Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Your 1st elk

Won't happen on the way in because you should be hiking in the day before season opens. It might on the way out but then you will pissed b/c you have a 14 hour drive to be at work in 30 hours and now you have a hunk of dead meat to get out first, and that pizza in that first town will just have to wait. :-)

I've killed more than a few elk and I never killed one that I could get out whole. The buggers always had to be quartered.

But, of course, almost all of my elk work was on horseback.

Once, in my early years, I was driving up a forest road and the truck about 100 yards in front of me suddenly hit the brakes ... You got it, the driver killed a 6X6, just a dandy bull, right in the middle of the road.

I helped him move the bull off to the side of the road and headed for the road's end. And I killed a raghorn about a mile off the end ... and grunted the SOB back to my truck one quarter at a time.

Sh1t, why couldn't I have had just ONE easy elk???? It ain't fair

Blessings,

Steve

PS. By the way, I always considered ANY elk to be one heck of a trophy; bull, cow or calf. They all come hard and we should be danged proud of each and every one of them.

I had a POS bear target bow. I could not get it to group past 30 yards. One night my saddle mule run off with it. The mule come into camp at about mid nite with the bow under its belly. That dang bow shot to over 50 yards! That afternoon I packed in and spike camped on top of a seep. While setting up my tee pee and tying off the mules I got my only boots soaked. I headed up the mountain and at the summit I could smell elk. It was cold and frigid that night and the next morning heading up the next morning with ice blocks for boots all I wanted to do was get to the top and start a fire. Instead I ran into a bachelor pod of bulls and harvested a five point! At 50 yards! Thanks Kirby! That be my mule that tuned the bow!

I was 33 hunting az unit 8. Had done a bit of scouting with a friend and had seen a number of bulls.

I hunted with my brother and dad who didn't have tags for 4 days and had only seen a spike and a ton of cows. Next day same friend who had scouted with me came up and we went to an area we hadn't scouted.

Looking over a canyon about 1200 yards are two bulls, we can tell ones a spike and the other one is a good bull. We had to go back to the jeep and drive around to get to them. We stalked down as close as we could get. 400+ yards and one hell of a side wind.

I sat down and set up the shooting sticks. Ranged at 407 yards. We talked about point of aim and then BOOM! I let it fly. We watched a puff of dust behind the good bull and thought damn. I racked another round and the guys are yelling " he's down you got him". I couldn't see him anymore but they saw him drop.

We hiked over he was a nice 6x6 with two little spikes on top that you can have a ring on. We quarter him up and hiked up to the jeep. My buddy carried up a quarter and when he got to the jeep there were two guys glassing over the same canyon. My friend dropped the quarter on a rock and hit the ground only to look at those guys who looked back at him and gave him the thumbs up!

My wife said there's no way I'm putting a dead head in her house so my friend has him on the wall. Now she kinda likes the deer in my avatar that I intensional had mounted so it looks at her chair in the living room.

Killed my first Elk on my second trip to Colorado in 2003. Muzzleloader .54 Knight. Me and two other guys were working our way thru some low brush and thought we heard a bugle up ahead. We cow called a few times and heard a cow answer us to our left. I had the only cow tag so I eased that away and slowly worked my way into the timber. My buddies continued cow calling occasionally and the cow would answer. I finally found an Elk in the timber and in my haste to shoot something did not look any farther. I shot it right behind the ear as its head and neck was all I could see. Turned out to be a calf, The cow and about 10 other Elk took off tearing through the tree's. If i had waited I probably would of got a shot at a bigger Elk but I was happy.

My first was very close after stalking to around 30 yards in thick timber. The 6 megapixels captured about 4 bulls in 1 shot.

Remind beginners that us experienced guys like to shoot more. A 1 shot kill is just 1 shot and the fun is over. If you get to shoot 4 times, that's 4 times as much fun. We all know that, don't we?

