First elk I ever killed

[Pony Soldier]

I have been thinking about this for a while so here goes.

When I was first starting out at the prime old age of 12, I went where my Dad wanted to go. Hell I could barely decide on lunch let alone where to hunt. Dad had been told by a friend that he had seen a nice bull elk up along the reservation boundary. Dad had never been there so it was a new experience for all involved.

Since we didn't know anything about anything we parked on the bottom and worked our way up the hill. There was a little block of cliffs with a kind of a flat above it. When we got there Dad chose to work the west side to the draw and sent me up the boundary line to the top. I guess that was his way of keeping track of me.

I worked my way up to the top but got cold. Kids don't pack a lot of insulation. I came upon a hollow log and crawled in to get out of the wind. I fell asleep and when I woke up, the sun had come up and the wind had gone away. I crawled out and perched on a large p-pine stump. Within moments I saw movement and stood up for a better look. At that point I could see it was a nice bull working towards the boundary. I put the sights on him and pulled the trigger. When he didn't fall I readied for a second shot and he fell just before I could pull the trigger.

When I got up to him he started to stand up and I shot him in the neck without even aiming. The first shot was at 50 yds and the second was at about 5 ft. I sat down and starrred at him. My heart was beating so hard I thought I was going to pass out.

Now I was at a real dilema. Earlier in the year Dad had given me a knife which I had lost fishing and never had guts enough to tell him. So now I had an elk and no tools or knowledge of knowing what to do or where to start. In about ten minutes my father showed up and the education began. He showed me where to start, what to cut, why and helped when I didn't have the strength.

The bull was a big, big bull. He had a 56" spread and a lot of mass. There was 6 on one side but the other side the last two points were broke off and gone.

We put a rope around the head and started down the hill . We give a hell of a pull and on dry ground he moved 10 whole feet. At that point Dad said let's lighten the load and cut the head off. He was right and it did move easier but then he said to leave the head and horns. He said they don't fit in a pan. With a great deal of pleading I got to bring them home. However when I went to college he threw them out.

We broke over a little bluff and found a road we didn't know existed. Dad walked out the road and came back with a jeep cabover with a flat bed and I guarded the meat.

That was the beginning of an insatiable apitite for elk hunting.

Now it's your turn. What do you remember about your first elk kill.

 

[Scoot]

That's a great story! Wish my dad could have been with me on my first elk. My good buddy called in a decent 6x6 to 8 feet and I shot him through the heart from my knees. We tracked him and found him 100 yards away. As we were about to go to work on him another bull bugled from not far away. I promptly called in that 6x6 and in spite of a warning shot, my buddy managed to make a good 2nd shot and we had 2 nice bills down. Elk hunting has gotten tougher since that first day!

 

[rayporter]

ok
it was 1983 and i was sitting on fence rail in ohio waiting on my turn to run a barrel race. dan, a fellow competitor sitting beside me says '" i wish i had some one to go elk hunting with."
i litterally grabbed him and asked "what do i need"

i had nothing fit for the trip, no rifle or sleeping bag and no horse to ride that was not half race horse. but dad let me use his and 30 days later we were going over wolf creek pass.

we went many miles in to where a guy told us he had seen elk and we camped in a foot of snow and seen elk most days but did not get a shot. but i was hooked.

the following year dan went somewhere else and i took my best friend back there with dads mules. it got sporty with the weather back in there. we camped in snow and the snow collapsed our 3 season summer tent.

the fun started as we rode up the canyon the first day of season. my mule stopped and looked off to the left and i soon spotted a bull. confident as hell i turned asked my pard "do you want this one?" he piled off and shot to start our elk hunt off with a dead bull. he walked up to it and i sat on my mule and took his picture. then i grinned and told him "skin that one, pilgrim, I'll get you another one" 2 hours later i had a second one down.

man, if i had a video of that mule packing meat i could sell it for a comedy of errors. the meat fell off many times and i cussed that mule as she stood rock solid as i put it back on.

we survived and had many more fun trips. lots of snow back then.

 

[11boo]

My first was 1989. I had done a couple archery hunts unsuccessfully, and a friend told me I’ll never get one with a bow. Invited me along on a rifle hunt, I had to borrow a rifle lol.
Opening day I walked up on a 4x at 25 yards. Dropped him right there. Hooked for life. Rifle hunting seemed too easy after 20 years and a bunch of elk I went back to archery. I never get elk meat now.

 

[mtnbiker208]

In oct of 2002 i bought the house i am in in North Idaho. I had taken some time off to move and get some stuff sorted out. I had a free afternoon and debated go get a load of wood, or walk from the house and see if i could find an elk. Took off from the house and a couple of hours later had a forked horn bull down. Packed it out on my mountain bike. 21 elk later and at least 15 have been packed out on a mtn bike, all on otc idaho tags.

