Tell me about hunting elk with a bow.

Typically during the rut. I like to hunt thick cover. Lots of eyes when with a bunch of cows.

Satellite bulls will be on the periphery of the herd. The herd bull will often move the herd from area to area trying to avoid the satelite bulls.

The herd won't be too far from water. A mile or less has been my experience.

Bull elk are hot and bugle one day, not at all the next has been my experience.

Hunting cow elk is a different story. Success rate is lower.

Hearing a bull elk within a couple yards will definitely get the adrenaline going and heart rate pounding.

Gotta watch the wind. Their eyes can be hard to defeat.

Lots of people think simply hit the cow call or hit a bugle and they will come running. Not so. I always use bugles sparingly. Cow calls more often.

A really fun hunt.

Just like rifle hunting, you carry them a lot more than you shoot them.

Hunting during the rut is great fun and educational. I had an entire herd within 15 yards last September, but only a deer and bear tag in my pocket.I was sitting in the sun in the open, they were under pines. We hung together like that for 15-20 minutes while the bulls yelled at each across the draw. Great fun.

Very different hunting in the early season.

You need to get 'em in close, for a shot.

Seriously though, if you've never hunted elk, only deer, they are much easier to move in on, don't be afraid to press.

Pat you are getting the fever and you haven't even gone yet!
It's like hunting turkey (easterns) but they can smell too!

Yea, a 600lb spring gobbler!

I did it with a buddy 5 times in Colorado back in the late 80's - 90's. We did it on our own each time. We never killed anything but a had a number of unreal encounters.

Public land; BLM and FS. We had connections that helped with pointing the way and that should only be much easier these days with places like the 24HCF and all the guys that can give you some hot spots.

It was a long assed trip for us but worth every ounce of effort.

You get one of those pricks bugling at 15 yards you'll come unglued.................grins

I'm still trying to kill my first elk with a bow, so take this advice for what it's worth. A few lessons I've learned:

Watch the wind, always. You can move and make noise around them, but wind will bust you EVERY time.

95% of the time call sparingly, if at all. 5% of the time, call like crazy!

Know how to shoot and quickly. A shooting opportunity can materialize and disappear within seconds.

Tune your bow/arrow to perfection. Shoot enough arrow. Use strong, sharp broadheads and practice with them.

Keep your gear simple and reliable, particularly your bow.

Get in shape.

And the most important thing, have fun!

In my opinion, September on the mountain is the most magical time of year, and the pursuit of the might wapiti the noblest of endeavors. The woodstove smoke waffling through the air, the smell of cowboy coffee brewing in the cook tent, a star filled morning with the faint sound of bugling bulls slipping across the canyon, ohhh. Aspens begin to turn color, the animals scurry about, the streams so cold and crisp and clear. Then in evening the sunk sinks into the western horizon and the rays bounce and dart about the peaks. A man can live free and wild atop the ridge in the back country autumn woods. That is archery elk my friend.

Wind, wind, wind, wind...

If you don't have a caller, find their beds and beat them to it before they do...

If you have a caller, find their beds and beat them to it before they do.

If you find their beds, setup and wait for them in the evening.

Buy and use more than one cow call... if you have enough hanging off you to open a booth at the gun show... buy two more.

It's ok to move away from a hung up bull while cow calling... or run at them bugling... and sometimes not... but sit'n there ain't go'na do chit.

Learn to say... 'that GD F'n wind'

When the opportunity comes... KILL... you have to put everything that happened before that moment behind you and think... KILL... All the busts, bugles, chases, trailing stink, hang ups, misses, almosts... when that bull is finally in the kill zone, it won't last long, a couple seconds, you can't be thinking about if your glow nock weighs .036 grains more than the regular one and where to aim... if you can't clear your mind and think KILL, you won't.

Previous years knowledge of elk in that spot is the trump card, if you don't have someone with you that has previous years knowledge, start banking it.

Elk in the rut aren't in the same pattern as elk during the other 10.5 months. Scouting the summer should be for cows, even that could be iffy as some areas only get used for breeding and could be mostly abandoned any other time.

Food, water, bedding areas... during your hunt day they will be in the beds the majority of time... hunt the edges when they come and go.

Wind... I almost forgot wind.

Kent

Lots of good info.
While I have killed elk with my bow, I don't have the experience of these guys.
The one suggestion that changed my dinner menu from tag soup to backstraps:

Find the elk.

Sometimes finding them means going to plan B.

Easier said than done especially when you don't live in an elk state. Some of my early elk hunts were just pleasant camping trips while carrying a bow and a tag.

I love this one because it really sums it all up:

>>sit'n there ain't go'na do chit.<<

Thank you guys. Great advice! Just what I need.

You know how we are Dan...24/7/365. It's what keeps us alive.

Yup !!!

