so that gives her a little break at least!
I'm steadily packing up and will be ready to hit the road before long.
I just need to somehow not think about elk hunting until I leave....
So, funny story, I get a call from the DR's office 5 days before my "procedure" and it turns out the urologist apparently had to have some kind of emergency surgery and was going to be out for 2+ months.... No idea what happened to the doc, but my best wishes with his recovery! Since it would have been pretty impossible to get re-scheduled with a new doc in time to recover before season my wife and I agreed to just postpone and reschedule sometime in Dec.
That left me with a bunch of extra time that I didn't think I'd have!
I've had a few extra shooting sessions and the muzzleloader is very well dialed in at this point. If I do my part I can break clays out to 140+ yards now. The key is the dirt-to-trigger interface working right
.Getting off the bench and simulating some hunting scenarios has also been a good teacher and I've learned some fun lessons!
- Failing to push the bullet down on the powder charge results in a very comical sounding poof! followed by the bullet landing somewhere in-between me and my designated target.
- Shooting said bullet without seating it also nicely fouls up the bore and makes it a GIANT pain-in-the-rear to seat the next one (mental note always have some patches handy).
- Clay pigeons are silly hard to see out past 60 yards when your heart is pounding after a 50 yard sprint.
- Clay pigeons are silly hard to see and HIT at 125yards+ with open sights even when calm (eyes might be getting old already.... just sayin...)
- Forgetting to put the ramrod back in the gun after reloading and then running off makes it hard to reload again.
- Not having a spare nipple can be bad news if you break the only one you have.
Along with my muzzleloader prep I was SORELY tempted to head back up to Idaho to scout my deer unit some more. To see if it was in the cards, I got all caught up on our budget and, well, lets just say the purchase of the new Metcalf+spotter+tripod+normal pre-season restocking of gear pretty well shut that down.
I almost had enough for the trip, but I've been needing new boots too and wouldn't you know it, there was a decent sale on some Scarpa Kenisis Pros' I couldn't pass up. So that was the last nail in the coffin on an extra scouting trip!
Speaking of new boots, going on two back-to-back 5 mile 1000+ vertical hikes (with only 15-25 lbs in my pack of course) in brand new, STIFF boots is not the wisest choice.... No real blisters or major hot spots, but my feet are NOT used to stiff boots right now and they very much let me know about it on that 2nd hike!
A couple weeks back we also got in a little 3 mile family hike to a near-by lake to celebrate my wife's birthday:
Everyone did great! I knew my 5-yr old could do the distance no problem (provided he was properly motivated) but I was REALLY impressed with the 3-yr old. He held his own just fine and in the attitude department did better than his older brother! I'll be taking him out on his first solo hike tomorrow so we'll see how he does without the "brotherly competition" that they had on our family hike
.Moving forward, my cow season opens tomorrow, but I won't be heading out for a while yet. When I do go I have up to 9 days I can hunt if needed, but I'm REALLY hoping I can get a cow down early and maybe scoot back to my deer unit to scout for an extra day or so AND get back home before the kids drive my bride completely bonkers. The one good thing is the two older ones are in school part-time now, so that gives her a little break at least!
I'm steadily packing up and will be ready to hit the road before long.
I just need to somehow not think about elk hunting until I leave....
bowhuntmontana
Well-known member
Loving the thread. Great to see you getting out and enjoying some things around here with the family too. Hope you get your cow quickly in ID to get some meat in the freezer.
duckhunt
Well-known member
Great stuff
D
Deleted member 22670
Guest
Good Luck! That is a stud Muley buck.
A-5_Guy
Member
Just a heads up, make sure you scribe your ramrod and seat that bullet all the way against the powder on your muzzleloader. It might sound comical, but you don't want to blow yourself up--make sure that sucker is seated!
jeremy.b
Well-known member
Thanks! I saw that its suggested to do that to ensure consistency shot to shot too. Already done on both the main ramrod & the spare!
