My brother drew a bull tag in unit 22N and spent a lot of time scouting this fall.
I took the week off work to help with his hunt and I'm glad I did because he didn't get his bull till the last morning.
We found some bulls and had some missed opportunities on Sunday and Monday. Tuesday and Wednesday were a bust as we didn't see any elk.
Rain, sleet and cold from a storm Wednesday evening had me feeling tired and a little defeated. We figured the weather would push some elk off the rim and into our unit so we looked over the map and made our best guess as to where to hunt the last morning.
I was relieved to find that we had the trailhead to ourselves. We shouldered our packs and headed up the canyon as it started to get light.
About a half mile in I spotted 3 bulls moving into a side canyon, the problem was they also saw us. The wind was in our favor so they weren't quite sure what we were. The two small bulls and the big 6x6 moved up to a brushy bench and looked back at us but my brother couldn't get steady enough for a shot.
I went up the right side of the canyon and my brother continued up the side the elk were on. One of the bulls tried to double back above my brother and was nice enough to give him a broadside shot.
Marc heard the bull crash and cough a few times above him so we waited a while before looking for him. We headed to the area he heard the bull go down but couldn't see it. I went uphill to the spot Marc shot the bull to look for blood. All of a sudden the bull stood up about 7 yards above me.
He was close and the pucker factor was high
. For a second there I was afraid that bull was going to trample me. I hit the dirt and yelled at Marc, " Shoot it, shoot it!!!"
Luckily for me the bull turned and trotted about 20 yards and laid down again. Marc was able to move around me and gave him a finishing shot.
There were a lot worse places we could have packed an elk out of given some of the steep, thick and brushy places we'd hunted. It also had the bonus of being the prettiest spot we'd seen all week and we were only 6/10 of a mile from the truck.
I'm super proud of my brother, he hung tough through all the ups and downs of his first elk hunt. I'm glad we got to spend the time together.
I'm also glad he didn't shoot that big 6x6, I'm sore enough from carrying the smaller bull's quarters down the hill.
I took the week off work to help with his hunt and I'm glad I did because he didn't get his bull till the last morning.
We found some bulls and had some missed opportunities on Sunday and Monday. Tuesday and Wednesday were a bust as we didn't see any elk.
Rain, sleet and cold from a storm Wednesday evening had me feeling tired and a little defeated. We figured the weather would push some elk off the rim and into our unit so we looked over the map and made our best guess as to where to hunt the last morning.
I was relieved to find that we had the trailhead to ourselves. We shouldered our packs and headed up the canyon as it started to get light.
About a half mile in I spotted 3 bulls moving into a side canyon, the problem was they also saw us. The wind was in our favor so they weren't quite sure what we were. The two small bulls and the big 6x6 moved up to a brushy bench and looked back at us but my brother couldn't get steady enough for a shot.
I went up the right side of the canyon and my brother continued up the side the elk were on. One of the bulls tried to double back above my brother and was nice enough to give him a broadside shot.
Marc heard the bull crash and cough a few times above him so we waited a while before looking for him. We headed to the area he heard the bull go down but couldn't see it. I went uphill to the spot Marc shot the bull to look for blood. All of a sudden the bull stood up about 7 yards above me.
He was close and the pucker factor was high
. For a second there I was afraid that bull was going to trample me. I hit the dirt and yelled at Marc, " Shoot it, shoot it!!!"Luckily for me the bull turned and trotted about 20 yards and laid down again. Marc was able to move around me and gave him a finishing shot.
There were a lot worse places we could have packed an elk out of given some of the steep, thick and brushy places we'd hunted. It also had the bonus of being the prettiest spot we'd seen all week and we were only 6/10 of a mile from the truck.
I'm super proud of my brother, he hung tough through all the ups and downs of his first elk hunt. I'm glad we got to spend the time together.
I'm also glad he didn't shoot that big 6x6, I'm sore enough from carrying the smaller bull's quarters down the hill.
