Vanish and FireTiger's 2018 Hunt Journal - Season 8

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Backpacked into the alpine last weekend. Hit some cruddy weather and didn't get to spend much time. Caught a few fish and saw 3 bucks.

We're backpacking into a different spot this weekend. FireTiger is going to try collecting enough mountain goat fur to make a hat. Fool's errand I say. I will fish.

Tuesday is leftover day and we've got our lists prepped. Then we're in Scotland for 10 days, and then its elk season! Still unsure whether I will buy an OTC tag, but I got a plan arranged with my Dad for opening weekend.

 

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Also went to my parent's house for a couple of days afterwards and got to see his buck from last year hung up finally.

First mule deer on left, first western whitetail on right, last year's mule deer in the middle.

 

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[dirtclod Az.]

Very nice.Envious.

 

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I bought the archery bear tag. Still haven't decided what I'm doing for elk. I think I'm going to give it until early September and if I haven't seen a tag I want on reissue, I'll just go OTC for the last two weekends of archery. That, or I'll just get the OTC tag when I'm back in town after this trip. Dad wants to take a weekend in the middle and go scout some new deer territory. He's retired so I don't know why he doesn't just go now, but, whatever.

 

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We're back from Scotland. Had a very good day for wildlife viewing one day including reindeer ( free range, not the "tour" deer ), red deer, roe deer and red grouse. The roe deer were all too far/small for my camera, and the stag photo didn't come out so well, but you can tell there was a whole pile of them together. The reindeer was sheer lucky timing as a group of 5 came over a ridge and walked right past us.

 

[kansasdad]

You say lucky timing, I say superior ninja stalking skills on the reindeer. Amazing landscapes

 

[WildWill]

Dream vacation for sure. I didn't know Scotland had wild reindeer. Hunting a red stag in the Scottish highlands would have to make my hunting "bucket list".

 

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Dream vacation for sure. I didn't know Scotland had wild reindeer. Hunting a red stag in the Scottish highlands would have to make my hunting "bucket list".

They're more "free range" than wild, but it was cool that we lucked into them anyway.

If anyone gets to go, make sure you try all the local food, as its very good. Maybe scary sounding ingredients, but tasty.

 

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Having a hard time focusing. Only 3 days away from the elk opener!

We'll be returning to a spot we hunted years ago, for the opener. To be honest, it isn't my first choice of where I want to hunt, but its more accessible for my father. I'm curious to see if we are more successful in finding the elk there now that I have much more elk hunting experience. There's definitely elk there, but they always seemed difficult to figure out, with most of our opportunities feeling more like blind luck.

 

[dirtclod Az.]

Go with the luck!Be it blind,it is what it is Hunting...

 

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I picked up my archery OTC E/S Elk tag today. With all the snafu's with the CO tags I just decided to make it simple and do what I've always done. FireTiger doesn't want to archery hunt elk so she's holding out for when Aspira gets their act together and will try to get a rifle tag reissue.

 

[Crumb]

I sure wish I could view your pictures, it’s odd I could on all your threads before and I can see everyone else’s photos?

 

[vanish]

I sure wish I could view your pictures, it’s odd I could on all your threads before and I can see everyone else’s photos?

Yes, you're missing out. That's very strange and sad indeed.

 

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I ended up beating Dad to camp on Friday night. He blew a tire on the way up. No photos of our camp as it is pretty spartan, just a couple of camp chairs and a Coleman stove, as we usually sleep in the back of our vehicles. We hung out for awhile, shared some beers with a neighbor, traded some photos and set up for a 4:30am wake up.

We got up, had our morning coffee and some apple pastries I made the day before, and headed out by 5:30. At shooting light, we in position near where we've had several encounters in the past. We continued working our way into the mixed timber.

