Third Time's The Charm?

Mason326

Member
Joined
Aug 21, 2016
Messages
125
Location
Midland, TX
This will be my first crack at a "semi-live" hunting thread.

Heading out this Friday for my third crack going after public CO elk. Still haven't seen one on public land with a rifle in hand. Lots of frustration, disappointment, and excellent camaraderie have been had. And many glorious poops in the woods. So far, we have hunted the fire-less ATV-scape that is the WR NF and the (relatively) female deer-ridden but elk-less Raggeds. Learning curve has been a bit steep as a displaced (now re-placed) Texan (yeah, boo, hiss :cool:) but got a great handle on how to thrive in relative comfort out of a pack now.

This year we are hunting a new unit in a steep, rugged, high, nasty, somewhat-recently burned range that overlooks a beautiful valley... to my surprise when scouting, one with 4G reception! And the best spot to camp will be near the truck (granted, way up high). Those are firsts. So this year, I will try to post daily updates when I'm on those (insert direction) facing slopes.

My usual hunting partners are my dad ("Pop", year 3 hunting with me) and my college buddy's BIL I befriended at his bachelor party ("brown beard", year 2 hunting with us). For the first time hunting outside Texas my not-so-little brother ("Bubba") is coming. It will be his first elk, wilderness, back country, and spot-n-stalk hunts ever. I am very jealous of him, I remember the nervousness and fun I had on my first western-style hunt (solo!) and the awe and joy of my first harvest on public land (mulie buck). He's in for a million-dollar experience no doubt, one I know he will make many memories on.

We all have 4th season either sex tags. We are all freezer-filler hunters and, like señor Newberg, I never pass on the first day what I wouldn't pass on the last. I gotta make sure elk aren't actually a figment of my imagination or confined to private ranches, too. Stay tuned for updates. Or don't. I like shouting at the sky as much as the next loon.

-Mason
 
Home sweet home scouting this August. My frankentruck in the background.
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F150 is dropped off for pops. Brown beard and bubba taking a turn at the wheel for the last stretch to the trail since I’ve been up all night all week with the babies and prepping for the trip.
 
We got up to the bottom of the mountain around 7-8pm and drove up. Had to chain up halfway due to ice. Ended up stopping around 10,200ft and got the tipi set up and us snuggled in for a long very cold night by 12:30am. Woke up to snow showers and spent the day digging in for the week. Snow started coming hard about noon and hasn’t stopped much yet, forecast says until late am tomorrow. Hopefully we can get some sleep and have scoped pictures of elk in the AM. Wish us luck and warmth.
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Things moved quickly, brown beard started having altitude sickness symptoms at about the same time we got ~36” of snow. With sunshine and warmer weather forecasted (ice) I felt it was doubly wise to beat a hasty retreat downhill to sleep below 8k. We stuck her in 4low and retreated to the local motel. Somewhat discouraged, we qualified our safety move as one that might coincide with the snow pushing the elk lower anyways... so we hoped.

We woke up this morning at 4am to go back in and scour and BB was feeling somewhat better. Chained up and made it to the trailhead with enough time to hike in and get settled behind glass right after first light. After finding lots of mule deer, I told bubba to look at a mule deer I had found to start training his brain to find animals. No less than three seconds later, he found the first elk! What appeared to be 2-5 cows/calves.
After watch a few minutes and much congratulations.... a 5x5 joined them!!!
 
Turns out there were ten cows with them! Quite a few cow/calf pairs and a couple old cows. Wish us luck, out to get em in a few hours now...
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