Crossbowguy
Well-known member
Good luck with the hunt it looks like your well prepared!
jeremy.b
Well-known member
Update: No plan survives contact with the enemy (or elk in this case)!
I'm back from my first 4 days looking for a cow. Just as a note: its been 14 odd years since I solo hunted elk, and I had forgotten how much of a mental challenge that is!
Here's our half-time report:
Even so, the trip, while it started off slow, did pick up. Unfortunately I didn't do a very good job getting many pictures, so you'll have to deal with some walls-o-text!
I'll cover it day-by-day and will post them as I get them written up:
Friday night
I had basically 2 areas I planned to hunt, the first area (we'll call it #1) is fairly open country with a couple major drainages. The area is fairly accessible (the reason I started there, being solo and all) and I've found a handful of elk there all times of the year. That night I got in and headed high up to glass and listen until dark. I tried bugling some but all was quiet. Overall it was an entirely un-eventful evening and I called it a night. Had a pretty sunset though!
I'm back from my first 4 days looking for a cow. Just as a note: its been 14 odd years since I solo hunted elk, and I had forgotten how much of a mental challenge that is!
Here's our half-time report:
- Cow Elk: 2
- Jeremy: 0
- Bull Elk (which I don't have a tag for): 3, maybe 4...
Even so, the trip, while it started off slow, did pick up. Unfortunately I didn't do a very good job getting many pictures, so you'll have to deal with some walls-o-text!
I'll cover it day-by-day and will post them as I get them written up:
Friday night
I had basically 2 areas I planned to hunt, the first area (we'll call it #1) is fairly open country with a couple major drainages. The area is fairly accessible (the reason I started there, being solo and all) and I've found a handful of elk there all times of the year. That night I got in and headed high up to glass and listen until dark. I tried bugling some but all was quiet. Overall it was an entirely un-eventful evening and I called it a night. Had a pretty sunset though!
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jeremy.b
Well-known member
Saturday
At daybreak I was back up to the glassing area and I spent a couple hours looking over everything. Other than a couple muley does, I could not turn up any other critters. I'll be the first to admit I'm not the most patient at glassing, but I felt I canvased the area very well for my abilities.
I relocated and hiked through part of the area where I had taken a cow during an Oct rifle hunt in 2016. There were a couple sets of fairly fresh tracks traversing one of the main ridges but they were at least a couple days old, nothing fresher. Later in the morning I ran into a couple other hunters with the same tag and they had been there the weekend prior and hadn't seen anything then either.
My in-laws live within an hour of where I was at, so I called it a day late in the afternoon and headed to their place to clean up and catch up. After chatting with them I found out that quite a few elk have been seen at the low end of the area (primarily all private) and sticking close to the main creek at the base of the drainages I was hunting. While there is some water up where I had been, I think enough human activity and the super dry conditions had most of them down low relatively near the main creek.
I did have a back-up plan for this condition though. I had contact with one land-owner that gave me access to a small chunk of state property in an adjacent ridge right next to the main creek and I was able to head in the next morning.
At daybreak I was back up to the glassing area and I spent a couple hours looking over everything. Other than a couple muley does, I could not turn up any other critters. I'll be the first to admit I'm not the most patient at glassing, but I felt I canvased the area very well for my abilities.
I relocated and hiked through part of the area where I had taken a cow during an Oct rifle hunt in 2016. There were a couple sets of fairly fresh tracks traversing one of the main ridges but they were at least a couple days old, nothing fresher. Later in the morning I ran into a couple other hunters with the same tag and they had been there the weekend prior and hadn't seen anything then either.
My in-laws live within an hour of where I was at, so I called it a day late in the afternoon and headed to their place to clean up and catch up. After chatting with them I found out that quite a few elk have been seen at the low end of the area (primarily all private) and sticking close to the main creek at the base of the drainages I was hunting. While there is some water up where I had been, I think enough human activity and the super dry conditions had most of them down low relatively near the main creek.
