Where to set-up camp for mid to late September elk hunt?

[Mjprohoroff]

A buddy and I will be backpacking into a wilderness for elk this year. I have spent a lot of time on google earth and onx studying the area. We are going over the weekend of 8/18 for weekend backpack/scouting trip. The area is the edge of a huge burn from a couple years ago. There is a great drainage that runs east to west, has water in the bottom, a little more water in 1/2 way up the head end of the drainage. The drainage is about 5 1/2 miles long. Some of it is burned but there are unburned timber pockets in draws that run north and south all along the drainage. We can get to the head of the drainage hiking ridge tops in about 4 miles or come in the bottom along the creek and it about 6 miles to the head. The Drainage has everything elk want and need.

Here’s my question, where should we set up camp? We both use hammocks so level isn’t important, but trees are. In your guys experience, is it better to camp up on top of ridge with glassing right out of camp but no water? Or in the bottom on water and hunt up hill everyday to glass etc? If we are on the ridge top will the morning thermals bring our scent down in the basin and spook the elk? In this scenario where would u guys camp?


Hunting is conservation

 

[FlyGuy]

How much elevation change between the two?

Sent from my SM-G610F using Tapatalk

 

[ElkNut1]

Just over the ridge opposite the drainage the elk are to be expected. This way you have no wind issues & are close enough to glass at daylight & hear them bugling throughout the night, if so you won't get much sleep! Ha Ha!

ElkNut/Paul

 

[Mjprohoroff]

The ridge tops range from 7-7800 and the bottom from 5-5500. So 1500 to 2000 vertical feet.


Hunting is conservation

 

[idahohikker]

What Paul said. I'd sleep high if you can. What state are you hunting? There may be water up higher. You can find some on topo maps and google earth and others you can't.

 

[Maverick940]

The ridge tops range from 7-7800 and the bottom from 5-5500. So 1500 to 2000 vertical feet.


Hunting is conservation

If that's the only amount of elevation you have for each of you to haul 5 gallons of water to camp at the very beginning of the hunt, then I'd camp up on top. I routinely do that in Arizona. It's only a couple thousand feet and 5 gallons of water only weighs 45 lbs. It's a no-brainer.

 

[Mjprohoroff]

If that's the only amount of elevation you have for each of you to haul 5 gallons of water to camp at the very beginning of the hunt, then I'd camp up on top. I routinely do that in Arizona. It's only a couple thousand feet and 5 gallons of water only weighs 45 lbs. It's a no-brainer.

That’s a great idea, thank you! We can even do that on the scouting trip and just stash the water by where we are going to camp.


Hunting is conservation

 

[Mjprohoroff]

What Paul said. I'd sleep high if you can. What state are you hunting? There may be water up higher. You can find some on topo maps and google earth and others you can't.

I will know more on the scouting trip, but I have spent many hours scrutinizing google earth, onx and cal topo and don’t see much water up high. We look around for sure.


Hunting is conservation

 

[FlyGuy]

(Im not an expert, but...) I'd probably work in from the bottom starting before daylight while the thermals are coming down. Hunt your way up, bugling and trying to locate them and dog them. If you put some to bed then wait for thermals to stabilize and then work around above them and set up. Or, If you haven't gotten on an elk that am, whenever the thermals start to change ( assuming you are ~ half way up in elevation at that point) I'd fill up my camp water bladders in the closest seep or runoff and make tracks to the ridgetop as directly as possible to keep your scent cone as small as possible. Then hike the ridgetop (w/o skylining) up to where you plan to make camp above that valley. Set up camp mid-day and then glass/bugle that evening and next morning.

Sent from my SM-G610F using Tapatalk

 

[chindits]

I second camping in the next drainage over from the one you hunt. I never stock water. I only need a couple liters for supper and coffee the next day so it’s nothing for me to top off my water bottle on the way back to camp. I use water drops so i don’t linger at water sources. You should be flexible and be willing to move camp if your area gets busted. Stocking water is committing too much to that camp.

