"I did it! I freakin' did it!" You'll understand the importance of that statement later. In 5 days of hunting elk I saw well over 100. 100 last weekend and then 13 on Friday. I won't bore you guys with the stories of the not quites and instead will skip right to the good part.
The plan was that me and my dad would drop into this valley and up on the other mountain that I had seen the vast majority of the elk I'd seen during the last 2 weekends. He took from the 31st of august to the 11th of september off trying to get his first elk with a bow. I could only be up from Friday to Monday each weekend but I had every weekend to hunt so I really wanted him to get an elk with his bow. The plan was to take him in there as I was confident I could call in a bull for him on that mountain somewhere as they were everywhere. Well when we got ready to drop into the valley was "I'm not going in there". I kinda tried to talk him into it and he just said, "no I'm not going in there unless I have to". ok I said and walked off the sheer face. I heard a bugle as I was about to the bottom and saw a cow walk through a clearing on the other side of the valley. I walked closer down the mountain and let a couple cow calls out trying to pinpoint exactly where that bull was. He never piped out. I walked across the whole face of that mountain everywhere I wanted to go and didn't see an elk but the typical mountain wind was swirling bad and I was always on fresh elk sign so I kept on going. After slowly picking my way through the timber and on the edges of some meadows I finally saw a cow and a calf at about 50 yards feeding on the edge of the trees I was in at the base of a steep clearing, about 100 yards from the top of a hogsback ridge. This was at about 1:15 and those were the first elk I'd seen since crossing over from the other side of the valley. Sure enough the wind switched and she shot a glare right at me and then they both took off right in the direction I wanted to go. i figured there wasn't much use in going that way so I climbed to the top of the ridge, took a nap, and dried my socks and shoes.
At about 4:00 I got moving again and decided to watch some meadows that were about 1000 yards away on another mountainside. just to see when the elk were moving. Right before 5:00 I saw a rag horn bull come out into one of those clearings. I decided I would wait until 5:30 and start working my way back down the top of the ridge. I got my things together at 5:30 and started my way along the ridge exactly as I planned. The left side is nothing but a grassy clearing that extend about 80 yards down the ridge and then it turns into dark timber and it runs the whole length of the ridge (about 3 miles) so i was mostly focused on that side as it was getting towards feeding time. The right side was trees. I had only walked about 200 yards from where I had been sitting the through the whole middle of the day and where I had spotted the rag horn bull across the mountainside when I looked to my left and saw an elk at the bottom of meadow I was walking. I had just went through a little group of trees so I jumped back and looked through my binoculars to make sure it hadn't seen me. The whole time I'm saying to myself, "Please be a bull, please be a bull, please be a bull." I look through the binoculars and I see it hadn't seen me but I also see it's a cow and I see a calf behind her. I scan to the left a little and through a tree I see another elk, I look closer and I see horns! "YES!"
The only problem is there's no where for me to shoot. i'm back in the little pocket of trees and I have to get closer as he's about 70 yards away. I figure I might be able to sneak down to the bottom of this little patch of trees and get a shot off that way. I make it about 15 yards down these trees when I look to my right a little and see a cow and a calf about 25 yards away. It quickly became apparent that I couldn't sneak down any farther for fear of one of the other elk spotting me. I tried sidestepping to my left and right just hoping to find a shooting lane. Where I was at was as good as it was going to get. I had a little 2 foot by 2 foot square shooting lane about 3 yards in front of me and was afraid I wouldn't get an accurate reading on my rangefinder through that.