I did have a back-up plan for this condition though. I had contact with one land-owner that gave me access to a small chunk of state property in an adjacent ridge right next to the main creek and I was able to head in the next morning.
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jeremy.b
Well-known member
Sunday (Area #1 ish)
At o-dark-thirty I climbed up through the private property into the smallish chunk of state ground made up of main ridge about 2 miles long with some grassy hillsides and a bit of timber, breaking off VERY abruptly down into the main creek.
Other than some beds I found on the private property right above some houses, there was zero fresh elk sign in the area. It was very dark when I went through the beds but they didn't smell or look especially fresh. It was a beautiful morning to be out though!
On the way back down the ridge, I traverse a rocky patch directly above the "old" elk beds, and wouldnt you know it, a cow jumped up and bailed off the ridge onto another section of private! There was no time to prep for a shot and I was close enough to various property lines I wasn't inclined to push it anyway. But hey, at least I saw an elk!
Since the first "area" and the backup spot (other than the spooked cow) had seemed pretty quiet, I headed up to area #2. This area is far less accessible than area #1 at the price of being very brushy and steep.
Hey I had to try the "easy" spot first!
At o-dark-thirty I climbed up through the private property into the smallish chunk of state ground made up of main ridge about 2 miles long with some grassy hillsides and a bit of timber, breaking off VERY abruptly down into the main creek.
Other than some beds I found on the private property right above some houses, there was zero fresh elk sign in the area. It was very dark when I went through the beds but they didn't smell or look especially fresh. It was a beautiful morning to be out though!
On the way back down the ridge, I traverse a rocky patch directly above the "old" elk beds, and wouldnt you know it, a cow jumped up and bailed off the ridge onto another section of private! There was no time to prep for a shot and I was close enough to various property lines I wasn't inclined to push it anyway. But hey, at least I saw an elk!
Since the first "area" and the backup spot (other than the spooked cow) had seemed pretty quiet, I headed up to area #2. This area is far less accessible than area #1 at the price of being very brushy and steep.
Hey I had to try the "easy" spot first!
jeremy.b
Well-known member
Sunday (Area #2, first contact)
I've found elk in area #2 quite a bit in the past, but you have to be careful as if you get one in the wrong spot, between unrelenting terrain and giant patches of bitter and buck brush, the pack job can be a nightmare!
This is also the same area where I got the muley in 2015. Its the kind of country that can grow a buck like that in a general season unit...
At about 11AM I parked, planning to head in to the area on a un-maintained road. The road is open enough to take a utv/atv down, or a truck if you don't care for its paint job, and is generally overlooked by most hunters.
Heading down the road I could see there were no recent vehicle tracks, one set of not too recent boot tracks (going in/out), and a pretty fresh set of elk tracks headed in. Away I went!
As I was wandering in, I kept looking at the elk tracks and they did look awful fresh... So, just to check, I crack off a bugle. Bam! Immediate response, and close! I find a gap in the trees and locate the bull. The road loops through a creek bottom and there he was on the road across the creek ~300 yards out. A decent 6x6 (huge body, fairly small antlers) nosing a cow around! Sweet, but WAY too far for a muzzleloader!
The two (there was only the one cow) continue to move down the road, not spooked, but moving steadily. Once they go around a bend I hustled to try to close the gap.
Elk walk fast by the way! I was never able to get them back in sight again.
I did follow their tracks and they seem to head up to a good water source that I know (unlike area #1, there is quite a bit of water all over in this area).
Unfortunately the following the tracks to the water source would take me directly down-hill and down-wind of the area. So, to beat the wind I back-tracked and climbed up the ridge to gain elevation, which took a good little while. After making the main ridge above the waterhole I nursed my way in and set up around 4PM.
I've found elk in area #2 quite a bit in the past, but you have to be careful as if you get one in the wrong spot, between unrelenting terrain and giant patches of bitter and buck brush, the pack job can be a nightmare!
