Hey guys, I’ve gotten a couple people asking to hear the story of my elk season this year. Heres the long recap of it. I don’t have near as many pictures this year, but it was a short and sweet season. Away we go.
Opening day rolled around on September 1 this year. Justin and I headed out early that morning to get to our glassing point before daylight. Once it’s bright enough to see through the optics and scan the area around us we immediately saw elk about 1.5 miles away. A fair number of cows and some descent little bulls. About 20 minutes goes by and all of a sudden I spot a 380” bull in the same general area and the plan set itself- close the distance on him. The elk weren’t talking a whole lot, but it was the earliest that the season has ever started. We load up our packs and took about 15 steps on our way to the 380 bull and all of a sudden Justin sees elk right below us 300 yards. “Big Bull” he says, and sure enough, there was a toad. He was with 4 other bulls, and he was a stud. He was significantly larger than that bull we were headed off to hunt, so plans changed. Long story short here, that group of bulls hit a thick timbered pocket and we planned be patient with that group of elk and hunt that bull that evening. With no conceivable way to sneak in on that big bull with the other eyes he had with him, we weren’t going to push it and risk blowing him out of the country.
We ended up deciding that we didn’t want to sit on that little pocket for 13 hours when there was other shooter bulls a mile away, and so we skirted that pocket and headed towards other elk. On our way towards the other bulls, a freakin plane decided to come and buzz us and the area we were hunting repeatedly. Having seen that plane before, a lot, I knew for a fact he was hazing elk back onto whatever property that person owned. Apparently he didn’t have enough elk on his place, and decided that he should go fly over public land and haze them back to his property. We just hoped he wouldn’t take all these bulls we had been seeing. I took out my phone and ended up getting pretty good video of him flying around in front of us. While I was videoing, Justin was watching him through his binos, hoping to read his tail numbers so we could report him to FWP. That plane got to about 100 yards or so from us in the air, and neither of us could pick up any tail numbers, it appeared to not have any. We watched him fly around for 10-15 minutes and he finally left. Luckily, the big boy next to us never came out and took off, that we could see, and some of the bulls we had been headed towards were still there and didn’t seem too bothered. Long story short, we ended up getting into 8-10 small 6 points, but never did see that 380 bull again. That evening we split up to hunt that pocket where the bigger bull went into, but never did see him again.
This guy is a real A-Hole.... with a capital A
Either the next day or monday, we did end up seeing that 380 bull again and were able to close the distance on him. He was pushing a couple cows and headed to the area we had watched him leave previously. We busted butt getting over there and got to within 200 yards of him. He had split from his cows and was bugling and looking for more. I went forward to get set up and all of a sudden I had a little raghorn trying to run right over me. He got our wind as we crawled out of a little cut and it must have swirled behind him. He was running right towards me and so I ran forwards trying to cut him off from where I thought the big bull was located. He turned and ran back quartered away from me, and ended up picking up the big guy and our night was over with.
The next weekend things were heating up. We ended up seeing a bull that we saw last year. We called him the “crown bull”. He seemed smaller than he was last year, but was a shooter none the less. He had lost his extra tine up top, but appeared to put on a couple more points down low. He was a 6 on his normal side and on the other side had at least 6 points down low below his 3rd. The wind was never right and conditions just weren’t right to stalk anything that weekend. But the elk that were around were becoming more vocal. We also saw a good 6x6 that weekend, but watched him from afar.
The "Crown Bull". These two pics are from last fall
The other good 6.
Opening day rolled around on September 1 this year. Justin and I headed out early that morning to get to our glassing point before daylight. Once it’s bright enough to see through the optics and scan the area around us we immediately saw elk about 1.5 miles away. A fair number of cows and some descent little bulls. About 20 minutes goes by and all of a sudden I spot a 380” bull in the same general area and the plan set itself- close the distance on him. The elk weren’t talking a whole lot, but it was the earliest that the season has ever started. We load up our packs and took about 15 steps on our way to the 380 bull and all of a sudden Justin sees elk right below us 300 yards. “Big Bull” he says, and sure enough, there was a toad. He was with 4 other bulls, and he was a stud. He was significantly larger than that bull we were headed off to hunt, so plans changed. Long story short here, that group of bulls hit a thick timbered pocket and we planned be patient with that group of elk and hunt that bull that evening. With no conceivable way to sneak in on that big bull with the other eyes he had with him, we weren’t going to push it and risk blowing him out of the country.
We ended up deciding that we didn’t want to sit on that little pocket for 13 hours when there was other shooter bulls a mile away, and so we skirted that pocket and headed towards other elk. On our way towards the other bulls, a freakin plane decided to come and buzz us and the area we were hunting repeatedly. Having seen that plane before, a lot, I knew for a fact he was hazing elk back onto whatever property that person owned. Apparently he didn’t have enough elk on his place, and decided that he should go fly over public land and haze them back to his property. We just hoped he wouldn’t take all these bulls we had been seeing. I took out my phone and ended up getting pretty good video of him flying around in front of us. While I was videoing, Justin was watching him through his binos, hoping to read his tail numbers so we could report him to FWP. That plane got to about 100 yards or so from us in the air, and neither of us could pick up any tail numbers, it appeared to not have any. We watched him fly around for 10-15 minutes and he finally left. Luckily, the big boy next to us never came out and took off, that we could see, and some of the bulls we had been headed towards were still there and didn’t seem too bothered. Long story short, we ended up getting into 8-10 small 6 points, but never did see that 380 bull again. That evening we split up to hunt that pocket where the bigger bull went into, but never did see him again.
This guy is a real A-Hole.... with a capital A
Either the next day or monday, we did end up seeing that 380 bull again and were able to close the distance on him. He was pushing a couple cows and headed to the area we had watched him leave previously. We busted butt getting over there and got to within 200 yards of him. He had split from his cows and was bugling and looking for more. I went forward to get set up and all of a sudden I had a little raghorn trying to run right over me. He got our wind as we crawled out of a little cut and it must have swirled behind him. He was running right towards me and so I ran forwards trying to cut him off from where I thought the big bull was located. He turned and ran back quartered away from me, and ended up picking up the big guy and our night was over with.
The next weekend things were heating up. We ended up seeing a bull that we saw last year. We called him the “crown bull”. He seemed smaller than he was last year, but was a shooter none the less. He had lost his extra tine up top, but appeared to put on a couple more points down low. He was a 6 on his normal side and on the other side had at least 6 points down low below his 3rd. The wind was never right and conditions just weren’t right to stalk anything that weekend. But the elk that were around were becoming more vocal. We also saw a good 6x6 that weekend, but watched him from afar.
The "Crown Bull". These two pics are from last fall
The other good 6.