After about 20 minutes, Dad jumped a young doe, which at first ran straight at him, then downhill 100 yards, turned around, ran straight at me and stopped about 10 feet from me. After a couple minutes of head shaking, she ran up the hill about 30 yards and turned to look at us. We finally moved on and didn't get 30 yards when she stotted into the woods, bumping right into a very nice bull. The bull, not knowing what was happening, burst out of the pines, ran past us at about 50 yards, went another 50 yards, did a complete 180 for who knows what reason and made like he was going to run over my Dad. I drew my bow as he closed in, finally stopping at around 30 yards from me, even closer to my Dad. The bull stood facing straight at my Dad with absolutely nothing between them...

 

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The bull was standing perfectly such that a large aspen was blocking my shot. Dad was having trouble clipping on his release. The bull didn't like what he was seeing, and spun around to leave. I dropped out of sight and started raking a tree. The bull stopped to look back, and made like he was going to come investigate, but disappeared behind some willows.

I kept at the raking for about 5 minutes ( time is always hard to judge in these situations ) before I moved up to discuss what had happened with Dad. His d-loop had gotten rotated against the arrow shaft and he couldn't clip on. We were so awed that the bull had decided to run straight at us that we just kind of stood there smiling.

20 minute go by, and we're still standing there giggling when I see some tan moving through the willows. I get my Dad's attention and let him know another bull is headed our way. This time we're knocked and locked with plenty of warning. There are two willow bushes in front of me and it appears the bull is going to step out at 20 yards heading left to right and I draw as his head is obscured behind the further bush.

The bull suddenly does a 90 and heads right at my Dad, who is also now drawn. He's completely obscured for me behind the closer willow, but if he passes it I'll have about a 5 yard shot. The bull stops just as he hits the end of the willow and I can't see a shot, but Dad drills him with a frontal at 9 yards. I see about 10 inches of arrow sticking out as he whirls back up the hill. My brain starts working again and I give a couple of mouth mews. He arcs around and stops at what I guess is 60 yards. There is a volleyball sized window through the willows, so I line it up and give it my best. The arrow arced perfectly through the hole and I heard a solid thunk. The bull disappeared over the hill.

In this photo, you can see where I was standing where my backpack is on the ground. The bull was standing next to the bush on the right side of the frame. Dad was about 10 feet behind and to my left.

 

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We returned to our state of awe. What on earth possessed those bulls to run straight at us? I'll take it.

We gave it an hour before starting. Our first objective was to see if I put the second arrow in the bull. I practice at 60 yards but I would not normally shoot at an animal that far. Elk are tough and anything to make recovery shorter warranted sending that arrow. My Dad worked his way over while I stared through that small hole. It took about 3 seconds for him to find a splatter of blood once he was in the right spot. I had thought the frontal shot looked a bit higher than I would have liked, but with two arrows in him I had confidence we'd find this bull not too far away.

After finding the evidence of the second hit, we switched places and I searched for my arrow. There was no sign of the arrow. We began a very slow tracking job, with me alternating between spotting blood and glassing ahead. The tracking was easy in the tall weeds, but the bull moved into an open, short grass meadow and it became difficult there. Blood was obviously on him and not really dripping to the ground.

90 minutes and 250 yards, and about 100 straight down vertical feet later, we found him piled up in a spring. The arrow you can see was my follow up shot. It had gone all the way through as there was an exit hole, but was pushed back in somehow. My dad is holding his broken arrow. The broadhead was somewhere still in the chest cavity. We didn't go fishing for it.

This was my Dad's sixth year archery elk hunting. He didn't have a tag the first year we went as he wasn't a resident yet, and took a year off in the middle due to a bum shoulder. If you've read from the beginning of the journal, you'll know this was one of my top goals this year.

My Dad is about to turn 64. My grandfather passed away at 66 and his brother at 68. The day before the season, we found out my cousin died unexpectedly at only 33, so you really never can plan on there being a "next year". Hopefully, I will continue to be blessed with moments like this for a long time. If your father, son or other important person in your life gives you the "next year", consider making it "this year".

 

[Carlin59]

Congrats, what a great accomplishment to share with your father!

 

[WildWill]

Success didn't take long this year. Congratulations to your dad and you. Can't wait to see how the rest of your season goes.

 

[LCH]

That's awesome!