Frustrating encounters 2022

[streetdoctor]

I've ran into the same bull (a good sized 6x7) 4x and have been unable to close the deal.

One time I slow played quiet when I found them in a meadow one morning. Instead of working the treeline to get closer (I ranged him at 90 yards). I set up in a good spot hoping they would graze within 60. They grazed the opposite way.

The next encounter was at last light and we were within 50 yards in heavy timber. The bull was able to circle and wind us. He responded to a location bugle.

The last two encounters I've gotten within 100 and to me it seems like calling has bumped them. Both in dark timber out of their bedding spot. Both times I saw them before they saw me as they were up slowly walking the opposite direction of my calling.

I know it's not my calling... last year I called a bull in with a sequence like he was on a string.

Every time this is the same bull with 4 cows. Cow calling I've done is everything from regular cow calls to lost calf mews to contact buzz's. Bugles have been location bugles and advertising sequences.

Getting down to crunch time again. I figure I can reliably get into them one more time...

At this point I'm convinced they're the only elk in this entire drainage or I would have killed a satellite by now.

 

[Marble]

Cows don't want the competition from another cow and he doesn't want it from another bull that's aggressive or near him.

You will have to either get between him and his cows or close enough to where can't ignore you.

If he responds from far away but then shuts up when you're close, you'll need someone calling from afar while you close the distance.

I killed a herd bull last week that I had been going after for two weeks. Our interaction began while he was at the wallow and his cows were up the hill near me. I had cows on one side and the bull on the other. He was super pissed off.

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[Ucsdryder]

@sndmn11 and I got into them thick this weekend. We got within 20-40 yards of the biggest bull I’ve ever seen while hunting 3 different times, with 3-5 other bulls answering every bugle that I made. It was something else. In the end the bow got drawn 3 times with no arrows let loose. We analyzed 100 times what we could have done differently. In the end I said, there’s a reason that bull has lived 7 plus years in the wild! MOST of the time you can do everything right and still not kill an elk.

On a side note, I got into about 20 yards from him and had him so pissed off he was growling like a grizzly bear. Everytime he’d growl, I’d growl back and he’d destroy a tree. It was fun!!

 

[sndmn11]

@sndmn11 and I got into them thick this weekend. We got within 20-40 yards of the biggest bull I’ve ever seen while hunting 3 different times, with 3-5 other bulls answering every bugle that I made. It was something else. In the end the bow got drawn 3 times with no arrows let loose. We analyzed 100 times what we could have done differently. In the end I said, there’s a reason that bull has lived 7 plus years in the wild! MOST of the time you can do everything right and still not kill an elk.

On a side note, I got into about 20 yards from him and had him so pissed off he was growling like a grizzly bear. Everytime he’d growl, I’d growl back and he’d destroy a tree. It was fun!!

I would have had way more fun if it were spot and stalk. Dude would be dead.

 

[Ucsdryder]

I would have had way more fun if it were spot and stalk. Dude would be dead.

BORING!!! Having a giant bull growling at you at 20 yards because he’s so mad he can’t stand it is way more fun than sneaking up and trying to kill one. And if someone had a little more awareness of her surroundings youd be trying to figure out who to send your skull to for a shoulder mount!

 

[sndmn11]

BORING!!! Having a giant bull growling at you at 20 yards because he’s so mad he can’t stand it is way more fun than sneaking up and trying to kill one. And if someone had a little more awareness of her surroundings youd be trying to figure out who to send your skull to for a shoulder mount!

I really like killing things that don't know I am there. Even more fun if you have watched them enough in the past to recognize them. Then when you kill them you can ask yourself, "I wonder if on {insert date} he knew he was looking at death when he saw me?"