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Elk Hunting
OTC Bull Elk, Public Land, CO 2nd Rifle Season 2017 – My Story
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<blockquote data-quote="LoneStar308" data-source="post: 1381715" data-attributes="member: 104048"><p>Day 2, morning:</p><p></p><p>Up at 4:15am again, leave the cabin at 5. We headed to a ridge just a few away from where we were the previous morning. Longer drive to get here, passed a bunch of big camps again. Got to the end of the road and our 2 other buddies from Pittsburg (also staying in our cabin) are there. Had a chat to figure out who was going where. Walked down to a finger ridgetop, pretty steep on the way down, already dreading the hike back up. We make it to an opening a little before legal light to start glassing. We can make out our buddies on the other side of the bowl. See 2 hunters at the bottom of draw headed away from us. The guide spots a muley buck out in front of us moving up the draw and away from us. I lose sight of him in some thick timber. A solo hunter starts making his way towards us up the draw. He makes us out and disappears into the timber. I spot the same muley buck again, and I'm watching him in my binos, when *CRACK*! He jumps and takes off running. We look over at our buddies, they didn't shoot. Then we see that solo hunter on the edge of the timber looking through his scope. He puts his rifle down and looks in his binos. Then he looks up in our direction and gives us a fist pump, haha. Comical. Good work buddy. Couldn't see where the deer lay, we watched as he walked up to it. He gave a finishing shot. He dragged it into the shade and disappeared from sight to get busy cleaning.</p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]87147[/ATTACH] </p><p>Again, same meadow. </p><p></p><p>More glassing. I'm looking far away, then take my eyes out of binos and there's 4 muleys right below us, 150yds. 2 does and 2 fawns. I think they could wind us because the one doe kept looking right at us. Didn't see anything else, we busted out around 10:30 or so, it was already hot. The hike out wasn't as bad as I had thought. About 70yds from the truck we saw another 4 muleys. Why don't I have a deer tag? On the drive out we get stopped by a game warden (ranger?). Cool guy; he knew the guide. We gave him our tags, license and ID. He asked for hunter safety card – crap! I showed it when picking up my license, then I left it at the cabin. He checked that our rifles were in cases. Wrote some text on my tag and told me to go to the ranger station in town with my hunter safety card. If I got stopped again without having that cleared I'd be in deep poop. So we took care of that before lunch.</p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]87148[/ATTACH] </p><p>Just enjoying some of OUR land.</p><p></p><p>Day 2, afternoon:</p><p></p><p>I'll be honest, we were starting to wonder if we'd see anything all week. Spoiler alert – we get some action on tonight's hunt! It's my paps birthday so I chat with him before going out and then get some facetime with my girls; gotta love technology! We again went to the same general location but to the other side of the ridge a little further out still from where we were in the morning. Park on the side of the road, no dead end here. Holy freaking uphill hike. Steady grade for first 90% with a stupid straight uphill at the end. But this time, I'm thinking about how awesome it will be going home. It was about 2 miles in there. I'm sweating my butt off. My heartbeat wasn't too bad but I was breathing heavy as we made it up to the point. Recovery come a little faster today it seems, we all post up in the shade to glass. Jokes abound, we pass time until about 30 mins before sundown. Guide gives a series of cow calls followed by a bugle – mind you, we are way past the rut, we haven't heard one bugle yet. Nothing. My buddy decides to get up and look back from where we came. I'm not kidding when I say this: good things always happened when this dude leaves the room. I don't know what it is, but I'm getting all exciting inside knowing something is about to happen now. The guide lets out another series of calls. BUGLE!! Faint and far away, but that's the first one I've heard in the wild (I've been 20yds away from a bugling bull before at a "petting ranch" in Texas). Pretty cool. He let out another series and got another answer. My buddy came back, he had heard it. The guide kept calling every couple minutes and would get an answer every 3rd series or so. Sounded closer. Light is fading fast. We ranged everything in front of us, most likely areas are 300-400yds. I've got shooting sticks (tripod) with my pack anchored against my shooting arm. Super solid. Felt good. I'm messing with the turret on my scope, planning to quickly dial the range.