tddeangelo
Handloader
- May 18, 2011
- 2,023
- 20
I still haven't gotten an image hosting setup figured out since Photobucket went the way it went, so this'll unfortunately be without pics for now. I'll correct that in the future.
I just got home this past Thurs. from my very first elk hunt, a 1st Rifle hunt for a cow in Colorado. This has been a long time coming, with lots of ideas and false starts here and there. From group hunt efforts that couldn't get going to talking to outfitters and many other twists and turns.
My hunting partner Dan and I met at his place in Kansas on 10/11. I left home in the dark hours of the morning on 10/10 and stayed that night in a hotel west of St. Louis. That first day's drive was 863 miles. I felt pretty good about the for a single day of solo driving. I got to Dan's the next day, and we got dinner and talked plans for the hunt. We left early out of his place on 10/12, and rolled into our lodging area around 7:30pm local time. We lit a fire and made some dinner and hit the rack.
The next day, Friday 10/13, we didn't do a lot. We fished, checked out the scenery. and just generally acclimated to life at 9500' (I live at 500'). I lost a super cutthroat and caught a great brookie, which seemed a good omen.
The next morning, Dan and I hit the trail head early....we were hiking at 4:15am, when most people in the cabins where we were staying were just starting to wake up. We went to a split in the trail about 3/4 mile in from the lot, then split up. He went north, I went south. We would generally work east into a large basin and meet in the back of it, or that was the plan, anyway.
When it got light, I crossed a creek and headed up a slope of burned timber. That stuff is miserable to cross, and I found that I should have gone a bit further before jumping off the trail. I have over a mile of this stuff to go through till I got to the basin, but there were islands of standing timber and lots of older elk sign, so I figured I'd hunt my way up. Each patch of timber showed lots of old elk sign, but nothing new, and no elk.
A snow squall rolled in and dumped snow on us for a few hours. This was a mood killer, but made for better tracking and visibility. After riding out the snow in the timber and eating lunch and them heading up the last butt-kicker climb to the last island of timber, I was headed for the timber when 4-6 cows busted from the timber and ran out into the burn. I dropped on my right knee, leaned off my left, and tracked them in the scope, murmuring "stop and look back, stop and look back..."
They stopped, but didn't turn. I saw a row of elk butts. Then I had a calf broadside. Mom wasn't turning. They milled about, and finally I saw a cow broadside. "300," I thought, and held just under the line of the back and let the 270 bark. My first thought was "I screwed up that one...no way I hit that elk." A horse of a cow stood close and broadside.....but I needed to check on that shot before taking another.
Then I saw an elk struggling in the deadfalls. I must have connected.
I walked down to a young cow with a Partition through the spine. Another through the lungs ended things. That was 3:15PM. At 5:30PM, I had her quartered, loins/straps out, and three quarters hanging in trees with one on the pack and the straps/loins nestled inside the pack. I headed out with a bit over an hour of daylight left. I needed every minute of it to get out of the burn and onto an established trail. I got to the trail head at 8:30 that night, dog tired.
Next day, I dropped Dan off super early. He'd had bulls bugling near him at daylight and he wanted to get setup good and early. It paid off...he was in them again, and he killed his first bull, a 4x4, at about 9:30am. I got back at 11am or so to go in for my remaining quarters and got Dan on the radio. Hearing the good news just was icing on the cake. I got out at 7:15 after picking my way through that vicious burned timber again and carrying out two fronts and a hind in one trip to avoid making two trips.
The next day, we went in to get Dan's remaining quarters. We were back in time to start cuttting. We finished cutting elk meat by lunch time on Tuesday (second to last day of the season). We rolled out that day for home, getting me home about 2 days earlier than planned (wife brownie points for me were a good thing!).
Back to Dan's by mid-afternoon on Wednesday 10/18, and I was home 10/19 at 11:30pm. Tired, sick of driving, but home in eastern PA and in my own bed.
I finished elk processing today, which involved grinding the trim meat and packing/freezing it. I got 25lbs of grind, and the trim meat was about 1/4 of my total, so I would have had about 100lbs of boned/trimmed meat till it was over. We had the tenderloins and a bit of backstrap tonight. Yum!