This is also the same area where I got the muley in 2015. Its the kind of country that can grow a buck like that in a general season unit...
At about 11AM I parked, planning to head in to the area on a un-maintained road. The road is open enough to take a utv/atv down, or a truck if you don't care for its paint job, and is generally overlooked by most hunters.
Heading down the road I could see there were no recent vehicle tracks, one set of not too recent boot tracks (going in/out), and a pretty fresh set of elk tracks headed in. Away I went!
As I was wandering in, I kept looking at the elk tracks and they did look awful fresh... So, just to check, I crack off a bugle. Bam! Immediate response, and close! I find a gap in the trees and locate the bull. The road loops through a creek bottom and there he was on the road across the creek ~300 yards out. A decent 6x6 (huge body, fairly small antlers) nosing a cow around! Sweet, but WAY too far for a muzzleloader!
The two (there was only the one cow) continue to move down the road, not spooked, but moving steadily. Once they go around a bend I hustled to try to close the gap.
Elk walk fast by the way! I was never able to get them back in sight again.
I did follow their tracks and they seem to head up to a good water source that I know (unlike area #1, there is quite a bit of water all over in this area).
Unfortunately the following the tracks to the water source would take me directly down-hill and down-wind of the area. So, to beat the wind I back-tracked and climbed up the ridge to gain elevation, which took a good little while. After making the main ridge above the waterhole I nursed my way in and set up around 4PM.
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jeremy.b
Well-known member
Sunday (Area #2, second contact)
I was able to keep still for all of 45 minutes (maybe) before getting antsy and I fired off a bugle. And another response, at around 300 yards!
Excellent, I hoped the cow was still with the bull, or, if it was a different bull then maybe HE had cows.
I started working a cow call and moving in on the bull. I got within 150 yards and set up hoping to draw the bull (and hopefully cows) into view. Eventually the bull made a quick appearance but I didn't see him very well.
He seemed to be alone, but to be sure I pursued him a little to see if maybe there was a cow lurking near-by. The bull eventually moved off and from what I could tell he was definitely alone. Even now I'm not sure that was the same bull from earlier or a different one.
At any rate, at this point I started to get a little suspicious; I had only seen the one cow with the first bull and if that WAS the same bull, then the bull(s) seemed to mostly cruising without any herds really formed up yet.
I had only covered one section of area #2 though, so I headed back to the truck to relocate a bit for the night with plans to get up high in the morning and cover more of the area to see what else was there.
I had covered a fair amount of ground between the areas #1 & #2 that day (at least 12 miles and 1500+ vertical up/down, which is a bit for me) so I was pretty tired that night.
I was able to keep still for all of 45 minutes (maybe) before getting antsy and I fired off a bugle. And another response, at around 300 yards!
Excellent, I hoped the cow was still with the bull, or, if it was a different bull then maybe HE had cows.
I started working a cow call and moving in on the bull. I got within 150 yards and set up hoping to draw the bull (and hopefully cows) into view. Eventually the bull made a quick appearance but I didn't see him very well.
He seemed to be alone, but to be sure I pursued him a little to see if maybe there was a cow lurking near-by. The bull eventually moved off and from what I could tell he was definitely alone. Even now I'm not sure that was the same bull from earlier or a different one.
At any rate, at this point I started to get a little suspicious; I had only seen the one cow with the first bull and if that WAS the same bull, then the bull(s) seemed to mostly cruising without any herds really formed up yet.
I had only covered one section of area #2 though, so I headed back to the truck to relocate a bit for the night with plans to get up high in the morning and cover more of the area to see what else was there.
I had covered a fair amount of ground between the areas #1 & #2 that day (at least 12 miles and 1500+ vertical up/down, which is a bit for me) so I was pretty tired that night.
jeremy.b
Well-known member
Sunday Night...
I think I'll break for a second and touch on the mental challenge that I mentioned the start of this update.
One would think that getting into elk would just fuel the fire going into Monday, but I have to admit that that was not the case for me and Sunday evening was a bit rough.