</p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]87149[/ATTACH] </p><p>I'm running out of things to say in these captions. Cool landscapes.</p><p></p><p>Guide and my buddy see movement. I'm not seeing anything. Precious time passes. Finally, I see a cow – holy schnikies! We have about 10 minutes of legal shooting left. That's the first elk I've seen in the wild. Then 6, 8, 10, 12 – no clue how many there were. Where are the bulls? There's one, I think? They started popping out of 10 different draws. I ask the guide, "he legal?" "Don't know bud, can't see clear." Couple more pop out at 320yds. "There's the big one," he says (haha, "big one" – as in the biggest in the field). I pull my head out of scope, see where he's pointing. Got it. I see antlers, but they are faint. "Take him!"</p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]87150[/ATTACH] </p><p>This was the set-up for the 2nd night hunt. (Black tape to ensure my magazine doesn't fall out while hiking.)</p><p></p><p>This all happened so fast. From the bugles, to the shadows moving through the timber, to the first full bodies you could see. I'm steady on the rest. I line up the crosshairs half-way up the body, right over the front elbow. *Boom*! I lose sight picture in recoil. I look up and see him run straight down into a draw and out of sight. All the others are just standing around. I put another round in the chamber. The guide says I missed. No way. I'm actually offended. Had an awesome sight picture. He said he saw dirt pop up behind him. My buddy says he saw dirt but thinks I got him as he saw a puff from the bull first. Thank you sir, that's why I like having him around. I keep an eye on the draw to see if this guy comes out. My buddy has his gun up to find another bull that stuck around. It feels like 2 minutes, but it was probably 20 seconds that passed. A buck and cow come up from the draw. He was bigger than anything else in the field. My buddy is getting ready to shoot. Wait! Is that him? He's acting injured. Then (something similar to) the following dialog occurs:</p><p></p><p>Guide (to me): "Are you going to shoot him again?"</p><p></p><p>Me: "Is that the same bull?"</p><p></p><p>Guide: "Not sure." (to my buddy) "Do you want him?"</p><p></p><p>Buddy: "Are you going to shoot him?"</p><p></p><p>Me: "I don't know. Is that him?"</p><p></p><p>Buddy: "Dude, I'll shoot him if you don't."</p><p></p><p>Me: "Well, if you're not going to shoot him I will."</p><p></p><p>Guide: "I think that's him, bud. He looks injured."</p><p></p><p>If I shot this one, and it turns out there is another dead one out there, my buddies hunt is over (and technically I could still be in trouble, even though WE have 2 tags I can't be the one shooting both). He definitely looks injured though. I line up the crosshairs, squeeze the trigger - *click*! F**************************************CK! Stupid Savage. I didn't pull the bolt ALL the way back when I went to reload – happens on occasion at the range. Open for my buddy, and he was at the ready. *BOOM*! Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing!! (My poor ears – he was sitting a little behind and angled towards me. I didn't have any hearing protection in because I wasn't planning on the volley of fire we are embarking on.) He got him good, but he's still standing. Now he's facing away at 360yds, I have a round ready for sure, I very deliberately watched it go in the chamber. With the angle, only good shot is in the neck. I line up about ½ way up his neck, maybe closer to the base of his skull. *BOOM*! Missed over his head. What the … *BOOM*!! Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing!! My buddy gets him again. The bull is still standing, facing the other direction broadside again. I'm frustrated with my 2 (or 3) mistakes and let my buddy finish it with another shot, this time plugging my ears. *BOOM*! And the bull goes down. There are still 10 elk in the field. We pack up our gear not really knowing if we have 1 or 2 dead elk – wishful thinking. We TEAR (read: fall in a controlled manor) down the ridge through thick oak brush. Run and jump over a gorge. Adrenaline is PUMPING! We make it up to the meadow where there is a dead bull on the ground. We find blood over where I first shot. I did hit him. Not a whole lot of blood though. Hardly a trail. I drop the pack and spend a good half hour looking around while they start getting ready to take the bull apart. It's amazing how easy it is to go up and down hills with no pack and all that adrenaline! It is pitch black now. The adrenaline is wearing off. I go back to where the bull is. Consensus is that it is absolutely the same bull. We grab some photos. When we got into cleaning we found my bullet hole, in-line with his shoulder but only about 1" down from the top of his back. My buddy got 1 in the boiler room and broke the opposite shoulder. 