 

[highcountrymuley]

Got to hunt some private land after several Years of unsuccessful public attemps. Was picking up friend at his property for a music concert and a herd of elk popped out 75 yds past the house. I said "my rifle is in the car, do u want to butcher elk or go to show?" Elk it was! I shot the first /lead cow in left shoulder broadside. She ran 50 yds and turned around. Shot her in right shoulder. She ran forward and I shot her again and she went down. Dragged her up hill away from house a few hundred yards and struggled the atv to hoist her up from a tree branch. Tough meat from an old cow but awesome. Killed a calf the next year! Half grown one on public a couple years ago. I prefer deer hinting and meat personally. Elk are too dang big and hard to hunt.

 

[Geewhiz]

This is great. Keep them coming.

 

[bohntr]

My first year hunting elk…..I was primarily a spot and stalk mule deer bowhunter so I left my bugles and cow calls in my pack and decided to stalk in on a herd. I got really lucky and managed to arrow my first bull (a satellite) at 30 yards after crawling up on him.

I still hunt like that today…..but I have learned of when/where to call

 

[SoloWilderness]

My first elk was a 3x4 bull, on the 14th day of hunting a 1 pt draw unit. I had hunted the unit hard twice before and had dozens of blown encounters to learn from by that point. Was glassing a big bowl that had been holding elk almost daily, but very hard to approach, as they hung out mostly in the tundra above treeline. Spotted him about an hour before last light, about a mile and half down on the other side of a canyon, by himself, no cows, who had busted me on every stalk I tried to put on so far. He was hanging out in a meadow, with a screen of trees and loud mountain stream between us.

I literally sprinted down the creek bed the entire distance to get close enough before I lost him at dusk. The creek covered my noise, and the small ridge of trees kept my smell blowing away from him. Made a 40 yard shot with my old aluminum Eastons through a little hole in the trees, and watched him run off into the trees with the arrow wagging... not great penetration. Followed blood into the timber until dark, flagged it and headed back to camp a few miles away. Got lucky and saw my buddies headlamps on the other side of the canyon. They brought a little bivy camp over, and we spent the night reliving the days events around a campfire drinking cheap whiskey... My buddy had shot over the back of a legit 7x7 earlier that day...

First light we started grid searching, and after a couple hours found my arrow stuck in the ground, point up, with about a 5 gallon bucket of blood spread around it. 20 yards downhill he had piled up, and we started cutting. Pack out turned out to be almost 14 miles, so we took it in 1 trip... It was a miserable hike out, luckily I was young....

Took me roughly 5 years of hard 10-15+ days/ year OTC and 1 point draw unit archery hunting to tag that bull. Blew an incredible amount of close encounters along the way, some of them on big 6x6 bulls, others on dinky little cows. It is still probably the one I am proudest of, due to the amount of sheer will it took after 14 exhausting days of hunting to keep going.

I spend A LOT more time on the glass, and a lot less time still hunting these days.

 

[mavinwa2]

I was 11yo. Even though tagged along for the past 2 years, this was my first carrying a rifle, license & elk tag.

Back then had to hunt next to my father, WA State requirement for hunters under age 16.
Opening day of elk season 1968.
On top of the ridge/plateau, a herd of elk spooked off the top and headed downhill into the basin we were hunting. Back then, hunters all over the place. The basin was nicknamed "Little Seattle".
Anyways my dad told me to stay put and he took a stand 30 yards away as we covered the trail intersection in the thick timber. Only took couple minutes but the elk were on us. Cows, Calves sounding like freight trains running the trails and through the brush, trees. I remember one big cow running right over a small Xmas-douglas fir tree just yards away from me.

Suddenly another hunter cut in front of me, running to my right and he disappeared. Well, he chased a bunch of elk right toward us. I had taken a stand 5 yards off the main elk trail, in sight of my dad. Suddenly 7 cows/calves come running down the trail. Couple cows had their tongues hanging out and breathing heavily. Then I spot a legal spike bull at the rear. Shoulder the Winchester 94 in 32-win special, align peep & bead, and before squeezing the trigger, my dad yells out; "Don't shoot, THEY're COWS!"

Too late, the Winchester booms, the spike bull drops to the ground and comes sliding to a stop, behind a fallen log. The cows/calves thunder past me just feet away. I recall the resounding echo of my rifle shot throughout the basin, an eerie sound never forgotten and heard often in later years.
Suddenly my dad, very upset, is next to me; "why did you shoot".
Me: "dad, I shot the spike bull. Its over behind that fallen log".
The log was 25 yards away. My dad goes over, "holy shiat!".

My first elk season and bull down, using the family heirloom Winchester 94, rechambered to 32 Win-Spl by my grandfather in the 1940's. That rifle passed down from his father, grandfather too. My Airforce dad, call sign Gator, shot many a NY whitetail with that gun. Bringing it with him on his move to Seattle/Boeing and me using it my first 3 years hunting.

2016: I took the ol' family Winchester94 out for a morning stroll for WA State general spike bull elk season.
After 5 days of nada elk, thought why not in the remembrance of good ol' times. 3 hours later, put down this WA State spike bull @105 yards...could feel my departed father's spirit with me.
48 years later and 200 yards from the spot I shot my first bull elk!

 

[Wyohunth]

Great stories.