4oh6hunter
New member
Just wanted to get some opinions from those who have experienced what my friends and I did this last weekend (apologizing now for the long story).
On Saturday evening (09/23) my buddy crawled up to 25 yards from a bedded 6 point bull, while two of us watched from a few hundred yards away. He made what we thought was a good, double lung shot, with a full pass through and a bloodied arrow. After the shot, the bull ran with his cows about 150 yards and bedded in a park, his cows continuing to run into timber. We got to a spot we could see him from a ways off and watched the bull for about a half hour, his head bobbing and blood streaming down his side. Right before dark the bull slowly got up and walked into the timber so we backed out and decided to give the bull the rest of the evening to expire, hoping to find him in his bed the next morning (highs for the night were in the mid to high 20's so we figured the meat would be fine). The next morning at first light the 3 of us went in and got right on the blood trail (which was bright red telling us he definitely got lungs) in the timber a few yards from where the bull was bedded the evening before. Unfortunately we followed blood (a very good amount) through the timber, down the mountain and a few miles to a river bank where we thought he crossed. It being late in the day by this point, we decided to head to the truck and drive to a different point to access the other side of the river. On our way to the truck, we got very lucky and noticed new blood, higher up the trail that we hadn't seen before, realizing that the bull had doubled back on his original trail to the river. We followed that until dark and then marked the last spot, unable to follow the blood in the dark, and went home. The next morning (09/25), my buddy who shot it and I went back in and started from the marked blood. The blood trail went from streaks on grass and brush, to LARGE patches and pools where the bull had bedded and coughed up good amounts. We assumed we were close to walking up on a dead bull, but to our disbelief, we got within 15 yards of him bedded under a tree and he got up and trotted off. Had we assumed he was still alive, which we now know we always should, we would have had arrows knocked and been quiet, but we figured he was dead by the amounts of blood we were seeing and it being 2 days since he was shot, so we just weren't ready and we were talking to each other fairly loudly (our mistake, knowledge for the future). Since the bull didn't run away, but rather slowly got up and tried to trot away, stopping several times to cough up blood, we decided to give him an hour to find a new bed where we could hopefully get another arrow in him (is this the right thing to do here?). Following his trail from his bed, we actually caught up to the bull, where he was walking back down towards the river again about 100 yards in front of us. Seeing this, we knew he was very sick (typically a bumped injured bull will never be seen again from what I've heard) and we decided to mark his blood trail, go home and give him the rest of the day to bed down and bleed out, hopefully without being bumped again. After another sleepless night, we returned to the last blood (09/26) and tracked him back to the river where he bedded in some very thick buck brush. In his bed was another very large pool of blood, but to our amazement, no dead elk. From his bed the blood trail was almost impossible to follow since it had rained a bit the night before and we spent the rest of the day looking but with no luck. We are going to continue to return to the area we last found blood and just do a grid system and hopefully locate him but we are both sick and feel terrible. This would have been his first elk with a bow and a big one to top it off. He is about to punch his tag but without taping it to a set of antlers and carrying meat out on his back
. I know elk are very tough but never did I think a lung-shot bull could bleed this much and still live.
Any advice or suggestions on what we could do differently in the future would be much appreciated.
Thanks!
On Saturday evening (09/23) my buddy crawled up to 25 yards from a bedded 6 point bull, while two of us watched from a few hundred yards away. He made what we thought was a good, double lung shot, with a full pass through and a bloodied arrow. After the shot, the bull ran with his cows about 150 yards and bedded in a park, his cows continuing to run into timber. We got to a spot we could see him from a ways off and watched the bull for about a half hour, his head bobbing and blood streaming down his side. Right before dark the bull slowly got up and walked into the timber so we backed out and decided to give the bull the rest of the evening to expire, hoping to find him in his bed the next morning (highs for the night were in the mid to high 20's so we figured the meat would be fine). The next morning at first light the 3 of us went in and got right on the blood trail (which was bright red telling us he definitely got lungs) in the timber a few yards from where the bull was bedded the evening before. Unfortunately we followed blood (a very good amount) through the timber, down the mountain and a few miles to a river bank where we thought he crossed. It being late in the day by this point, we decided to head to the truck and drive to a different point to access the other side of the river. On our way to the truck, we got very lucky and noticed new blood, higher up the trail that we hadn't seen before, realizing that the bull had doubled back on his original trail to the river. We followed that until dark and then marked the last spot, unable to follow the blood in the dark, and went home. The next morning (09/25), my buddy who shot it and I went back in and started from the marked blood. The blood trail went from streaks on grass and brush, to LARGE patches and pools where the bull had bedded and coughed up good amounts. We assumed we were close to walking up on a dead bull, but to our disbelief, we got within 15 yards of him bedded under a tree and he got up and trotted off. Had we assumed he was still alive, which we now know we always should, we would have had arrows knocked and been quiet, but we figured he was dead by the amounts of blood we were seeing and it being 2 days since he was shot, so we just weren't ready and we were talking to each other fairly loudly (our mistake, knowledge for the future). Since the bull didn't run away, but rather slowly got up and tried to trot away, stopping several times to cough up blood, we decided to give him an hour to find a new bed where we could hopefully get another arrow in him (is this the right thing to do here?). Following his trail from his bed, we actually caught up to the bull, where he was walking back down towards the river again about 100 yards in front of us. Seeing this, we knew he was very sick (typically a bumped injured bull will never be seen again from what I've heard) and we decided to mark his blood trail, go home and give him the rest of the day to bed down and bleed out, hopefully without being bumped again. After another sleepless night, we returned to the last blood (09/26) and tracked him back to the river where he bedded in some very thick buck brush. In his bed was another very large pool of blood, but to our amazement, no dead elk. From his bed the blood trail was almost impossible to follow since it had rained a bit the night before and we spent the rest of the day looking but with no luck. We are going to continue to return to the area we last found blood and just do a grid system and hopefully locate him but we are both sick and feel terrible. This would have been his first elk with a bow and a big one to top it off. He is about to punch his tag but without taping it to a set of antlers and carrying meat out on his back
. I know elk are very tough but never did I think a lung-shot bull could bleed this much and still live. Any advice or suggestions on what we could do differently in the future would be much appreciated.
Thanks!