And if you don't get a blood moon over your eye, you were not properly amped up. :-)

I was 14. I remember my mom having to drive me and my friend down to camp, as we had a football game the day before the opener.Our fathers were already in camp in the High Uinta mountains, general season any bull.

Spent 3 days wondering around aimlessly through the woods..Me and my friend were tired of hunting with our dads by that point, so they sent us off solo to a little lake off the beaten path..Elk were the last things on our mind, having pretty much given up by that point. instead we were performing penetration tests on tree's, to see of grand slams were better than power points..

On the hike out we were stopped in our tracks by the pungent odor of elk, i got on my knees to try and see through the thick pines, and seen the legs of some elk out in front of us.

My friend tried to get in front of them, I went on their trail. About 20-30 seconds later I was just standing on the elk trail, wondering what to do when i heard a shot..I just stood there for awhile, and to my surprise i seen a lone bull coming back down the trail they had just made.

I shot him at around 50 feet, it was a small 6x6.

My friend missed a different bull out of the same group(supposedly MUCH bigger than the one I had just killed, of course!) ..After putting together where he had shot, and where I ended up shooting mine we learned a very valuable lesson, the "fish hook maneuver". Ive killed a handful of bulls doing it since then.

My first being a 6x6 was great and I was hooked, had more focus on the hunt from that year on and didnt get bummed out so easily. after that year i went on a run of spikes for the next 3 years.

No pic of the bull,not even sure where the rack went.

I elk hunted in WA with a guy who took me to a place where he had only seen one elk. It ran by when he was taking a dump.

Then I worked with a young man from WY who told the story of hunting with his father. His dad was taking a dump, and the boy took a hail Mary shot at a bull he saw running away. The father, who did not see the elk, cussed out the son for making noise and scaring game... then they found the dead bull with a hole in the back of the head.

I am not going to tell MY elk story.. it is too personal.

Thats a great story Clark..always a pleasure.

Great stories here.

My first elk died when I was 14. I was with my dad, which was the norm for most of my first hunting years. We always hunted the same general area. It was some family owned timber land a couple miles behind my grandparents house. It was so thick back then, we would mostly walk the old logging roads and skid trails in the mornings and evenings.
On this particular hunt we were working our way back to the pickup. There was a saddle we passed and Dad saw his cousins pickup parked there, this just irritated the heck out of Dad cuz Norman had his own ground to hunt. Dad decided we would circle the back of the knob and come in behind Norman, see what he was up too.
I was in the habit of not seeing elk anyways, and this little plan of dad's put another mile or two onto an already long walk. As we were coming around the back of the knob headed headed towards the saddle, I was trudging along behind dad. Just hoping the end was near. He stopped and threw his rifle to his shoulder, I almost walked into the back of him. About 100 or so yards farther up the old grown up skid road we were on, stood 2 fine rag horn bulls. Dad fired first and missed. I stepped up next too him, and started shooting. I was shooting a rem 700 30-06, it was full, 5 shots. Dad had his Mauser 7x57, VZ24 my great grandpa on the other side of the family built for him, he only had 4 in his.
Anyways, we both opened fire. 8 clean misses between us, then my last bullet went right behind the shoulder of the bigger raghorn. He hit the dirt right there. The smaller one took one leap and was gone. Up the hill in the brush about 10 cows and the big bull took off over the mountain. It was the only time I had ever seen my Dad miss with his rifle.
We gutted the 4x5 bull, and walked out in the dark. We went and got the neighbor and went back with 4 of us and a chainsaw, Stihl of course. We loaded the bull whole and took it to my granparents house and hung it in the garage.
That was number 1, I have about 20 under my belt now. About a third of em came off of that mountain.

Unfortunately, a lot of the older family died off and others moved to bigger towns. Not by my choice obviously, but the family timber land got mostly all sold off to corporate timber companies. That mountain is now full of roads and clearcut for miles.
That first elk was a great memory, but it makes me sad to think of how it used to be.

