Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Oregon Bull

After not drawing a coveted eastern tag, I bought an over the counter cascade bull tag and headed for the public ground to do battle with the many for the few bulls that get killed each year.

I joined my dad and brother at their usual camp on the western slopes of the cascades. Their style of hunting doesnt suit well with my limited patience and planned to hunt on my own while they hunted together.

I was up and gone the first morning before they rose from their slumber. I had plans to head for a draw which we always see bulls in each year when glassing across from the roaded area, but its several miles of hiking to get into shooting position, and those miles have about 1000 feet of vertical to gain on foot. Basically if you spot something from the road, you dont just run over and shoot, it takes a while to get there.

This draw is not very big, there is an old blocked road winding thru the bottom, and the trail around the top. From the trail to the abandoned road is only about 600 yards and parallel to each other. From the abandoned road you cant see up the canyon into any openings, but from the trail you can look down into several openings, but only about 30% of the hill is open, the balance is bigger timber with a fair amount of vine maple and other underbrush.

I started up the trail a little over an hour before light, I planned to hunt the trail for the 3 or so miles to the draw I wanted to hunt. At about 30 minutes into the hike, I have 1/2 of the vertical done, and you come out into a long opening the trail switchbacks several times as you finish out the climb to the upper portion of the ridge. As I was standing in the bottom of the opening, cooling off, trying to glass up thru the opening for any elk, the lack of light was getting the best of me. I flinched when I heard a shot ring across the canyon from at least a mile away. Not sure what they were shooting in the dark, but I am guessing it was in the headlights.

I work my way to the top of the hill where the trail turns level. I am about to the next set of openings when my radio squawks with dads voice. He was going out a trail a few miles away. He just stepped out in an opening and it had a half dozen or so elk in it and he could see branched bull antlers out of the bunch, but it was still to dark to tell which of the bunch was the bull, they headed across the hill and out of sight at a good speed. Brother was coming up thru the timber where the elk headed. A few minutes later the elk cross right in front of brother, but he only sees cows cross in front of him, the bull had split off. I head for a nearby open peak on top of the ridge so I can spot across for them.

As I near the opening, the fog settles in and I can not see beyond about 50 yards. I hang around on the ridge top for about a 1/2 hour and the fog doesnt appear to be planning on leaving anytime soon. I radio them good luck, and plan to head back to my planned hunt. As I work my way along the ridge, I have the scope turned down to 3 power since I cant see very far.

By the time the 8th grouse had flushed in front of me I was getting use to needing a restart on the heart. I get to my small draw I had wanted to hunt and the fog is still hanging tough. After I cooled off sitting in an opening on a big flat rock, I start to get cold. I dig in the pack for my fleece top and coat. I get on the stocking hat and gloves and lay down next to a small rock shelf to wait out the fog.

Radio chatter between dad and brother wakes me up, not sure how long I dozed off, but at least 30 minutes. I would never make a tree stand hunter. 10 minutes in one spot and I am going to sleep. Thank goodness the ADHD keeps me on the move for the most part so I dont sleep.

Fog still has the draw socked in, so I pack up and head on up the trail. About a mile down the trail I meet a father and son coming the other way. We chat briefly and they go on their way. Fog is lifting, and I can see, I continue down the trail till I can look across at a big open ridge. I dont see any elk on the open hill, and have literally seen no elk sign all day.

I head back to my draw in hopes I can find some elk love. I get back to my big flat rock and shuck the pack. I glass the draw and it appears to be a bust. It isnt like me to spend to long at any one point, but I hang tough for about an hour, eating some lunch and keeping an eye on the draw. I pull out the range finder and glass across to a small white log near the top of the other side of the draw. 472 yards, probably the farthest shot in the draw. 250 yards to the bottom of the draw where I can see something besides trees.

I am about ready to head back down the trail when I hear elk crashing in the head of the draw. It is headed down the draw headed to my right. At this point the adrenaline is pumping and I am looking for what or who is making all the noise. An elk walks out right along side the white log I had range at 472 yards. There is no question it is a bull, snow ball white, standing like an alpha male. A quick check thru the binos and I see main beams and big forks in the top, ...time to shoot.

There is literally nothing to shoot off of for a rest. I grab the pack frame and while sitting on the rock I lay the gun across the pack frame. I know I am 2 feet low at 450 yards. I am moving very fast at this point working towards a shot, the bull only has a few steps and he is in the timber. I am amazingly calm at this point, adrenaline pumping, but no shakes and no panic. The bull looks pretty little in the scope at that range, but I hold over the shoulder a couple feet and settle in for the shot. I should have realized I was on 3 power when the bull was a spec in the scope but the obvious isnt so obvious when its crunch time.

The silence is disrupted with 73 grains of IMR4831 propelling 180 grains of boat tail down the barrel. I didnt even need to check I new I missed, I had to have been 10 feet over the bull when I pulled the trigger. Dont know what happened but it wasnt the smooth even shot I had envisioned just moments before. I work the bolt and come back across the top of the pack frame with the rifle. The bull is looking right at me and hasnt so much as flinched. I take a deep breathe and exhale, pull the trigger and as I look over the scope I see the elk doing end over end flips, rolls and tumbles down the hill. He went from the top of the opening to the bottom and out of sight into the timber coming out of the bottom of the canyon. I pick up the binos and see the bull thru the timber, head up and looking around. I dont know if he is on his feet or what, vision is limited with th trees. I can only see the head and body between the noble fir bows on the timber. I sent shot number 3 thru the tree and the elk disappears. I fear he ran and I have a tracking job on my hands and need to get after the bull.

