Elk Stank Question

[Muley_Stalker]

No, I haven't been around cattle. I know what elk smell like.

 

[Muley_Stalker]

Using your nose to find elk

How you can use your nose to find more elk this hunting season

www.gohunt.com

 

[Dougfirtree]

The smell was probably a bull. When you urinate all over yourself for 6 weeks you tend to get a pretty strong order. Smelling them is pretty common when you "get in the elk". Cow elk don't smell as much. Better hygiene probably. My guess on "smelling distance" is about 50yds, but depends on a lot of things. There have been a couple of times when hunting when I run into cattle and elk on the same hunt. There is a difference in smell, but it is subtle.

And the fact that you seemed to hear one animal run away is another clue that it was a bull.

 

[Bob-WY]

If you smelled them and heard them, you were close enough to shoot them.

Part of still hunting, and this is the hardest for me, is seeing the dang things. It's VERY hard to focus and keep looking for an ear, leg etc, The smell would put me on alert, but it may be to late. That's why I like snow tracking, at least I know there's one at the end of the track. Helps stay focused.

 

[bullbugle307]

Well, he never saw the elk so I assume the elk didn't see him. Although that's not a given. If the elk didn't hear you, see you, or smell you. Why would it spook?

I'd bet 100 bucks the wind swirled and he did get smelled for a fraction of a second.

 

[Muley_Stalker]

I'd bet 100 bucks the wind swirled and he did get smelled for a fraction of a second.

Yes, it can happen. I keep a piece of thread hanging off the muzzle of the rifle to check the wind. It's always out in front of me when hunting. If it's swirling I back out and go to another area.

 

[kwyeewyk]

I killed a muley buck after I caught a whiff of him one year, first I thought it came from one side of the ridge but couldn't find him, tried the other side and less than 100 yards he jumped up and looked at me and I dropped him.

 

[hank4elk]

I live with both in the neighborhood. They smell different to me.
A herd of cows smells stronger than one bull too. 50-500 yards out I've smelled them.

 

[utah400elk]

For what it’s worth...I have chronicled my adventures of teaching my son (now 13) to elk hunt on hunttalk. Last year he took his first elk...cow with a rifle on the Utah youth hunt. He should have an archery elk tag this year in WY. That said, one of the first thing I taught him was that when you smell elk, you stop immediately. He thought it was amazing that last year about 60%-70% of the time we smelled elk, if we stopped and seriously glassed we usually saw elk. Usually just an ear, eye, leg... By the end of the hunt he was very sensitive to elk smells.

In the rut, I think the bulls will be a little more pungent but I could not say I can smell the difference. I usually believe if you smell elk very strong then they are within 100 yards. There are a lot of variables but that the general rule I hunt by.

 

[Hunting Wife]

The farthest I’ve personally found elk by smell is about 1/4 mile once...got a whiff on the wind, walked into the wind until I came to a cliff, peeked over and there they were.

A few times, in a good directional wind I’ve smelled them and been able to work into the wind to find them. But more often it’s just a whiff and it may or may not be live elk. There are times they’ve used areas that still smell elky even though the sign looks at least a few days old. But if you can still smell them, they are usually somewhere in the neighborhood in my experience.

I also think bulls smell sharper, kind of more “vinegary”, if that makes any sense.

 

[Hem]

I'm with Muley. Elk don't smell like cattle.
Bulls smell like bulls...heavenly.

 

[SAJ-99]

Some of you guys have 6.5-Creed-equivalent olfactory lobes. Once you start separating out the stench of various ungulates by sex and distance, you can consider yourself legit.

 

[mtmuley]

Some of you guys have 6.5-Creed-equivalent olfactory lobes. Once you start separating out the stench of various ungulates by sex and distance, you can consider yourself legit.

Some of us have hunted elk for damn near 40 years. That's kinda legit. mtmuley

 

[Rzrbk]

Yup, classic Squatch! Sour smell and at best you see a blurry image!.

 

[SAJ-99]

Some of us have hunted elk for damn near 40 years. That's kinda legit. mtmuley

You get props from me.

 

[mtmuley]

You get props from me.

No props needed. You just kinda figure things out. Still learning.... mtmuley

 

[Muley_Stalker]

Some of us have hunted elk for damn near 40 years. That's kinda legit. mtmuley

Only 40 years?

 

[mtmuley]

Only 40 years?

Yeah. And elk don't smell like cattle. mtmuley

 

[Muley_Stalker]

They do to a lot of people. I'm a mountain man. Not a cowboy.

If you wanted to describe the smell of elk to someone who never smelled elk before. How would you describe it so they'd know what you mean? Saying it smells like cattle is as close as you can get.

Maybe if I had both smells together i'd see the difference between cattle and elk. As it is i'm not an expert on cattle smells like you are. I do know elk when I smell them.

You should get off your high horse.

 

[mtmuley]

You should get off your high horse.

Have a nice day. mtmuley