Did you run out of paper?

My first elk is a memory that many would rather forget.

I was young, full of know-it-all teenage bravado. My cousin and I were driving logging roads. I was tired of "road hunting" so I told him I was going to put on a little hike and made arrangements for a meetup later in the afternoon.

I started hiking and continued to hit road after road as I ascended the mountain. During one bend in the road I bumped a dozen elk. Very thick cover and they disappeared before I had a shot.

I decided to walk a little further and the road ended in a turn around. More out of curiosity than purpose I started cow calling. Thinking to myself, "How cool would it be to see those elk again?" I also didn't think that cow calling in November would have much effect on the elk.

I finished my granola bar and started walking the same little logging road out. As I turned the corner there are the elk, all milling about near the road and the bull is standing smack dab in the middle of the road.

One shot, to the head at about 40 yards, with an open sighted remington 700 in .270 and the bull drops. Shooting core lokt bullets.

My excitement goes through the roof. Only problem is that he is much bigger than I can handle and move. I kept problem solving trying to figure out how I was going to position him so I could clean him out. After a while I managed to awkwardly turn him on his side and cleaned him out. There was 4 inches of snow on the ground and I wasn't too worried about the meat cooling out.

Meanwhile the sun is going down quickly and I am late for the meetup spot. I rush to the spot, sometimes jogging, sometimes sliding through the snow going down the mountain.

When I see my cousin I tell him the good news. We both leave our rifles in the truck, grab rope, knives and our packboards.

We work our way up to bull and about 150 yards from where he was laying... all we see is taillights storming away.

Sure enough we get to where my elk was and all that's left is the gut pile and all the coagulated blood that I couldn't pour out because the bull was too heavy for me to maneuver. More or less a crime scene in the snow filled with fresh tire tracks, and 3 pairs of boot prints.

I'll admit I felt nauseous and was very close to tears, somehow I held it together. My cousin and I walked down the mountain in silence. I was still processing the day's events. Also wondering how my Dad was going to react. Somehow I had it in my mind that with my elk - I was going to come into camp and be recognized as a "real" hunter by the men. Without my elk I was still just one of the "kids" in camp.

The rest of the season was uneventful, and I didn't have much desire to even get out of camp. Upon leaving I told my cousin that I'd never hunt there again. And true to my word I've never been back. My Dad was more than understanding and tried to cheer me up. He told me that sometimes in our loss, we actually come out ahead.

I didn't understand it until 2 years later when I shot a monster 6x6 herd bull. One of the coolest things I've ever seen. A herd of 100+ elk covering the hillside like ants. I was alone and was stressed out trying to find the big bull. Of course he was at the back pushing his cows. One shot dropped him, this time using my "new to me" used 30-06 with a leupold scope.

I'll never forget the smile on my Dad's face when he crested the hill and saw my bull laying in the snow. It was a combination of happiness and joy...all made better because of it being my first bull.

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Thankfully persistence and time have reversed my elk fortune. Through the years I've taken many elk. My first bull is one I don't have a picture of, nor the rack...just a sad twinge every time I think about the type of person who would steal another man's elk.

I'll never forget my first elk, and surely will never forget my first "recovered" bull. Everytime I look at him on the wall I remember the ups and downs of elk hunting in the woods...as well as that smile that covered my dads face as he walked up to my first trophy bull. In that moment I had arrived as a real elk hunter, and the kid became a man.