1 thru the gut and into the vitals as he was quartering away. And I think the last 1 was quartering to, in the leading shoulder. We make quick work of it. Apparently most of the guide's clients don't help with this part. Hell, that's what I came here for! We make use of some game bags, grab the ivory and cut the skull from behind the antler to the eye sockets. We stash the quarters in some trees about 40yds away and the guide will come back in the morning with his horses to pack out. You see, that's why it is nice to have a guide! </p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]87151[/ATTACH] </p><p>My buddies bull, but I shot him first. </p><p></p><p>It was freaking COLD when the adrenaline completely wore off (remember, Houston blood here). The hike back was as sweet as we imagined – all downhill. Got back to camp and our Pittsburg buddies were stoked! They turned in around 11pm. Since we wouldn't be hunting in the morning we stayed up celebrating until about 3am. Haha, our Pitt buddies were waking up an hour later. The engineer in me needed to know what went wrong. I was dialed in, steady rest, steady crosshairs. I grabbed the target from when we confirmed zero out there a few days ago. That's when I realized I was 1.5" high. I'm pouring over ballistic calculators on my phone. Basically, I was about 3MOA higher than I needed to be, and at 320yds, that's right about 10". I intended to aim at the heart, bottom 3rd of the body right above the elbow, and dialed a little extra range so to guarantee that I wouldn't miss low. Then, for whatever reason, my mind seeing the animal in my scope and wanting the largest margin of error, I aimed for ½ way up the body above the elbow. Add the minute-and-a-half high I was to start, plus the little extra that I dialed, and that was my problem. And that makes sense with the 2 shots that I got off at that animal, both missing high by a little less than a foot. My buddy brought it up, and I have to agree, but me sitting there for an hour looking through my scope at nothing wrecked me. I was over thinking it WAY too much. Too much info and too little time to process it when the bulls showed up. Better to just stick to your instincts and let muscle memory take over.</p><p></p><p>No more F'ng around with the elevation turret on the scope. I'm going to put it at 3-4" high at 100 and that will put me right around 4" low at 300. That's an old saying (3" high at 100 is 3" low at 300) and the ballistic calcs verify it. So my buddy and I are running through the details over and over. And I'm still beating myself up because if either shot came down 10" they would have been excellent. But, I learned some good lessons, we did get a bull on the ground, and we'll be enjoying some steaks the next day!</p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]87152[/ATTACH] </p><p>Ivories and 1 recovered 300WSM round. I think it was a 185gr partition.</p><p></p><p>It was just a crazy day overall. So much happened and it was all so fast. Not seeing anything through 3 hunts and most of the 4th and then boom! Game time. Awesome experience. Awesome to see that bull piled up. The guide was really happy that my buddy went over, put his hand on the bull and said "Thank you." So, 3 days of hunting left for me. My buddy is going to do some fishing and he might still tag along on a few hunts. I'm ready to get back out there.</p><p></p><p>Day 3, morning:</p><p></p><p>We woke up around 9am and decided to go to town to grab some real breakfast – good idea. Went to a little café for coffee and a breakfast bowl; scrambled eggs, sausage, hash browns, beans and cheese all in a sopapilla bowl – delicious! Went and grabbed the meat from the guide and took it to a processor on the way back to the cabin. We lopped off some of the backstrap to have steaks that evening. </p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]87153[/ATTACH] </p><p>River right next to the cabins.</p><p></p><p>Day 3, afternoon:</p><p></p><p>Back out and ready to go – buddy stayed back to cook steaks. We headed back to his uncle's. No elk. Didn't see any other hunters in the spot either. Jumped a couple of muleys on the way in again. Seriously, why don't I have a deer tag? You could hear a bunch of coyotes howling. At 1 point it sounded like 30-40 of them were going off at the same time (it was probably 8 or 10, I don't know). No telling how far away they were. It was pretty cool experience though, I'd never heard anything like that before. Otherwise, just some awesome star gazing again. The big dipper was bigger than I've ever seen.</p><p></p><p>Got back to the cabin and enjoyed some steaks. First taste of elk … and to be honest it was drowned in marinade. Good, but I'm not getting the impression I'm getting an authentic taste of it. I want some steaks with only salt and pepper next time.