Wonderful story! I don’t know how many stands I’ve blown because of impatience or getting lax. I can still see a bulls eyes that I had called in up Lost Creek. I stood up after 15 minutes, heard a twig snap, and there he was no more than 15 yards behind me. Of course he exploded into the timber…I killed my first elk the second year I moved to MT. Prior to that fateful day I had hunted MT and CO as a NR and the last week of the prior MT season as a resident. My second season as a resident I logged more than twenty days hunting through archery and the early days of rifle season. It happened on the Saturday of the third week of rifle season and up to then I had hunted elk probably fifty plus days, I had missed two shots at bulls with archery and had multiple coulda, shoulda,woulda, close calls.
That morning I started out before daylight in a favorite drainage where I had encountered a 330” type herd bull in archery. Several inches of crunchy snow and thick timber and no wind to cover up my footsteps made it likely that today was going to be another day of navigating deadfall and getting a lot of excercise without an elk encounter to reward my efforts.
I took my time that day still hunting as quietly as possible through the timber up towards the single meadow in the drainage that offered more than thirty yards of visibility. I made it to the meadow in the early afternoon and was encouraged to find fresh elk tracks from the night before. I wasn’t all that experienced but I knew enough about the conditions to understand my best chance at seeing elk was to sit quietly until dark and hope they returned rather than trying to follow their tracks into their bedding area.
I took a seat in a location that gave me the best view of most of the meadow and settled down for the four hour wait to dusk. This meadow was on the side of the ridge, not the top and the only seat available for me required me to hold myself on the ridge by pushing against the ground. I could hold position for ten to fifteen minutes then I would have to turn and give my legs a break. One hour dragged to two and into the third with nothing more than tired legs and a wandering mind to distract me. There was no wildfire, nothing more than trees, clouds and one hundred yards of meadow on either side of me.
Well into the third hour of my sit, I started thinking about my wife and infant daughter at home and how many days I had been gone from them since the beginning of the season. I knew she was fatigued and weary of how much I had been hunting and I started thinking about how enjoyable it would be to get back home and spend the evening with her and my daughter. I thought through the logistics and knew that if I hurried home I could make it back just before dark and dinner time.
Something shifted inside me mentally and emotionally and I suddenly wanted to be home way more than I wanted to be hunting. Without further processing of what I was feeling, I stood up got my pack together and started walking down the ridge. I was less than twenty yards and one minute from where I was sitting when I heard the sound of rocks clattering and cows calling as they entered the meadow about sixty yards from where I had been sitting. The only problem was that because I had dropped down the ridge the cows and the herd bull were obscured by the tops of trees between us. I could clearly see them but it was too brushy to shoot.
I stayed frozen until the cows were out of my sights and as soon as the bulls eyes were obscured I climbed back up as fast as possible to get a clear angle. Geometry was my enemy because as I climbed he was losing elevation and try as I might I could only see the top three tines on his rack. I knew he was going to make the timber on the far side of the meadow so in desperation I gave my best cow call and laid in the snow on my side hoping he’d come up for one last look.
I saw his rack swing from away, to a side profile and then to facing me. He started my way as bull fever welled inside me. I knew he’d never fully expose himself and I planned to shoot him under his chin as soon as his head crested into view. Two steps towards me then he stopped. I could see most of his rack but no part of his body. I was laying in the snow gloves off fingers freezing waiting for him to come. Waiting… waiting. I’m guessing the standoff was at least ten minutes or more and then I saw his rack turn and move towards the timber and his cows. I climbed and cow called and called but never saw him again.
I was so disappointed that I was nauseous. To have that bull so close after so much effort I wanted to vomit. I literally had thoughts about throwing my rifle down the ridge I was was so disappointed. I remember having a mental conversation with God about how could this have in the very instance I was doing something good for my family?
I was seriously dejected and was feeling really sorry for myself. I was about five minutes into my moping when I heard a twig snap back in the timber where the elk had come from. I almost dismissed it as being my imagination but then I heard it again and now I could definitely hear an animal coming my direction. What was this? Glimpses of tan, then flashes of antlers and a raghorn bull cleared the trees looking for the herd that was in front of him and trying to hook up with that lost cow he had just heard.
My response was automatic and I shot him three times as quickly as I could before he fell just thirty yards from me.
I was dumbfounded. Still disappointed that that 330 class bull got away but in shock that I had finally killed an elk.
I didn’t make it back home early that night and looking back realized that it’s probably good for my ego that my first elk wasn’t that big of a bull. I would have probably thought that I had elk hunting figured out if I had shot that big bull.
