Elk Hunting 2009

Elk hunting this year was very good for our family. We were 100% on elk hunting with 4 bulls and 1 cow elk. Three taken archery and two with rifle. The archery elk were take off of blinds set up by me and my dad. My dad hunted for almost three weeks on these blinds with bad luck. Then he brought up a friend to the blind for one night and he shot a spike. My brother's friend Heath who is in the hunting photo last year's hunt, killed another bull this year in a different blind while he was drunk! He fell out of the blind about four feet high and climbed back in and then shot a 5x5. Lucky punk that he is, he only hunted 2 or 3 days. My dad ended up shooting a cow after several weeks of bad luck, and then 15 minutes later had a 5x5 walk with in 15 yards of him. Unfortunetly I don't have photos of those elk or my brother's because I was not there and I haven't got them from the hunters.

Now to the rifle hunts. My brother and I both drew on a bull hunt for the first 2 weeks of October (peek of the rut). There were only 25 tags on this hunt and neither of us planned on drawing. With a brand new bow I really wanted to archery hunt and didn't think I was lucky enough to draw. Well, my dad took up the guide position for me and my brother. After all, he spent so much time hunting archery in the area he learned it pretty well, on the other hand Jeremy and I didn't know to much. Opening morning I decided to check out some hay fields up the valley a ways where a friend told me he had seen a big bull. At first light we were sitting close the field spotting and my dad spotted a herd of about 30 head with a big bull at the end. He gunned it down the road and told me I was going to shoot that bull. Well, I didn't totally agree with him because it was hard to see how big he was. When we got in position I started looking at the bull trying to decide to shoot him or not. It was hard to tell how big he was when they were running all out. Finally at about 250 - 300 yards I decided to start shooting still unsure of weather I wanted to shoot him. It was opening morning! I wasn't ready to stop hunting. I ended up getting a bad rest on the door of the truck and emptied my gun at him. It went to show that I need to practice my long range shooting. Later on we figured out he was only a 5x6 and there was a bigger bull on the mountain. I was glad I didn't hit but depressed at my poor shooting. Well that day we decided to take a camp up on a mountain where we heard of another big bull where my dad had scouted out during archery and where Jeremy heard a good bull bugling a week before. We put tent down after clearing 6" of snow off the ground. Spent most of the day hauling everything in for camp. That evening Jeremy and I went to scout out an area down the trail while my dad stayed at camp and spotted the area. My dad was the lucky one and spotted about 25 head on the ridge just down from camp. The next morning Jeremy had gout in his toe so bad he decided to go back down to the truck and road hunt since he couldn't walk well. Me and my dad went down the ridge to try and get a look at this bull. After just about 30 minutes down the ridge he started bugling. For an hour we tried to figure out where they were going to go and where we needed to be. There was a park to their left where I thought they might come out to feed and then work their way back up the ridge towards us. We almost decided to wait for them to come back but then decided to move in on him. We headed down on there right until I ran into some of his cows. They kinda spooked but not really they didn't know what we were and the wind was in our favor. To keep from spooking the whole herd we doubled back and I started moving in on the left side while my dad kept the bull bugling so I knew where the bull was. It was thick brush and loud snow but I was able to sneak with in about 50 yards of the bull but I couldn't see him well because of the brush. Then some cows cut wind of me or something and spooked running to my left towards that park. I knew if I could get to that park quickly I could get a shot at that bull and see him. I bolted to my left and could see cows running almost parallel to me 30 yards to my right. I hit the park and immediately sat down and got a rest on my knee. Then the rest of the herd came out of the timber into the park about 30 head. They still couldn't figure out exactly what I was because most of the herd stopped and looked at me including the bull. That's when I decided to take him. He was a good bull but a little week on one of his fifth points that he had broken off. My first shot hit him and the herd went from a stand still to a run. The bull ran another fifty yards and was having a hard time. I shot at him twice really quickly but I think I only hit him once. He then went through a little patch of timber and cows just kept coming through the park while I ran up the park to see if I could find this bull again. I knew if he dropped off the other end of this park it was going to be a pain because it was very steep. Luckily he came out of the timber at the end of the park and I shot him again. While I was reloading he went down and was done. It was a very pretty place to kill an elk. On top of a mountain with beautiful views in every direction. Plus, it died right on a 4x4 trail. It was one of the easiest elk hunts I have ever had and one of the best.
My dad wanted the cape so I let him take the head home. He then surprised me by having the head mounted English style. It's pretty cool looking. I haven't hung it in the house yet, still trying to find room. All in all it was a great year. On the way out off the mountain we spotted about 5 herds of elk all of them had similar bulls in them. If they made it through the year there should be some really good bulls up there next year for archery. Jeremy ended up shooting a five point coming out of a hay field a week later. It was a good year and we got a lot of meat. I had to give a bunch away.