 

[Mjprohoroff]

I’m a big sweater and drink a lot of water throughout the day so water is a big concern. I use a 4L platy gravity filter at camp and can easily go through that water in a day. Maybe when we get in there we find out there’s more water than we think and it won’t be an issue. . I like idea of camping in the next basin towards the top. That makes sense to me.


Hunting is conservation

 

[bluetick78]

+1 on Elknut1's post. If you camp on the water you WILL, without any doubt, spook off the elk. No questions. Without knowing where there feeding and bedding areas are, there's about a 90% chance you'll camp in the middle of it, especially if green timber is scarce. Camp in the next drainage. I see this every year. Well-intentioned hard working guys make this mistake and hamstring their hunt before it's even begun. Camp as far from the animals as you reasonably can. It might not be convenient, but tag soup isn't really that convenient either. Find the elk, then camp where they can't see you, smell, you or hear you.

 

[Brendan]

My advice: If it's 4-6 miles in, and not a total sufferfest bushwack: At your truck. Seriously. I wouldn't plan on backpacking a into a wilderness planning to stay until I knew where the Elk were.

I had a similar idea as you when I first started out in 2014, biologist said "look high", and then found the Elk much closer to my truck, down lower than I thought, so it was more advantageous to essentially day hunt even though summer sign was up high and deeper in the backcountry. I found Elk on the way in, wasted a day and a half in the backcountry with nothing more than old sign before heading back out and getting back into them.

Do a lighter weight recon trip at the beginning of your hunt, or just be prepared to haul everything back out if you need to relocate.

 

[Maverick940]

Do a lighter weight recon trip at the beginning of your hunt, or just be prepared to haul everything back out if you need to relocate.

On occasion, this tactic has also worked well for me.

 

[Haneydew]

This sounds exactly like the hunt I've been planning for over a year now. It will be an Idaho wilderness hunt in the Selway. Mid September rifle hunt. I have a trail system in mind, and the drainages I want to hunt. Same elevations, 7600-7900 up top, 5600-6500 in the creek drain. This will be my first time elk hunting, although I've been hunting deer for 35 years here in Texas. I assumed that the thermals and wind come into play just the same. I also plan on hammock and tarp camp, and staying mobile until I find the elk. Water is my biggest concern also, since I plan on only carrying in enough for the first 24 hours. I know there will be water down low but hope to find some at the head of the drain higher up. It's just the chance you take going into a new place. So my plan is to camp higher up at the head of the drainage after the first night. With several drains within a 5 mile radius within the trail system which makes a big loop I should be able to cover as much ground as possible, which is what I was told you needed to do in this area.

 

[Whiskey_Fish]

My advice: If it's 4-6 miles in, and not a total sufferfest bushwack: At your truck. Seriously. I wouldn't plan on backpacking a into a wilderness planning to stay until I knew where the Elk were.

Could not agree more, you didn't mention the length of your hunt. Is it long enough to spend the first day or two just hunting the first 2-3 miles in, then decide if you want to go deeper? Learned this the hard way, hiking past a water hole to a promising ridge for 5 days, only to realize they were hitting the water 2x a day every day.

 

[Maverick940]

A couple years ago I had a hunter who booked an 11-day trophy bull elk hunt with me. We went in two days early and set-up an overnight camp alongside a four-wheel-drive road in a saddle beneath a high mesa. There were bulls everywhere next to that road, but I told my hunter that we were going to pack an 8-day camp up on top of the message the next day and get set-up up there. He thought I was nuts. I told him that within 24-36 hours there'd be two or maybe three other truck camps near ours and that by opening day of season, all the bulls we'd been seeing by the road would be way up on top. So, we busted our ass the next day, packing an 8-day camp and then setting up and then hauling 10 gallons of water from way down off the other side. As it turned out, the bulls did come up on top as soon as other hunters started pushing them up where hunters didn't want to go. Something to keep in mind when considering a roadside hunt.