Lemhi, Idaho - antlerless within 1 mile of agricultural land

[southsidenando]

Turned 40 in mid-July and decided my mid-life crisis would be throwing caution to the wind and trying to get a cow elk before Labor Day.
Already an onx member, so I bought the elk101 online course, watched all of Randy's e-scouting vids and even contacted wescout4u, but they were fully booked.
Renting a truck the week of August 24th and driving from Chicago to Idaho with a friend who is way better at camping than me (as a whitetail archery hunter, backpacking in IL isn't really needed). Bringing a .308 as its my first time going after elk and while I love my Hoyt, I don't want to it make it harder than it already is.
Special season rules means I can only take a cow a mile from private land (on 51, it also can't be within national forest).
Robby Denning recommended I reach out to Idaho DFG to ask if any landowners had complained about cows (btw - solid move and I definitely plan on using his services in the coming years based on this simple gesture), which I did, but a young lady stated that she did/could not provide that info.

Reaching out to see if anyone familiar with that area could provide a helpful tip or two.
Im very realistic and realize the odds are against me, but again; mid-life crisis dictates rash moves...

thank you in advance!
Nando

ps - sorry for the wall of text

 

[KHNC]

Ton of elk on private near Leadore. When i was there two years ago i saw plenty of people road hunting looking for cows mid September. Not sure if you will have a lot of competition end of august tho.

 

[southsidenando]

@KHNC DUDE, thank you so much!
Leadore was identified as a potential base, but this is super helpful - really appreciate it.

 

[mwebs]

Isn't it within 1 mile of private, cultivated land? Anyways from what I witnessed no one pays attention to that and I was told local authorities do not prosecute. So you will have lots of competition from dudes driving around, rounding up cow elk and shooting at them from most roads outside the mountains, but it seemed easy to harvest one doing that from what I witnessed, if your into that.

 

[87TT]

It will be hot! You need to plan on meat care.

 

[FlyGuy]

I am no expert, but I hunted there last year and I don’t think that it’s much easier. I think that tactic works well for locals or for people with experience in the unit and know where to go, but one mile of cultivated private - that you can actually access - is not extremely easy to find. We thought it would be an easy plan D but we ended up wasting a lot of time in the truck driving to spots that seemed like they would work just to find they didn’t. In hindsight, The time would have been way better spent with bows in hand. Anyway, I wouldn’t be so quick to dismiss archery as your primary means of taking an elk.





You can’t cheat the mountain

 

[porkchop76]

I was there with my family from July 13th-21st. (Drove from NC) I’ve deer hunted that same area before. (2005) Bunches of closed gates now. The only thing I saw was whitetails in the crop fields. I’m no elk expert. Got my fair share of unfilled tags. But when I was there before, we saw more elk than deer. Only problem was that was in October, not August. The BLM joins the old lemhi rd in one spot probably a mile south of Pratt creek rd. That roads steep in some places. It’d turn into a scatting rink if it rained enough. Good luck. Ima try my luck a bit further in.


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[Fullfan]

Several of us drew cow tags in the salmon zone. Which had to be within the mile. Drove out a day early and talked to several ranch owners. We were given permission to hunt every place we checked. Do some digging and check out the Idaho yes program.

 

[southsidenando]

@Fullfan - thank you!

 

[Fullfan]

Good luck, the one place we hunted there must have been 200 cows and 20 bulls. They love that alfalfa