I think there are a few things I would like to add. Wind is your adversary but THERMALS are your friend. I.E. get into em before the sun hits the side of the mountain. You will have a nice down word breeze in your face as you climb.In the afternoon the thermals are more fickle. Hitting one with an arrow in the morning will also give you all day to track and harvest. In September a dead elk will not stay very fresh over night if intact. If they smell you they will leave you, if they do not smell you, they will be close by the next morning. Cow calling works best early in September, Bugeling works better later if at all.

Here's some more fuel for the fire Pat!

Pat, save yourself a ton of money on tags, trips, expenses and time and pay big bucks for a good private ranch and/ or top class archery guide. I didn't. On national forest you can easily spend 6-10 years trying to get a good bull by yourself.

The years slip by and before you know it your knees and dreams of making other hard hunts turn into nightmares.

Well, that was uplifting. I think it all depends on what turns your crank, some guys would rather do it themselves. Also, how much work you're willing to put in to get a little farther back in, away from roads.

And also, where in the NF you hunt. I hunt the early season too, with a muzzleloader, on public land. If you find the right spot, you'll be in elk. With a bow it's never a sure thing though, no matter how many elk you're in.

I hunted them about 20 years in national forests in colorado and Montana ( and muley and moose in BC) because of the fun and on my own to save money and because I was one of those guys who likes to do it on his own, but I missed Alaska, its bears and sheep. I also spent many years and many days after BIG whitetails and Muleys. I got them big and elk too, but I wish I had done it quicker and hunted Alaska with a bow.

In Colorado I have backpacked in and stayed 5-6 days or camped at a trailhead (10,400 ft) and made it in 2-3 miles in by daylight many times, often to be screwed over by by guys coming through on horse back at 10-11 am after they left the trailhead at daylight and homed in on me talking to a bull.

If you know of national forest where bulls don't usually haul ass at the sound of more than a spike bugle I'd make a grateful friend. In many areas of SW Col the elk have learned to live pretty silent and haul tail at the first sound of a hoochie- mama.

Also, there seem to be more hunters and less elk every year. I hope to hear you say it is better in other areas, but it takes me a few years to learn how elk move in a new area and that's a rough proposition at my age.

I can't argue with much of anything you said, but I will say there are some areas that are better. You never know where the hunting pressure is going to be from year to year, I've run into a bunch of people (good people, just too many) as far as six miles in on foot. Places where one year there are multiple bulls bugling (and answering) in a basin, and the next all there seems to be is other hunters bugling.

So the key is (and this is the harder part for a non-resident) to have a few different places scoped out and make a quick decision to pull up stakes and move to the next if the first area is too crowded.

So if age is a factor for the OP and he doesn't have a lot of hunting seasons left to be able to hump it up mountains, a private land hunt could be just the ticket, if he wants to pay. I didn't get that from his post though.

If age is not so much a factor, then this could be the year he starts finding his own spots for plan A, B, and C, which is most of the fun IMHO. There's nothing like hunting new territory and figuring it out on your own, or with your buddies.

Right...we're DIY kinda guys. I guess we're stupid that way, but some of us just gotta piss on the sparkplug, you know?

Another thing I will add is elk are much "duller" than deer. They seem more tolerant of human forms and movement to some degree.They have a comfort zone of about 50 to 60 yards. Either set up a bow system to take close work such as a recurve or be able to shoot your compound 60 to 70 yards. Unless you are calling for them and hidden, most elk will not take your presence and pulling back a compound at under 45 yards.

Well, pissing on the spark plug is a good way to make sure the lesson stays learned.....

To add to what was said above regarding calling them in, they have an uncanny way of zeroing right in on the caller's location. If you set up in an open area, like an aspen grove and call one in, he's more likely to hang up out of bow range because he'll be looking for elk and not seeing any where he expects them. So it's easier if you're solo to call them in to areas where there's some cover and they can't scan the area from a distance and see that there are no elk there.

Better yet is to work in pairs with the shooter 50 or more yards out in front, between the caller and the elk, so that the elk doesn't zero in on the shooter's location and is focused on the caller, hopefully walking by the shooter in a concealed location where he can draw unseen.

Also, it's easier to call a bull downhill than up, especially if you're challenging him with a bugle. Works best in the AM when the thermals are still drifting downhill.

x2. 7 years ago we had two shooters set up maybe 70 yards apart with the caller in the back (think triangle). I watched a nice 6x walk RIGHT by my buddy but unfortunately it was on the wrong side of the little patch of cover he posted up in.

Nothing is more thrilling than archery elk in the rut with them going nuts all around you. Noise isn't as important like deer. In fact we tried destroying a tree limb in response to a big bull that was hung up, really pissed off, and was throttling some tree.

Wind will kill you. When it comes time to the shot you want your mind to essentially go blank and into robotic mode.

Turkey hunting tactics! Except you have to factor wind into the equation...one turkey tactic I found that didn't work that I have great sucsess was the "flanker move"
I've made a big flanking move on a Tom that calls but moves away from me being able to get around him and set up...an elk moving away is covering major ground,I couldn't catch up to the elk let alone get far enough infront of him to flank him

Been archery hunting Colorado Elk for over 15 years hunting national forest (Public Ground). Each year has been for the entire archery season. All I can say is be persistent, don't give up. Some years there seem to be few elk in the area and sometimes more.