After about 3 tries I was able to and it read 55 yards. I knew I could do it! I then went into what I call "the zone". I had an arrow previously knocked so I put my release on the D loop. As I did so I saw how badly my hands were shaking. I remember unclipping my release once and reaching for my rangefinder just because of nervous energy. I remember saying to myself, "No Trent you know how far he is just focus". He was always quartering to me as he slowly fed up the hill toward me. I almost drew back once but right then he took another little step which made him ever so slightly quartering to me. "just wait" I told myself, "he has no idea you're even here, he'll give you a shot." After about 2 more minutes he finally turned perfectly broadside. Ok this is it. This whole time I've also been debating to myself how far to aim as he was way down hill. I finally decided I would use my 40 yard pin as it just seemed right. I drew back and said "ok here we go" I put my 40 yard pin about mid way up his side just a touch back from straight up his leg just because if my yardage guess wasn't right I didn't want to hit him in the leg and wound him. When my pin was settled I let her fly. Everything then went into slow motion as I watched every little back and forth and up and down motion of the fast moving arrow. It seemed like the arrow took about 10 seconds to get there and then I watched the arrow disappear right where I had put my pin.
The hillside exploded as elk went everywhere and I watched him go straight down hill towards the dark timber. He was already starting to lose his back end after only traveling about 30 yards and then he went out of site. I then commenced to going nuts. I was still in "the zone" so I don't remember hardly anything. I remember looking at my phone and it was 5:53. I then remember ripping off my bugle tube and saying fairly loudly, "I won't be needing this anymore! Get this off me!". Before I knew it I had taken off my backpack and gotten out my little digital camera and put my backpack back on...or so I think because my little camera was in my backpack and all of the sudden it was in my hand. I looked at the time again and it was 6:01. I have almost no recollection of 8 minutes of my life LOL. I took plenty of pics and a couple videos. Remember, the one video is of my 8 minutes after the shot and I was still very amped. The videos will say a lot of what I just said but it never hurts to say it twice. Enjoy
PS it took me until about 11:00 o'clock to get to my truck that night after being done dressing him out at 8:00. It was about 7 miles and 3 very steep ridges just to get out. The next day me and my dad went in there to get the rest out as I only brought out the backstraps that night. We left the truck at 9:45 and didn't get back until 6:30. About 14 miles round trip and up and down through thick timber the whole time. Most physically demanding thing either one of us had every done! Downright crazy to shoot an elk where I did. Thank god he went down in there with me because if I would've had to go back in there today for the second half I might still be packing it out. Crazy Crazy Crazy. Has to rank in the top 5 of hardest pack outs EVER. It can't get much worse then that one.
Videos
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PM2ZT-TBCWU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cL65hBCVkfk
Pics
The plan was that me and my dad would drop into this valley and up on the other mountain that I had seen the vast majority of the elk I'd seen during the last 2 weekends. He took from the 31st of august to the 11th of september off trying to get his first elk with a bow. I could only be up from Friday to Monday each weekend but I had every weekend to hunt so I really wanted him to get an elk with his bow. The plan was to take him in there as I was confident I could call in a bull for him on that mountain somewhere as they were everywhere. Well when we got ready to drop into the valley was "I'm not going in there". I kinda tried to talk him into it and he just said, "no I'm not going in there unless I have to". ok I said and walked off the sheer face. I heard a bugle as I was about to the bottom and saw a cow walk through a clearing on the other side of the valley. I walked closer down the mountain and let a couple cow calls out trying to pinpoint exactly where that bull was. He never piped out. I walked across the whole face of that mountain everywhere I wanted to go and didn't see an elk but the typical mountain wind was swirling bad and I was always on fresh elk sign so I kept on going. After slowly picking my way through the timber and on the edges of some meadows I finally saw a cow and a calf at about 50 yards feeding on the edge of the trees I was in at the base of a steep clearing, about 100 yards from the top of a hogsback ridge. This was at about 1:15 and those were the first elk I'd seen since crossing over from the other side of the valley. Sure enough the wind switched and she shot a glare right at me and then they both took off right in the direction I wanted to go. i figured there wasn't much use in going that way so I climbed to the top of the ridge, took a nap, and dried my socks and shoes.