A quick check of the watch and it is 3pm, I have about 3 hours of light left. I make several radio calls to dad and brother as I run around the trail as I try to get above where the bull was. I get no radio response and know I am on my own. I picken up the pace, the trail is fairly level around the head of the canyon, but it is about 1/2 mile to the other side how the trail winds up the draw and out onto the other ridge.

I get to the top of the opening where the bull was first standing and look down the long opening and see two hunters near the bottom of the opening, each holding an antler looking at my bull. The first thing thru my mind was my brother lost a bull a couple years ago when he got to his bull and found a tag on it, and after a heated confrontation with another hunter who didnt even shoot, left the bull and hunter.

I run down the hill noticing blood and dirt patches in the ferns where the bull tumbled. I hold up just above the other hunters and asked where I hit MY bull at. They tell me he is hit twice, nice shooting. A sigh of relief as it didnt appear they were going to try and steal my elk.

They start telling me about how they were working their way up the draw thru the timber when they hear me shoot twice, then the elk ran down the hill and stopped right in front of him about 50 yards, the third shot rang out just as he came up to the opening about 50 yards from the bull. I tell them the bull didnt run down the hill, but rather rolled, and the third shot just finished him off since that must have been the second shot into the elk.

The first shot was fairly level and thru both shoulders. Breaking a shoulder blade on the right side, and disintrating as it hit the ball and socket on the left side. The second shot was shooting down hill, bull was facing me, bullet hit the bull in the small of the back from the top taking out the backbone and a bit of the rear part of the tenderloins.

The two hunters were not real happy, the bull had died right in front of them, and in their mind they would have killed it if not for me. I talk one of them into taking a few pics and they leave me a bull without so much as offering to help gut or what not. I tend to forget in the offseason how big a roosevelt is, right up to the point you try to roll one over by yourself.



I manage to get the bull gutted, bucked in half which was made easy with the bullet thru the backbone. Head cut off and some skin removed so it would cool before darkness started to settle in. I tie the head to the pack and headed for the truck. I arrive at the truck with headlamp on and tired sore feet. It was a 3.5 mile hike back on the abandoned road to the truck. The next day dad, brother and a couple other hunters who camp near us went in and packed the elk out.

While boning out the front shoulder an old broadhead was found in the shoulder. It had been there for a while and I dont believe from this year. The meat had grown solid in the hollow part of the broadhead blades holding the blades in place.



I hung around camp for several days spotting for the family, we spotted no more elk.

nice bull! thanks for sharing...

i like the broadhead pic... look familiar anyone???

Nice bull. Great story, Iam glad you didi not get your bull taken away. That is B.S when it does happen

Great story and nice bull. Those boys do pack on the pounds. Good job, 1Minute

Good story great elk!!!

Great bull !!!!!!

Way to go!! Was that South, Central, or Northern Cascades?

What bullet were you using?

I have a feeling those two guys would have run into a freight train if they'd tried to take your bull <g>...

I would call it central cascades.

I have shot a lot of bullets looking for something my A bolt likes. Speer 180 grain boat tails group the best so that is what I shoot. When I have bullet recover I usually am in the 70 - 80% weight retainage range. Not bad for a non premium bullet. The one bullet that went thru a shoulder blade on one side and hit the ball and socket on the other shoulder did its job, but there wasnt much left of the bullet. I have never seen a complete seperation of lead and casing. The copper jacket was hollow with no lead core left in it. I found a slug of lead which weighed 49 grains, and the copper jacket weighed 40.5 grains. The rest of the bullet went away.

thanks for the pics! This is a 300 win mag, right?

Aren't Cascade Elk considered as an "in between" type of elk between Rocky Mountain and Rooseys? Pure Rooseys are west of I-5, and Pure RMs are east of the Cascades. However, the habitat IN the Cascades ranges from RM type to Roosey type, and Valerius Geiss (sp?) tells us it's habitat that determines the type of elk we see.

Blaine, I personally agree with that; the coast range Roosie's that literally leave tracks on the beach, are a different beast than a west-slope Cascade elk. For that matter, you get up to near the PCT and you get into hybrid deer too.

That's just based on looking at them and what I've read. I am not an elkologist (g).

Nice bull and story, congrats. Broadhead looks to be a thunderhead and I believe the small chunk of arrow is an Easton Carbon Evolution.

Nice bull BOE! Those roosies are tough to find.

Regardless, it is a nice bull. Especially so when yuo consider it was taken in a general season on public land.

Nice Bull

So that's what they look like!

I'll be out tomorrow looking for a Roosie bull--now I know what I'm looking for!

Congrats!!!

Congrats on the Fine elk.

Thank you for sharing the story!

Thanks,

Yes it was a 300 win mag

Congrats on the bull! Great story and pics...