It was 1986,my first hunting season in Wyoming.Having gotten "skunked" on elk during the regular season,I had an opportunity to make a late season cow elk hunt near Jackson Hole with two friends from work.
We took an older small camper to a location near Turpin Meadows.It was late November,and is typical in the Wyoming high country,it was cold with almost a foot of snow on the ground. After setting up camp,we had a few hours of light left for an evening hunt. With a "High Boy" F-250 chained on all four,we started driving a few two-tracks. With darkness closing,we had just cleared some heavy timber and were entering an old "clear-cut" with the new conifer growth approaching ten feet in height.
As most of you know,when "two tracking" the preferred seating is in the middle.You don't have to get out to open the gates. But,when elk hunting that is not a good place to find yourself!
Just as we were entering the "clear-cut",someone yelled elk,the truck slid to a stop.We started jumping out of the truck,and as you have probably already summarized,I was getting off to a late start!
I only caught a glimpse of the elk about 200 yards away, leaving the "clear-cut" entering the timber,crossing to our right. My two friends headed into the timber at a run,trying to close the distance,hoping for a shot in the timber. Knowing I was way behind,I "broke" hard to the right,hoping to get ahead of the elk. After a short Sprint,I came into a long,narrow opening in the timber. As I stopped to analyze the situation,the shots started to my left. Cursing at my poor luck and choice of direction,I suddenly heard footfall's in the snow and breaking limbs,elk were headed my way. Suddenly an elk burst into the narrow opening about 50 to 70 yards away,crossing at a 90 degree angle.I quickly determined that the leading elk had no "headgear". My Model 70 Winchester,375H&H snapped into my shoulder, the rifle firing almost of it's own will! The elk collapsing as the 300 grain GameKing connected,and skidding about 10 or 15 feet to a stop!
As my elk was slidding to a stop, the rest of the small group of elk came "pouring" through the alley in the timber. It was then that I realized that I had killed a "baby"!My first elk,and he still had "momma's" milk on his face!
All three of us got our elk that evening,though it took until after midnight to find one of them.
After the long tracking job and the field dressing we headed back to camp for some rest,we would make the recoveries in the morning.
But,the days events weren't' over.As the trucks headlight swept across our "humble abode",it was clear that we'd had a visitor while we were gone.From the tracks left at the scene of the attack,it was apparent that a small Black Bear had come by for a midnight snack!Our cooler,which had been left outside,was opened with the small remainder of it's contents scattered about.
The morning's breakfast might be a little sparse,but we had three elk on the ground. I got my first elk,good memories,and friendships that have lasted for years! memtb

My first elk (and elk hunt) was probably my most memorable hunt of my life. I was I believe 12 or 13 (that part I dont remember). My dad, late grandfather and I drew late season unit 1 Arizona bull tags. Long story short, we glassed up elk up on top of a hill that has great significance to our family (I got engaged on top of said hill, and my grandfathers ashes will soon be spread on top of said hill.... Just fairly important to us.)

Anyways, my dad and I made a stalk, identified a bull and made sure there were no cows behind him. This was before range finders existed. I leveled my scope and fired, missing. The elk began to run, my dad fired and missed. I leveled the rifle again, took aim at the slowly trotting spike and fired. When I shot an elk dropped. Now, I was certain I was on a bull, but when I shot my dad said there was still a spike visible and I instantly began to worry that I killed a cow! Once we got closer, we confirmed that I had indeed shot the bull I targeted and I was relieved and excited! To top it off, my grandfather killed a bull (which ended up being his last bull) the next day, and my dad killed his first elk on the final day of the hunt.

My 4th year hunting in Co sitting on a small piece of BLM when what sounded like a herd of horses on shale turned into a herd of about 20 elk cows and young bulls looked like they were going to trample me and was thinking my anti-hunting friends & family would laugh their heads off.

They passed about 60 yards in front of me - I couldn't decide which to shoot when a cow finally spotted me and stopped. I held on the chest of the bull behind her the I realized there was another bull directly in line with the chest and I was shooting a 7mm RM 150 grain Accubond that would probably penetrate and wound the other animal. I adjusted quickly to shoot the nice 4 point in the neck and the sound he made when he hit the ground was wonderful. Even better when I got my hunting group together to help we hiked back up the hill and spooked out a nice 3 point buck I shot him through the heart and he took off running for about 70 yards where he dropped within 90 yards from the dead bull.