</p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]87155[/ATTACH] </p><p>The fish were equally as small as our bulls. Haha. (Sigh)</p><p></p><p>Day 4, morning:</p><p></p><p>My buddy stayed back again. I'm wearing a knee brace and taking pain killers. My knee freaking hurts on the downhills. I was doing squats before bed and there are all sorts of squeaks and sounds resonating from my knee. I tore my ACL and ripped up half of my meniscus 10 years ago (almost to the day – 1 week shy). It's fine in my everyday life – I think when the adrenaline was pumping the other night and we were tearing down hills, with full packs and all, I did a number on it. And not that I'm a serial complainer, but my big toe on the opposite foot is numb. Broke that when I was younger and can't really bend it anymore; I've always had feeling in it though. (And as I write this, 4 weeks later, it is still numb. Might need to get that checked out.) Elk hunting is no joke!</p><p></p><p>We go back to the same spot where we were on morning 2 and saw the muley get killed in the bowl. We hang out in the same spot until the sun comes up. We saw a hunter and guide on horseback on a ridge about 800yds away. That's what my guide was hoping for. We are looking a couple hundred yards in front of them to see if they pushed anything. Instead of continuing, which would have been ideal, they peel off and go back from whence they came. Bummer. Nothing moving in front of them. We pack up and head to the other side of the bowl where our Pittsburg buddies were the other day. We follow along a private fence where there's a lot of good sign and fresh urine smell. Took a break at the top of the hill and the guide gave me some ram meat wrapped up in a tortilla. Wow! That stuff was excellent. It's from a ram he took last year, and it is about the last of the meat he has left. It was the 2nd ram he's taken, the first one was 20 years prior. (After getting a tag in CO you have to wait 5 years – I think – to apply again, and then it took him another 15 years to draw for the 2nd time.) We did some more glassing and saw a couple more hunters over a mile away and another 2 deer past 1000yds, couldn't get a range on them. Headed back to truck and bumped another 4 muleys. Dang, seriously, might need to put in for the draw to get a muley tag next year. </p><p></p><p>Do some fly fishing with my buddy after I got back to the cabin, have a couple hours before we go out again. Pretty fun, I could see how that would be addicting. My buddy runs a couple flies our guide gave us. Not catching anything. I pick out a little, pink, Chinese/Walmart fly and my buddy catches one. Well, the jury is still out on whether it counts, he only brought it in and touched it before it escaped. But then he did, legit, catch a couple. </p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]87156[/ATTACH] </p><p>They sure are pretty.</p><p></p><p>Day 4, afternoon:</p><p></p><p>Plan A – to go back to where we got the bull a couple nights ago. My buddy stayed back again – gone fishing. We go down the road and Old-man-river's truck is in our spot. This dude was posted up yesterday morning when the guide went back out to get my buddies meat. Can't go here.</p><p></p><p>Plan B – go further up the road to a spot that faces west – into the setting sun, not ideal. Stuck behind Joe Slow in his 80s pickup swerving like he's 8 deep in a 12-pack. Pull off to a trail head where there's a couple camps. Young dude, 18 maybe, making his was down the trail. We get out, gear up and make a tough hike in. Uphill and pretty steep for 3/4ish mile. Get to top, go under/thru a fence – and it's really pretty up here. Yellow and orange leaves in what looks like and orchard as trees were in perfect rows. It was still oak brush I believe, but the leaves hadn't fallen yet. Start making climb down to glassing spot when we spot that dang 18yo kid sitting there. Apparently it is pretty thick and there aren't any other spots in there, so we turn around and make the hike back to the truck. Yikes! I'm freaking sweating, it's hot. Guide is visibly ****ed – that's 2 spots taken. He is grabbing and breaking branches on the way out – haven't seen him do that before. Back to truck and back on road.</p><p></p><p>Plan C – guide blames it on Joe Slow – I'm thinking maybe we shouldn't have spent close to 30mins BS'ng back at the cabin. Doesn't matter. I ask "What's the plan?" He's thinking of going back to where we were in the morning, but hunting it a little different. That would be 6 hunts and only 4 unique spots. To be honest, I wanted somewhere new – but I also need to trust the judgement of the guide. We get back to main road and need to turn right.