It was exhausting, but so worthwhile. Can't wait to do it again!
I just got home this past Thurs. from my very first elk hunt, a 1st Rifle hunt for a cow in Colorado. This has been a long time coming, with lots of ideas and false starts here and there. From group hunt efforts that couldn't get going to talking to outfitters and many other twists and turns.
My hunting partner Dan and I met at his place in Kansas on 10/11. I left home in the dark hours of the morning on 10/10 and stayed that night in a hotel west of St. Louis. That first day's drive was 863 miles. I felt pretty good about the for a single day of solo driving. I got to Dan's the next day, and we got dinner and talked plans for the hunt. We left early out of his place on 10/12, and rolled into our lodging area around 7:30pm local time. We lit a fire and made some dinner and hit the rack.
The next day, Friday 10/13, we didn't do a lot. We fished, checked out the scenery. and just generally acclimated to life at 9500' (I live at 500'). I lost a super cutthroat and caught a great brookie, which seemed a good omen.
The next morning, Dan and I hit the trail head early....we were hiking at 4:15am, when most people in the cabins where we were staying were just starting to wake up. We went to a split in the trail about 3/4 mile in from the lot, then split up. He went north, I went south. We would generally work east into a large basin and meet in the back of it, or that was the plan, anyway.
When it got light, I crossed a creek and headed up a slope of burned timber. That stuff is miserable to cross, and I found that I should have gone a bit further before jumping off the trail. I have over a mile of this stuff to go through till I got to the basin, but there were islands of standing timber and lots of older elk sign, so I figured I'd hunt my way up. Each patch of timber showed lots of old elk sign, but nothing new, and no elk.
A snow squall rolled in and dumped snow on us for a few hours. This was a mood killer, but made for better tracking and visibility. After riding out the snow in the timber and eating lunch and them heading up the last butt-kicker climb to the last island of timber, I was headed for the timber when 4-6 cows busted from the timber and ran out into the burn. I dropped on my right knee, leaned off my left, and tracked them in the scope, murmuring "stop and look back, stop and look back..."
They stopped, but didn't turn. I saw a row of elk butts. Then I had a calf broadside. Mom wasn't turning. They milled about, and finally I saw a cow broadside. "300," I thought, and held just under the line of the back and let the 270 bark. My first thought was "I screwed up that one...no way I hit that elk." A horse of a cow stood close and broadside.....but I needed to check on that shot before taking another.
Then I saw an elk struggling in the deadfalls. I must have connected.
I walked down to a young cow with a Partition through the spine. Another through the lungs ended things. That was 3:15PM. At 5:30PM, I had her quartered, loins/straps out, and three quarters hanging in trees with one on the pack and the straps/loins nestled inside the pack. I headed out with a bit over an hour of daylight left. I needed every minute of it to get out of the burn and onto an established trail. I got to the trail head at 8:30 that night, dog tired.
Next day, I dropped Dan off super early. He'd had bulls bugling near him at daylight and he wanted to get setup good and early. It paid off...he was in them again, and he killed his first bull, a 4x4, at about 9:30am. I got back at 11am or so to go in for my remaining quarters and got Dan on the radio. Hearing the good news just was icing on the cake. I got out at 7:15 after picking my way through that vicious burned timber again and carrying out two fronts and a hind in one trip to avoid making two trips.
The next day, we went in to get Dan's remaining quarters. We were back in time to start cuttting. We finished cutting elk meat by lunch time on Tuesday (second to last day of the season). We rolled out that day for home, getting me home about 2 days earlier than planned (wife brownie points for me were a good thing!).
Back to Dan's by mid-afternoon on Wednesday 10/18, and I was home 10/19 at 11:30pm. Tired, sick of driving, but home in eastern PA and in my own bed.
I finished elk processing today, which involved grinding the trim meat and packing/freezing it. I got 25lbs of grind, and the trim meat was about 1/4 of my total, so I would have had about 100lbs of boned/trimmed meat till it was over. We had the tenderloins and a bit of backstrap tonight. Yum!
It was exhausting, but so worthwhile. Can't wait to do it again!