They asked if I minded not killing everything on the hill next time and we got both animals to the processor a little after dark. I filled my cow tag 2 days later - haven't had that kind of luck since.

I went on my first Elk hunt at age 61 and a friend of mine had to talk me into going. Being the lucky SOB that I am I shot my first Elk and he scored SCI 498 5/8. Now I have to admit that it was an Estate kill but my point is I can't believe that I waited my entire life to go on my first Elk Hunt. So now I have been on two Elk hunts and have two bulls mounted. Now I've been hunting Deer all my life and I have paid my dues but sometime it's better to be lucky than good.

I was kinda disgruntled at having to hunt a bull at camp the year I was 19. It was my second year of college and I wasn't sure if I'd be able to go to CO for camp for 10 days so I hadn't applied for a buck tag. I was able to get free and go kindof last minute but had to buy a OTC bull tag if I wanted to hunt. I was super excited to be back at camp having missed the year before due to school but was still reeling from the $575 I'd plunked down for the tag.

I'd gotten a little discouraged with elk hunting early on for a couple reasons. Lack of sightings being a big one, with a deer tag at least there are usually a few does that hang down around the meadow that camp sits in that I can see every day to assure me that they do exist. Second was antler restrictions, my first year I had to pass the only bull I saw since he didn't have enough bone growing out of his head. Third was the fact that I'd been a part of breaking down and packing out quite a few that Dad and my uncles and Grandad had scored on, and it's a lot of work. Guess I was the typical teenager who wanted instant gratification with no work involved. But anyway.

Dad took me aside the night before the opener and told me that if I wanted to punch my tag I'd better ask my uncle Kent, the Elkslayer of the family, if I could hunt with him, to listen to everything he said and "get in his back pocket and stay there". I did all of these things and it payed off the next morning.

Sunrise on the opener found me and Kent at the top of a ridge with me panting for breath like a guy who'd smoked 3 packs of Camels a day his whole life. Lesson number one, be in shape to elk hunt. While I was chasing girls and doing 12oz curls at Jr college Kent was doing farm work and being in shape in his late 40's.
As it got light we eased down a game trail on the peak of the ridge. I was mesmerized by a small flock of Merriams turkey that were strolling down the trail in front of us, not alarmed but not letting us get any closer. Lesson number two, as I was gawking at turkeys Kent was looking for elk. As I watched the birds he tapped me on the shoulder and whispered for me to look across the canyon.

Sure as the world standing under a piñon pine across the canyon was a big yellow critter that I would have passed right by with my head up my butt. As we sat to glass for a better look Kent told me he was almost certain it was a big bull due to it's being alone and it's pale color. Right again on his part, when it raised it's head above the lower limbs of the piñon I about crapped my pants. Not because it was huge but because I had identified the telltale 5" browtine making it a legal bull.
Without my even asking Kent kindly asked me if I'd like to shoot this one. I almost shouted as I tried to whisper the word yes I was so excited. He asked me if I thought I could make the shot and offered me his shooting sticks. Which I graciously accepted since I'd left mine on the camp table while packing my lunch that morning.

I set up the sticks and planted my old sporterized 1903 Springfield in the vee and quickly found the bull. I knew it was a long shot and thought to ask Kent to range it since he was the first person I knew to own an LRF. Turned out his LRF was right next to my shooting sticks in the tent. I guessed it at 400 and he thought that looked about right. So I held up about 2 feet over where I wanted the bullet to land, I was shooting about 200-400 rounds a week at that time so knew my rifle pretty well, and applied pressure to the trigger. I lost the bull in the fixed 4x Leupold under recoil but remember the sweet sound that bullet made when it landed like it was yesterday, sounded like someone hit a plastic trashcan with a baseball bat as it echoed across the canyon. I found the bull in the scope soon enough to see him come down out of the HiHo Silver pose and take a step behind the piñon he was standing under, effectively stopping me from taking afollowup shot.
Lesson three was to be patient, this one would be reinforced with a sledgehammer blow shortly. I was ready to start lobbing more rounds into the tree trying to get another one in the wounded bull but Kent assured me he was hit hard and that we should just wait a minute. After what seemed an eternity I heard the rolling of gravel and knew something was happening, as I readied myself to shoot again I saw an upside down elk sliding down the steep slope, dead as a wedge!