</p><p></p><p>Plan D – "**** it!" He turns left and floors it. We go about 10 miles out there and pull over into a little area on the side of road with another truck there. There's a hunter walking down hill and out of a gate (there was a fence there – I wouldn't have known it was ok to cross these things). Local kid, hunting elk, the guide knows his parents and grandparents. They BS some, and we set out. Up, up, up, and deep in there. </p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]87157[/ATTACH] </p><p>Obligatory selfie. (I wear the mask more for the sun protection than anything else.)</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="LoneStar308, post: 1381715, member: 104048"] Day 2, morning: Up at 4:15am again, leave the cabin at 5. We headed to a ridge just a few away from where we were the previous morning. Longer drive to get here, passed a bunch of big camps again. Got to the end of the road and our 2 other buddies from Pittsburg (also staying in our cabin) are there. Had a chat to figure out who was going where. Walked down to a finger ridgetop, pretty steep on the way down, already dreading the hike back up. We make it to an opening a little before legal light to start glassing. We can make out our buddies on the other side of the bowl. See 2 hunters at the bottom of draw headed away from us. The guide spots a muley buck out in front of us moving up the draw and away from us. I lose sight of him in some thick timber. A solo hunter starts making his way towards us up the draw. He makes us out and disappears into the timber. I spot the same muley buck again, and I’m watching him in my binos, when *CRACK*! He jumps and takes off running. We look over at our buddies, they didn’t shoot. Then we see that solo hunter on the edge of the timber looking through his scope. He puts his rifle down and looks in his binos. Then he looks up in our direction and gives us a fist pump, haha. Comical. Good work buddy. Couldn’t see where the deer lay, we watched as he walked up to it. He gave a finishing shot. He dragged it into the shade and disappeared from sight to get busy cleaning. [ATTACH=full]87147[/ATTACH] Again, same meadow. More glassing. I’m looking far away, then take my eyes out of binos and there’s 4 muleys right below us, 150yds. 2 does and 2 fawns. I think they could wind us because the one doe kept looking right at us. Didn’t see anything else, we busted out around 10:30 or so, it was already hot. The hike out wasn’t as bad as I had thought. About 70yds from the truck we saw another 4 muleys. Why don’t I have a deer tag? On the drive out we get stopped by a game warden (ranger?). Cool guy; he knew the guide. We gave him our tags, license and ID. He asked for hunter safety card – crap! I showed it when picking up my license, then I left it at the cabin. He checked that our rifles were in cases. Wrote some text on my tag and told me to go to the ranger station in town with my hunter safety card. If I got stopped again without having that cleared I’d be in deep poop. So we took care of that before lunch. [ATTACH=full]87148[/ATTACH] Just enjoying some of OUR land. Day 2, afternoon: I’ll be honest, we were starting to wonder if we’d see anything all week. Spoiler alert – we get some action on tonight’s hunt! It’s my paps birthday so I chat with him before going out and then get some facetime with my girls; gotta love technology! We again went to the same general location but to the other side of the ridge a little further out still from where we were in the morning. Park on the side of the road, no dead end here. Holy freaking uphill hike. Steady grade for first 90% with a stupid straight uphill at the end. But this time, I’m thinking about how awesome it will be going home. It was about 2 miles in there. I’m sweating my butt off. My heartbeat wasn’t too bad but I was breathing heavy as we made it up to the point. Recovery come a little faster today it seems, we all post up in the shade to glass. Jokes abound, we pass time until about 30 mins before sundown. Guide gives a series of cow calls followed by a bugle – mind you, we are way past the rut, we haven’t heard one bugle yet. Nothing. My buddy decides to get up and look back from where we came. I’m not kidding when I say this: good things always happened when this dude leaves the room. I don’t know what it is, but I’m getting all exciting inside knowing something is about to happen now. The guide lets out another series of calls. BUGLE!! Faint and far away, but that’s the first one I’ve heard in the wild (I’ve been 20yds away from a bugling bull before at a “petting ranch” in Texas). Pretty cool. He let out another series and got another answer. My buddy came back, he had heard it. The guide kept calling every couple minutes and would get an answer every 3rd series or so. Sounded closer. Light is fading fast. We ranged everything in front of us, most likely areas are 300-400yds. I’ve got shooting sticks (tripod) with my pack anchored against my