I'm sure we all deal with it at some level; being away from family, physically tired and animals not cooperating with OUR plans provides a great breeding ground for frustration and self-doubt.
In this case, since all the elk sign I was seeing in area #2 was so dispersed through really rough country I was very frustrated and concerned with actually locating any cows AND getting a clean shot opportunity.
But after working through it, since the bulls were active, the best plan I could come up with was to hunt bugles in the hopes that I'd find a bull with at least ONE cow.
Anyway, not to overly emphasize it, but its a very real part of hunting, especially solo hunting and while its not very fun, we all do make it through it, hopefully for the better.
There is more of the story to tell though, so onward (when I can get to it)!
I think I'll break for a second and touch on the mental challenge that I mentioned the start of this update.
One would think that getting into elk would just fuel the fire going into Monday, but I have to admit that that was not the case for me and Sunday evening was a bit rough.
I'm sure we all deal with it at some level; being away from family, physically tired and animals not cooperating with OUR plans provides a great breeding ground for frustration and self-doubt.
In this case, since all the elk sign I was seeing in area #2 was so dispersed through really rough country I was very frustrated and concerned with actually locating any cows AND getting a clean shot opportunity.
But after working through it, since the bulls were active, the best plan I could come up with was to hunt bugles in the hopes that I'd find a bull with at least ONE cow.
Anyway, not to overly emphasize it, but its a very real part of hunting, especially solo hunting and while its not very fun, we all do make it through it, hopefully for the better.
There is more of the story to tell though, so onward (when I can get to it)!
jeremy.b
Well-known member
Monday (we have more bugles!):
Well before daylight I headed to the top of the ridge that overlooked the area I had found the elk the day before and into the back-side of that series of ridges. The back-side is a DEEP NASTY drainage. This is the kind of drainage where you really just need to set up camp for a few weeks to eat any animal you kill in there...
Waiting for it to get light I hear a bugle across the nasty drainage. Then a response from the ridge where I had run into the bull the night before. I assumed that bull on the ridge was the same bull from the night before.
The bulls sounded like they were doing simple locator bugles, they didn't really sound like they were moving cows around or anything. Sun-up came and both bulls were still piping off here and there.
I worked my way a little bit down into the nasty drainage to glass. Eventually I was able to glass the bull across the drainage, a smallish raghorn. He seemed to be alone, but I ALMOST MIGHT have heard a cow chirp or two above/below him. I didn't spot any other elk though.
I got a pretty good location on where he seemed to be headed to bed, and since I had the tiniest of hopes that there were cows in the area, I decided to the take on the task of dropping down into the drainage (1100 ft in less than a mile) and climbing back up the other side (800ft in 3/4 of a mile) to get above the apparent bedding area.
Just typing that makes me cringe...
Well before daylight I headed to the top of the ridge that overlooked the area I had found the elk the day before and into the back-side of that series of ridges. The back-side is a DEEP NASTY drainage. This is the kind of drainage where you really just need to set up camp for a few weeks to eat any animal you kill in there...
Waiting for it to get light I hear a bugle across the nasty drainage. Then a response from the ridge where I had run into the bull the night before. I assumed that bull on the ridge was the same bull from the night before.
The bulls sounded like they were doing simple locator bugles, they didn't really sound like they were moving cows around or anything. Sun-up came and both bulls were still piping off here and there.
I worked my way a little bit down into the nasty drainage to glass. Eventually I was able to glass the bull across the drainage, a smallish raghorn. He seemed to be alone, but I ALMOST MIGHT have heard a cow chirp or two above/below him. I didn't spot any other elk though.
I got a pretty good location on where he seemed to be headed to bed, and since I had the tiniest of hopes that there were cows in the area, I decided to the take on the task of dropping down into the drainage (1100 ft in less than a mile) and climbing back up the other side (800ft in 3/4 of a mile) to get above the apparent bedding area.
Just typing that makes me cringe...
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