Non Heavy Timbered Areas

[Flatlander3]

How do you all go about scouting and scouting non timber land for elk. It's mainly open with scattered juniper and pines here and there, transitioning into your standard high desert area. Does the few scattered tree areas make finding bedding easier? Do you focus on green low areas on the aerail imagery for feed and water? Curious on your approaches.

 

[dtrkyman]

Absolutely find lower green areas, typically there will be a dirt tank or water source near by as well.

It can be shocking how many Elk are in the desert!

I have a tag this fall in a unit that goes from high classic elk country to desert, I will likely hunt the desert, less pressure for sure.

Little isolated canyons and thicker areas will have bedding, it's amazing how well they hide in what appears open from a distance.

Find a vantage point and get on the glass.

 

[LCguy]

Look for them bedding under juniper in the little arroyos. These elk were bedded when I walked up on them quail hunting. That's at least where e
i see them bedded in the lower elevation, flatter stuff.

 

[nphunter]

Water is key, they move way further in the desert, a lot of times if you bump them they will go miles. If there are any holes look in those.

The bull on the bottom was bedded with over 20 cows and we walked right past them. They were bedded in that sage where he died. We made it a couple hundred yards past them and bugled, he answered where we just walked though. We probably walked 50 yards from where they were all bedded.

The top bull was moving with his cows and a couple of other bulls and I ambushed him in a ravine where I thought they would pass.

I love elk hunting the desert!

 

[TaperPin]

How do you all go about scouting and scouting non timber land for elk. It's mainly open with scattered juniper and pines here and there, transitioning into your standard high desert area. Does the few scattered tree areas make finding bedding easier? Do you focus on green low areas on the aerail imagery for feed and water? Curious on your approaches.

There’s a little mountain covered in PJ near the Utah boarder that all the elk move off of during the season and out into the open sage flats. I was really surprised, but they do it every year according a guide in the area.

Some sagebrush herds in Wyoming don’t move far - finding them in the middle of summer or during the season is a matter of checking a few dozen shallow draws to see which they are in. Without anything to hide behind they remind me of big antelope out there.

Other sage areas have a small population that hangs around all summer and a much larger group that heads for the mountains during the summer until snow pushes them back, often covering a long distance. During the season these migratory elk might be in sage and PJ, but only if they’ve been pushed there. It helps to know if the elk are already there or it’s a waiting game as they trickle in. Sometimes there are so few resident elk that spend all summer in those areas it’s not really them you’re hunting.

Then there’s the foothills that open out into the sage flats. Big draws hide a lot of elk, and getting away from danger is just a matter of going over a few draws. In some of these I’ve never seen elk actually out in the flats, but they stick in the draws, at least during the season.

Finally, I can think of some large areas without a lot of draws or topography, where the elk are somewhat sprinkled all over without a lot of rhyme or reason. If someone bothers them, they head through the PJ a number of miles and continue doing their elk things. We’ve flown over some of this firefighting and in the air or on the ground I couldn’t make sense out of why elk were where they were - seemed very random.

To make a long story short I’m terrible at guessing what PJ and sage elk like to do without asking a local.