shooting arm. Super solid. Felt good. I’m messing with the turret on my scope, planning to quickly dial the range. [ATTACH=full]87149[/ATTACH] I’m running out of things to say in these captions. Cool landscapes. Guide and my buddy see movement. I’m not seeing anything. Precious time passes. Finally, I see a cow – holy schnikies! We have about 10 minutes of legal shooting left. That’s the first elk I’ve seen in the wild. Then 6, 8, 10, 12 – no clue how many there were. Where are the bulls? There’s one, I think? They started popping out of 10 different draws. I ask the guide, “he legal?” “Don’t know bud, can’t see clear.” Couple more pop out at 320yds. “There’s the big one,” he says (haha, “big one” – as in the biggest in the field). I pull my head out of scope, see where he’s pointing. Got it. I see antlers, but they are faint. “Take him!” [ATTACH=full]87150[/ATTACH] This was the set-up for the 2nd night hunt. (Black tape to ensure my magazine doesn’t fall out while hiking.) This all happened so fast. From the bugles, to the shadows moving through the timber, to the first full bodies you could see. I’m steady on the rest. I line up the crosshairs half-way up the body, right over the front elbow. *Boom*! I lose sight picture in recoil. I look up and see him run straight down into a draw and out of sight. All the others are just standing around. I put another round in the chamber. The guide says I missed. No way. I’m actually offended. Had an awesome sight picture. He said he saw dirt pop up behind him. My buddy says he saw dirt but thinks I got him as he saw a puff from the bull first. Thank you sir, that’s why I like having him around. I keep an eye on the draw to see if this guy comes out. My buddy has his gun up to find another bull that stuck around. It feels like 2 minutes, but it was probably 20 seconds that passed. A buck and cow come up from the draw. He was bigger than anything else in the field. My buddy is getting ready to shoot. Wait! Is that him? He’s acting injured. Then (something similar to) the following dialog occurs: Guide (to me): “Are you going to shoot him again?” Me: “Is that the same bull?” Guide: “Not sure.” (to my buddy) “Do you want him?” Buddy: “Are you going to shoot him?” Me: “I don’t know. Is that him?” Buddy: “Dude, I’ll shoot him if you don’t.” Me: “Well, if you’re not going to shoot him I will.” Guide: “I think that’s him, bud. He looks injured.” If I shot this one, and it turns out there is another dead one out there, my buddies hunt is over (and technically I could still be in trouble, even though WE have 2 tags I can’t be the one shooting both). He definitely looks injured though. I line up the crosshairs, squeeze the trigger - *click*! F**************************************CK! Stupid Savage. I didn’t pull the bolt ALL the way back when I went to reload – happens on occasion at the range. Open for my buddy, and he was at the ready. *BOOM*! Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing!! (My poor ears – he was sitting a little behind and angled towards me. I didn’t have any hearing protection in because I wasn’t planning on the volley of fire we are embarking on.) He got him good, but he’s still standing. Now he’s facing away at 360yds, I have a round ready for sure, I very deliberately watched it go in the chamber. With the angle, only good shot is in the neck. I line up about ½ way up his neck, maybe closer to the base of his skull. *BOOM*! Missed over his head. What the … *BOOM*!! Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing!! My buddy gets him again. The bull is still standing, facing the other direction broadside again. I’m frustrated with my 2 (or 3) mistakes and let my buddy finish it with another shot, this time plugging my ears. *BOOM*! And the bull goes down. There are still 10 elk in the field. We pack up our gear not really knowing if we have 1 or 2 dead elk – wishful thinking. We TEAR (read: fall in a controlled manor) down the ridge through thick oak brush. Run and jump over a gorge. Adrenaline is PUMPING! We make it up to the meadow where there is a dead bull on the ground. We find blood over where I first shot. I did hit him. Not a whole lot of blood though. Hardly a trail. I drop the pack and spend a good half hour looking around while they start getting ready to take the bull apart. It’s amazing how easy it is to go up and down hills with no pack and all that adrenaline! It is pitch black now. The adrenaline is wearing off. I go back to where the bull is. Consensus is that it is absolutely the same bull. We grab some photos. When we got into cleaning we found my bullet hole, in-line with his shoulder but only about 1” down from the top of his back. My buddy got 1 in the boiler room and broke the opposite shoulder. 