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Hunting Stories and Pictures
As told by Dave Howell: My hunt was really challenging this year. I started scouting a few weeks before opening day, driving out into my hunting area, doing a lot of long range glassing, spotting a few big bulls from vantage points down the ridges. I always carry my 8 power glasses and my light weight spotting scope and a small lightweight tripod in a New Frontier day pack, as long as the weight is 25 pounds or less. If I go for an overnight trip, I'll tie my sleeping bag onto my BULL-PAC with the day pack or my Selway. Over the years I've found that using my field glasses and scouting out this rugged elk country has saved me a lot of walking. You have to put in the hours to be successful. I was lucky enough to kill my 6 x 7 opening day this year. That hasn't happened very many times over the last 20 years. I had split up from Jim, my hunting partner. We went down 2 ridges into different drainages. We left about a half hour before daylight. I went down a ridge I'm pretty familiar with, carrying the same optics in my daypack as I did scouting, but also had quarter bags, snacks, my cantene, matches, a disposable camera in a plastic bag, my hatchet and knife, a diamond hone to put an edge on my knife and some flagging tape in case I needed to mark the trail. About a half mile down the trail, just before light, I began to hear some elk vocalizing - bugling, cow-talking in a drainage off the ridge. About a quarter mile down I got into a small herd of elk in a dry meadow. They didn't scent me since the wind was in my favor. I got within about 100 yards and there was 8 cows, so I watched until I could spot the bull that had been bugling, but I never did see him. I split off from that herd and headed back toward the top of the ridge. Then, I heard another bull bugling so I actually started running down the trail, hoping to sight him before he went into the timber. I had jogged for 100 yards or so and dropped into some dark scrub tamarack and just exploded a herd of about 6 elk right in front of me. I threw my rifle up on two of them, but they were cows and they crashed off into the timber. That was pretty exciting! So I kept on going down toward where I had heard the bull bugling. In fact, he had bugled a couple of times while I was with these other elk. I knew a couple hundred yards down the trail, it would break out and I could actually see across to where the bull was bugling. When I got there I looked across and he was right out on a ridge just bugling down the drainage like they often do. I could see with my naked eye that he was a trophy bull so I threw my glasses on him and my eyes about popped out! He was a dandy out about 400 yards. I started easing down off the trail to try to find a rifle rest. It is real steep country and real brushy so it's hard to find a rest and a vantage point at the same place. Finally I found a place where I could throw my pack on the brush and use it as a rest. About the time my breath was slowing and the crosshairs were starting to settle down on him and I was ready to squeeze off a shot, the bull stepped into the timber! He had probably been standing on that ridge bugling for at least an hour. I get down there, get my rifle on a rest, ready to shoot and he decides to step into the timber. I thought he was lost at that point. I just waited there hoping he would step out, but he never did, but he kept bugling about every 15 minutes. I figured "Well, he's in a timber pocket with brush faces on both sides. He can't leave without me getting a shot and he's still bugling." So I'd cow-call back or he'd cow-call and I'd bugle back. This went on for about an hour. I was amazed he was so vocal the first day of rifle season and that late in the morning. I figured he must be suicidal at this point! Anyway he finally slowed down to bugling every half hour and the last time was about 9:45 and it was getting pretty warm. The sun was really beating down so I decided to head back up to the trail, walk out and come back in the evening. When I got back up to the trail I changed my mind. I decided to go a little further down the ridge and check out a couple of other drainages I knew that might have some elk in them. I went down the trail about 100 yards to a decomposed granite face and sat down for a minute and looked across the canyon. Lo and Behold! The bull had come through the timber pocket and started across the next brushy face. He wasn't spooked and didn't smell me or anything. He was just hunting for cows I guess. I put my range finder on him again and he showed at 520 yards, a little farther than I like to shoot under any circumstances, but there was no way to close he distance. I threw my pack down on a rock that stuck off the edge of the trail and I actually laid down in the trail. The elk was across the canyon and my rifle was at a right angle to my body. At this point the bull had slowly picked his way about halfway across the brushy face and was starting to close in on the next timber pocket. I got the cross hairs on him, waiting for him to stop. A standing broadside shot at this range is a must! So I waited and he never stopped, just worked his way through the brush on the steep hillside. He was almost clear across and I figured "I have to take a shot or let him go." He answered the question for me, as