But here's where that third lesson gets reinforced. As I started working my way around the rim of the canyon to try to find my bull I heard a terrific crashing of brush and the distinctive sound of antlers on oakbrush. I was horrified thinking my bull was making his escape. I radioed Kent and asked if he could see him and why he wasn't shooting. He replied that the noise was coming from behind him and getting closer, "I'm going to turn around and have a look" was the last thing I heard before two quick shots rang out behind me followed by a loud crash and all went silent.
As Kent had stood watch to direct me in to where my bull was a monster 6x6 had run over the ridge and catching my scent, stopped and sniffed my butt prints in the dirt where I'd shot from a half hour earlier. That was his last mistake, as Kent was leaning against a jack pine ten yards away and promptly fed him a double dose of 150 partitions in the wheelhouse. He lurched forward one bound and piled up in a thicket 10 feet off the trail.

I eventually worked my way to my bull and found he was an ancient old 5x7 nontypical. He was also wrapped around a small pine, upside down and backwards on a 45 degree slope. I ended up using my pack saw to cut the tree down so he'd skid down onto a flat place about the size of a pickup bed where I could skin and quarter him. The rest of the gang showed up about the time I got the 3rd quarter off and hung in a little tree. I was gassed, out of water, food, and rope but I had a grin a mile wide on my mug that no amount of exhaustion could wipe it off.

We all took a piece that afternoon and Kent and I went back the next morning and finished the pack job. One of my favorite hunts and one of my favorite pictures is the one my Dad took of Kent and me standing looking over the ridge back toward camp with those two big racks on our pack boards.

Ps Dad brought the LRF the next day and hit the spot where my bull was standing from where I shot. The readout read 402yds.

Mine was a DIY hunt in Colorado with two friends. I had the tag, they came along to help. We hiked to a bit above timberline, about 12,700', in the dark to a rock pile that would allow glassing. As the sun rose we spotted a herd of at least 75 elk (we stopped trying to count) moving right along timber line like a row of ants. They were thousands of yards out. We dropped down to just at timberline and I proceeded to head towards them just below timberline working whilst ensuring that I could see my partners. As I made my moves I would glass back and they would provide pre-agreed hand signals. After some time they signaled for me to move up, enough such that I would be able to see the elk as they crossed in front of me. I found a small clump of trees and crawled into it kneeling while I watched and listened. After a bit of time some cows appeared moseying on past, about 75 yards out. Soon after I started hearing a lone bull bugling. I kneeled waiting. Soon a few bulls, a 4x4, spike and a decent 5x5 pass by. The bull continued to bugle. I waited. More cows and bulls (including a few more decent 5x5's) crossed, at least 20 as I waited. Finally a 6x6 showed up and that was going to be the one. He crossed in front of me ~75 yards out, stopped to munch a bite of grass and the 210 gr Partition from my 338-06 was launched. The bull spun, leaped and fell over dead. I waited a bit and saw he was finished. I headed up towards him and heard a grunt. I looked up and above me less than 50 yards away were at least another 30 elk all standing there looking at me and their fallen friend. Just then I heard the bugling elk circling in the timber below me, smart old bastid he was. I looked back at the elk above and one of the 5x5's heads out and the rest follow. It was near ethereal. The elk I shot was in a separate group, the group above were out of my sight due to the land contour. After a fair bit of time my partners arrived stunned to see me with the elk. From where they were they could only see the higher group and having seen nothing drop or run at the shot assumed a clean miss. Still the greatest hunt I have had.