1 thru the gut and into the vitals as he was quartering away. And I think the last 1 was quartering to, in the leading shoulder. We make quick work of it. Apparently most of the guide’s clients don’t help with this part. Hell, that’s what I came here for! We make use of some game bags, grab the ivory and cut the skull from behind the antler to the eye sockets. We stash the quarters in some trees about 40yds away and the guide will come back in the morning with his horses to pack out. You see, that’s why it is nice to have a guide! [ATTACH=full]87151[/ATTACH] My buddies bull, but I shot him first. It was freaking COLD when the adrenaline completely wore off (remember, Houston blood here). The hike back was as sweet as we imagined – all downhill. Got back to camp and our Pittsburg buddies were stoked! They turned in around 11pm. Since we wouldn’t be hunting in the morning we stayed up celebrating until about 3am. Haha, our Pitt buddies were waking up an hour later. The engineer in me needed to know what went wrong. I was dialed in, steady rest, steady crosshairs. I grabbed the target from when we confirmed zero out there a few days ago. That’s when I realized I was 1.5” high. I’m pouring over ballistic calculators on my phone. Basically, I was about 3MOA higher than I needed to be, and at 320yds, that’s right about 10”. I intended to aim at the heart, bottom 3rd of the body right above the elbow, and dialed a little extra range so to guarantee that I wouldn’t miss low. Then, for whatever reason, my mind seeing the animal in my scope and wanting the largest margin of error, I aimed for ½ way up the body above the elbow. Add the minute-and-a-half high I was to start, plus the little extra that I dialed, and that was my problem. And that makes sense with the 2 shots that I got off at that animal, both missing high by a little less than a foot. My buddy brought it up, and I have to agree, but me sitting there for an hour looking through my scope at nothing wrecked me. I was over thinking it WAY too much. Too much info and too little time to process it when the bulls showed up. Better to just stick to your instincts and let muscle memory take over. No more F’ng around with the elevation turret on the scope. I’m going to put it at 3-4” high at 100 and that will put me right around 4” low at 300. That’s an old saying (3” high at 100 is 3” low at 300) and the ballistic calcs verify it. So my buddy and I are running through the details over and over. And I’m still beating myself up because if either shot came down 10” they would have been excellent. But, I learned some good lessons, we did get a bull on the ground, and we’ll be enjoying some steaks the next day! [ATTACH=full]87152[/ATTACH] Ivories and 1 recovered 300WSM round. I think it was a 185gr partition. It was just a crazy day overall. So much happened and it was all so fast. Not seeing anything through 3 hunts and most of the 4th and then boom! Game time. Awesome experience. Awesome to see that bull piled up. The guide was really happy that my buddy went over, put his hand on the bull and said “Thank you.” So, 3 days of hunting left for me. My buddy is going to do some fishing and he might still tag along on a few hunts. I’m ready to get back out there. Day 3, morning: We woke up around 9am and decided to go to town to grab some real breakfast – good idea. Went to a little café for coffee and a breakfast bowl; scrambled eggs, sausage, hash browns, beans and cheese all in a sopapilla bowl – delicious! Went and grabbed the meat from the guide and took it to a processor on the way back to the cabin. We lopped off some of the backstrap to have steaks that evening. [ATTACH=full]87153[/ATTACH] River right next to the cabins. Day 3, afternoon: Back out and ready to go – buddy stayed back to cook steaks. We headed back to his uncle’s. No elk. Didn’t see any other hunters in the spot either. Jumped a couple of muleys on the way in again. Seriously, why don’t I have a deer tag? You could hear a bunch of coyotes howling. At 1 point it sounded like 30-40 of them were going off at the same time (it was probably 8 or 10, I don’t know). No telling how far away they were. It was pretty cool experience though, I’d never heard anything like that before. Otherwise, just some awesome star gazing again. The big dipper was bigger than I’ve ever seen. Got back to the cabin and enjoyed some steaks. First taste of elk … and to be honest it was drowned in marinade. Good, but I’m not getting the impression I’m getting an authentic taste of it. I want some steaks with only salt and pepper next time. [ATTACH=full]87155[/ATTACH] The fish were equally as small as our bulls. Haha. (Sigh) Day 4, morning: My buddy stayed back again. I’m wearing a knee brace and taking pain killers. My knee freaking hurts on the downhills. I was doing squats before bed and there are all sorts of squeaks and sounds resonating from my knee. I tore my ACL and ripped up half of