My first elk hunt (archery) is coming up and I'm having a lot of anxiety over my "plan" after my scouting trip. I'm local to CO, and the unit is 5hrs from my home. For some reason, I was drawn to GMU25. I liked that it has a large roadless area, it is very scenic, and its adjacent to 24 which is supposedly a good unit. I've heard that it has a ton of hunters, but then again I hear that same thing about literally every OTC unit, so I don't understand how I'm supposed to judge the actual hunter pressure in a unit. I've also heard that there are lot of outfitters, and I really hate the idea of not knowing where they'll be, how many there will be, and that all these guys will be living it up on horses while I'm packing in a spartan camp alone for 9 days.
I did a lot of e-scouting as best I could from stuff I've seen online. I identified a bunch of spots, but when I got out there they all kinda seemed well, the same. Couldn't really evaluate one from another. I scouted the area over the weekend, and I found that the terrain is relatively flat for the most part with some dramatic exceptions. I didn't see a ton of practical glassing locations. For the most part the terrain is rolling hills with lots of grassy meadows broken up by stands of pine, lots of blow downs, etc. I found lots of elk crap and tracks, but nothing super fresh. I saw one elk, no herds. How do you hunt terrain like this? After looking at stuff on the ground, I was thinking of picking out pockets of pine that might hold elk, considering the wind direction and then try to work slowly along the edges with a cow call. Or just finding spots along meadow edges with elk trails and just sitting. Maybe this is my whitetail hunting talking. I'm kinda at a loss.
I've read that you want to keep moving until you find the elk, so I am thinking of hunting out of my car instead of the backpack hunt I initially was dreaming of. It's more practical, and lets me move from area to area. But now I think maybe GMU25 might be a bad bet for that style of hunting. Would love some general advice, even if it's not unit specific. And if you've hunted 25 before and aren't this year and want to help me with some specifics, even better.
I did a lot of e-scouting as best I could from stuff I've seen online. I identified a bunch of spots, but when I got out there they all kinda seemed well, the same. Couldn't really evaluate one from another. I scouted the area over the weekend, and I found that the terrain is relatively flat for the most part with some dramatic exceptions. I didn't see a ton of practical glassing locations. For the most part the terrain is rolling hills with lots of grassy meadows broken up by stands of pine, lots of blow downs, etc. I found lots of elk crap and tracks, but nothing super fresh. I saw one elk, no herds. How do you hunt terrain like this? After looking at stuff on the ground, I was thinking of picking out pockets of pine that might hold elk, considering the wind direction and then try to work slowly along the edges with a cow call. Or just finding spots along meadow edges with elk trails and just sitting. Maybe this is my whitetail hunting talking. I'm kinda at a loss.
I've read that you want to keep moving until you find the elk, so I am thinking of hunting out of my car instead of the backpack hunt I initially was dreaming of. It's more practical, and lets me move from area to area. But now I think maybe GMU25 might be a bad bet for that style of hunting. Would love some general advice, even if it's not unit specific. And if you've hunted 25 before and aren't this year and want to help me with some specifics, even better.