At about 4:00 I got moving again and decided to watch some meadows that were about 1000 yards away on another mountainside. just to see when the elk were moving. Right before 5:00 I saw a rag horn bull come out into one of those clearings. I decided I would wait until 5:30 and start working my way back down the top of the ridge. I got my things together at 5:30 and started my way along the ridge exactly as I planned. The left side is nothing but a grassy clearing that extend about 80 yards down the ridge and then it turns into dark timber and it runs the whole length of the ridge (about 3 miles) so i was mostly focused on that side as it was getting towards feeding time. The right side was trees. I had only walked about 200 yards from where I had been sitting the through the whole middle of the day and where I had spotted the rag horn bull across the mountainside when I looked to my left and saw an elk at the bottom of meadow I was walking. I had just went through a little group of trees so I jumped back and looked through my binoculars to make sure it hadn't seen me. The whole time I'm saying to myself, "Please be a bull, please be a bull, please be a bull." I look through the binoculars and I see it hadn't seen me but I also see it's a cow and I see a calf behind her. I scan to the left a little and through a tree I see another elk, I look closer and I see horns! "YES!"
The only problem is there's no where for me to shoot. i'm back in the little pocket of trees and I have to get closer as he's about 70 yards away. I figure I might be able to sneak down to the bottom of this little patch of trees and get a shot off that way. I make it about 15 yards down these trees when I look to my right a little and see a cow and a calf about 25 yards away. It quickly became apparent that I couldn't sneak down any farther for fear of one of the other elk spotting me. I tried sidestepping to my left and right just hoping to find a shooting lane. Where I was at was as good as it was going to get. I had a little 2 foot by 2 foot square shooting lane about 3 yards in front of me and was afraid I wouldn't get an accurate reading on my rangefinder through that.
After about 3 tries I was able to and it read 55 yards. I knew I could do it! I then went into what I call "the zone". I had an arrow previously knocked so I put my release on the D loop. As I did so I saw how badly my hands were shaking. I remember unclipping my release once and reaching for my rangefinder just because of nervous energy. I remember saying to myself, "No Trent you know how far he is just focus". He was always quartering to me as he slowly fed up the hill toward me. I almost drew back once but right then he took another little step which made him ever so slightly quartering to me. "just wait" I told myself, "he has no idea you're even here, he'll give you a shot." After about 2 more minutes he finally turned perfectly broadside. Ok this is it. This whole time I've also been debating to myself how far to aim as he was way down hill. I finally decided I would use my 40 yard pin as it just seemed right. I drew back and said "ok here we go" I put my 40 yard pin about mid way up his side just a touch back from straight up his leg just because if my yardage guess wasn't right I didn't want to hit him in the leg and wound him. When my pin was settled I let her fly. Everything then went into slow motion as I watched every little back and forth and up and down motion of the fast moving arrow. It seemed like the arrow took about 10 seconds to get there and then I watched the arrow disappear right where I had put my pin.
The hillside exploded as elk went everywhere and I watched him go straight down hill towards the dark timber. He was already starting to lose his back end after only traveling about 30 yards and then he went out of site. I then commenced to going nuts. I was still in "the zone" so I don't remember hardly anything. I remember looking at my phone and it was 5:53. I then remember ripping off my bugle tube and saying fairly loudly, "I won't be needing this anymore! Get this off me!". Before I knew it I had taken off my backpack and gotten out my little digital camera and put my backpack back on...or so I think because my little camera was in my backpack and all of the sudden it was in my hand. I looked at the time again and it was 6:01. I have almost no recollection of 8 minutes of my life LOL. I took plenty of pics and a couple videos. Remember, the one video is of my 8 minutes after the shot and I was still very amped. The videos will say a lot of what I just said but it never hurts to say it twice. Enjoy
PS it took me until about 11:00 o'clock to get to my truck that night after being done dressing him out at 8:00. It was about 7 miles and 3 very steep ridges just to get out. The next day me and my dad went in there to get the rest out as I only brought out the backstraps that night. We left the truck at 9:45 and didn't get back until 6:30. About 14 miles round trip and up and down through thick timber the whole time. Most physically demanding thing either one of us had every done! Downright crazy to shoot an elk where I did. Thank god he went down in there with me because if I would've had to go back in there today for the second half I might still be packing it out. Crazy Crazy Crazy. Has to rank in the top 5 of hardest pack outs EVER. It can't get much worse then that one.
Videos
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PM2ZT-TBCWU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cL65hBCVkfk
Pics