my meniscus 10 years ago (almost to the day – 1 week shy). It’s fine in my everyday life – I think when the adrenaline was pumping the other night and we were tearing down hills, with full packs and all, I did a number on it. And not that I’m a serial complainer, but my big toe on the opposite foot is numb. Broke that when I was younger and can’t really bend it anymore; I’ve always had feeling in it though. (And as I write this, 4 weeks later, it is still numb. Might need to get that checked out.) Elk hunting is no joke! We go back to the same spot where we were on morning 2 and saw the muley get killed in the bowl. We hang out in the same spot until the sun comes up. We saw a hunter and guide on horseback on a ridge about 800yds away. That’s what my guide was hoping for. We are looking a couple hundred yards in front of them to see if they pushed anything. Instead of continuing, which would have been ideal, they peel off and go back from whence they came. Bummer. Nothing moving in front of them. We pack up and head to the other side of the bowl where our Pittsburg buddies were the other day. We follow along a private fence where there’s a lot of good sign and fresh urine smell. Took a break at the top of the hill and the guide gave me some ram meat wrapped up in a tortilla. Wow! That stuff was excellent. It’s from a ram he took last year, and it is about the last of the meat he has left. It was the 2nd ram he’s taken, the first one was 20 years prior. (After getting a tag in CO you have to wait 5 years – I think – to apply again, and then it took him another 15 years to draw for the 2nd time.) We did some more glassing and saw a couple more hunters over a mile away and another 2 deer past 1000yds, couldn’t get a range on them. Headed back to truck and bumped another 4 muleys. Dang, seriously, might need to put in for the draw to get a muley tag next year. Do some fly fishing with my buddy after I got back to the cabin, have a couple hours before we go out again. Pretty fun, I could see how that would be addicting. My buddy runs a couple flies our guide gave us. Not catching anything. I pick out a little, pink, Chinese/Walmart fly and my buddy catches one. Well, the jury is still out on whether it counts, he only brought it in and touched it before it escaped. But then he did, legit, catch a couple. [ATTACH=full]87156[/ATTACH] They sure are pretty. Day 4, afternoon: Plan A – to go back to where we got the bull a couple nights ago. My buddy stayed back again – gone fishing. We go down the road and Old-man-river’s truck is in our spot. This dude was posted up yesterday morning when the guide went back out to get my buddies meat. Can’t go here. Plan B – go further up the road to a spot that faces west – into the setting sun, not ideal. Stuck behind Joe Slow in his 80s pickup swerving like he’s 8 deep in a 12-pack. Pull off to a trail head where there’s a couple camps. Young dude, 18 maybe, making his was down the trail. We get out, gear up and make a tough hike in. Uphill and pretty steep for 3/4ish mile. Get to top, go under/thru a fence – and it’s really pretty up here. Yellow and orange leaves in what looks like and orchard as trees were in perfect rows. It was still oak brush I believe, but the leaves hadn’t fallen yet. Start making climb down to glassing spot when we spot that dang 18yo kid sitting there. Apparently it is pretty thick and there aren’t any other spots in there, so we turn around and make the hike back to the truck. Yikes! I’m freaking sweating, it’s hot. Guide is visibly ****ed – that’s 2 spots taken. He is grabbing and breaking branches on the way out – haven’t seen him do that before. Back to truck and back on road. Plan C – guide blames it on Joe Slow – I’m thinking maybe we shouldn’t have spent close to 30mins BS’ng back at the cabin. Doesn’t matter. I ask “What’s the plan?” He’s thinking of going back to where we were in the morning, but hunting it a little different. That would be 6 hunts and only 4 unique spots. To be honest, I wanted somewhere new – but I also need to trust the judgement of the guide. We get back to main road and need to turn right. Plan D – “**** it!” He turns left and floors it. We go about 10 miles out there and pull over into a little area on the side of road with another truck there. There’s a hunter walking down hill and out of a gate (there was a fence there – I wouldn’t have known it was ok to cross these things). Local kid, hunting elk, the guide knows his parents and grandparents. They BS some, and we set out. Up, up, up, and deep in there. [ATTACH=full]87157[/ATTACH] Obligatory selfie. (I wear the mask more for the sun protection than anything else.) [/QUOTE]
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OTC Bull Elk, Public Land, CO 2nd Rifle Season 2017 – My Story
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