he nearly stopped as he entered a real thick patch of brush. I knew that if he was walking I'd have to lead and holdover at this distance so I put the cross hairs a little ahead and above him and touched off a shot, if anything hoping that the sound of the shot would stop him if not hit him. The bull had no reaction, just kept walking - didn't even scare him, didn't hit him for sure. I put another round in and just then he had to turn to go around a big Alder bush, so when he turned he was quartering toward me. As he did that his profile wasn't moving forward since he was actually moving toward me. I shot again, came down from the recoil and he had disappeared. I figured "Well he either hopped into that little timber pocket, maybe I hit him, maybe I didn't. Maybe I dropped him, but I should see him rolling down the hill through the brush." I waited to see if I could get another shot if he was still there. I couldn't see any tan coloration as you would ordinarily see in the brush. I watched about 15 minutes through the scope, and with binoculars for another 15 minutes and nothing ever did show. I really didn't know what to think so I figured "Well, I got to go over there and look for sign of a hit or something." I started off down the side of that steep, nasty canyon between me and him. It took me an hour and a half to get over to where he was. I'd taken landmarks of his last location with a couple of side hill passes. I hadn't cut his tracks yet and I was at the highest point he would have been. I was making my cut across to where I thought he was and I could smell him or smell where he had been. Now I knew I was on the trail and I walked around a bush and there he was, just laying there. He had dropped and died instantly when I hit him high on the neck right in the spinal column. When I brushed his hair with my hand a little bit he actually started sliding down the hill. I couldn't believe how fragilely he was laying on the hillside, so I tied his antlers to the brush to keep him from going down the hill, making a miserable mess out of the whole deal. I kind of admired him there for a minute. They are a huge animal when you get right up to them. I sized him up for field dressing, skinning and quartering and decided we'd have to bone him out for sure. Keep in mind I was 2 to 2 1/2 miles of steep terrain from the road. I got out my camera and took a few pictures, admired the antlers, a few things like that. I always like to sit down and kind of relive the whole hunt and the stalk for 15 or 20 minutes after I find the animal, just kind of relax for a while. I called Jim on my pocket radio to have him come and help me get him dressed and quartered and hung up because it was warm on the Southern face where we were. I couldn't raise Jim so I got him field dressed and started skinning. When Jim finally came on the radio and asked me if I got anything, I told him I had shot a small spike and told him to get his ass down there and help me get him out. When he got there he congratulated me on my bull! He knew I hadn't shot a spike clear down there! So Jim and I got him wrestled around enough to fully bone out the carcass. We got the front shoulders off, bagged and hung up, took the meat off the ribs, neck and back bone. Then we took the hams off. We had got it down to reasonable load size, the hams being probably 80 to 90 pounds each and the boned meat and shoulders making a couple more 50 to 70 pound packs. We got everything bagged and hung in the tree. Sometimes its nice to have a small tarp to put over the meat so it doesn't get wet. That's a good use for your space blanket if you carry one. We finished about 6 in the afternoon and started out. I tied the antlers to the top of my day pack. If you drape them down both sides of your body you can manipulate them a little bit. They are the hardest darn things to get out of the woods. Getting them out after you've wrestled an elk around on a hill side is the hardest thing to do. So we got back to the road and took the 4 wheelers back to camp. I had carried my day pack and the antlers. Jim carried his pack and both rifles and we switched loads back and forth. We were tired to the bone when we got back to camp about 9 and, of course, it was pouring rain. We crashed, knowing we still had work ahead of us. I called Dad and had him bring up some help. In the morning five of us walked in real light, taking just one rifle, some parachute cord to tie the meat to our BULL-PACS, a knife and steel, hatchet and plenty of water. We had eaten a good breakfast and went in about 7. It was nice to have one extra guy to trade off packs and carry the water jug. We hiked in, loaded up and got the meat out of there in 2 or 3 hours. We took plenty of rests. Putting 50, 70 or even 100 pounds on your back and hiking in rough country is one of the hardest things you'll ever do. Train if you can but if you don't, the pack will train you as you do it. It takes physical strength, but equally important is mental conditioning. More than anything you've got to really love to hunt elk to kill one a long ways off the road and pack it out. Some guys look down in those canyons we hunt and think there's just no elk worth going in there after. But we are serious elk hunters and are dedicated to the challenges of harvesting these majestic animals. |
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