PJ0311
Member
After spending most of the season hunting the breaks I finally put one down. He's not what I was looking for and I held out for the big one until the bitter end. The drifts were too high for me to get into the area I had been hunting so I had to start from scratch in a new area that was filled with road hunters with cow tags and quite a few hunters out doing it the right way. There was so much orange it reminded me of a Gardiner late hunt back in the 90's. After going almost a week without seeing a single elk I followed a bull's tracks from sunrise to about an hour before dark. I tried to go quietly but I bumped him in the thick stuff twice. Never saw him, but I could smell him when I got close to where he was bedded. The last time I bumped him his tracks went straight down a steep incline into a large drainage. I figured he was long gone and decided to wait until last light and glass from that spot. I spotted three bulls feeding about a mile away and decided to try and take one since it was the day before the end of the season. While closing the distance cows started appearing all over the place and I had to keep altering my approach in an attempt not to spook them. When I was almost there I was busted by five raghorns who ran straight to the three bulls I was after. After a mad dash to the top of the ridge I spotted the raghorns but not the three six points I was looking for. Finally, the bigger bulls appeared and I had just enough time to let the air out of one before he made it out of the drainage. I have no idea if he was the biggest of the three, I just confirmed he was a six and put a bullet in him. Unfortunately he didn't know he was dead yet and made it all the way down to the bottom before piling into some small trees. Had to do some pruning before I could quarter him. Pack out was a mile and a half uphill to the highway and not as bad as I thought it would be, although it did take over a day busting through snow drifts to get him out. Of course I was three miles from my vehicle so I had a long hike uphill in the opposite direction just to ge the pack frame. After reading the elk slaughter post I was obviously doing it the hard way
. Hardest elk hunt I've ever had, hands down.
. Hardest elk hunt I've ever had, hands down.