You don't have to be an elk calling expert and be prepared for an Elk to show up in any area when you least expect it. Early on I use a sceery cow/calf call since Bulls normally are pretty quiet around this time. Have called cows into arms length a couple times. Whether you use cow/calf calls or bugle make sure you practice before season. Some of the worst calls I have heard have come from Elk.

#1 tool you must have is a range finder. Elk are huge and it's really easy to under estimate the range. Also make dam sure you have a warm dry place to sleep. You cannot hunt if you don't get a good nights sleep.

For me it's all about getting into the mountains and hunting. Each year you hunt you learn a little more and get to know the area better. Get maps of the area and use your GPS. Maps are readily available on Google or other sites.

It's all about the experience, I love it. Tom

I'd second that, if they're moving it can be hard to keep up, especially when they're going uphill at 10K. And even if you can keep up, it can be hard to keep track of where they all are when they're moving, so that you don't blunder in too close to an unseen cow and blow them out.

On the other hand, if there's one bugling back, not moving away but not coming in either, sometimes the best tactic is to move right in on him, as close as you can without blowing him out, and try to piss him off by bugling and raking trees.

If it works, hold onto your hat!

Anybody using a decoy with the caller to bring in a shy bull?

the area I hunted you wouldn't wanna be lugging around a decoy

I'll be totin' my longbow and am used to hunting the thick stuff, so I'm sure my tendency will be to do the same there. Is thicker better generally better for elk, like it is for whitetails?

Two hunters...I call if he's on your side, you call if he's on mine. Good plan?

I was thinking along the lines of a Montana Decoy...

Not really Pat, you have to decide who's turn it will be I alternated with my partner

Gotcha.

If you are in elk and hit the rut right there will be multiple opportunities( by that I mean try for an elk and have him call,not nessisarily a shot or seeing him)

Heck on my 1st hunt my partner and I both turned down shots on 4x4's and it was my turn and I passed a 5x5 that my partner elected to kill( I knew some thing was up as he's usally way more selective than me,turns out he had pneumonia and knew he didn;t have much left in him although he hunted and followed me around the rest of the hunt at 11,000ft as soon as we got off the mountain got him to urgent care )

This is the elk he took

Here's one I cow called in for my hunting buddy. We were about 100 yds apart. He was in a climbing stand and I was in a make shift ground blind.

You know me...I'd be happy with a calf! Hell, I'll be happy anyway.

That's a dandy! I just wanna TRY.

Unit 61?

Pat if you hit one with the long bow do you think we can "heard" it to the trail?
I am a good guide too if you recall

You gotta admit that they did the same thing with training wheels.

Dang, that thing looks like a musk ox.

We have had excellent luck with the Montana decoy. I no longer wear camouflage. I think they spook at camo, especially the cows.

I don't think you should have said it. Anybody who tries to look like a game animal during any hunting season is, well, you get the gist.

Better ditch the Mossy Oak and get this

wearing that costume to a bull elk fight....you better have a LOT of confidence in your hunting buddy or you are gonna have to make a choice between fighting an enraged bull or ripping your antlers off and .... well, loving that bull!

I wish I had advice to give, but I've been trying for the last 4 years without success. We don't have huge elk populations where I hunt, and the herds are usually quite small. Also, it's pretty much flatland.
Still, every year we have a great time and so far I'm learning things and getting closer to success, so you never know when it'll all come together.
I'm reading all the responses here and trying to learn as much as I can, hopefully one day I can give some advice too.

In many areas of national forests the elk have heard so many hunters using a cow call its not a good idea. A rut crazed bull however won't be deterred in giving a shot. The problem is in finding a rut crazed bull

Don't try to call one across an opening. 90% of the time they hang up. The caller may be on one side of a small clearing but the hunter best be on the same side as the elk.


Quite often the bull is very close if you hear him bugle. You best not move much after hearing him. If he's coming he'll be on you and see you move before you are ready. Don't ask me how I know.

Don't have red or orange on your cap. In my experience elk are much smarter than MOST deer and bugger more easily. While a deer may locate and avoid you if an elk realizes a human is close they can hurt themselves getting the hell out of there, crossing a canyon and going over the mountain on the other side. Otoh, if the wind is good they may come right to you trying to figure out what you are if partially hidden. Otoh, I have sat on a hillside leaning back against a fence post while glassing scattered meadows below and had a cow elk feed into an opening at six hundred yards. She looked up my direction and hauled tail. She knee there was no stump on that fence line in that spot.

In canyons with small meadow where you find elk sign, don't hunt the meadow. Normally they will wait until the event fools and come into it from below (downwind). It's best to set up 75 or so yards downwind. Also, the same elk may be bedded above the meadow catching the uphill currents. If you get there early and they smell you on the rising thermals they just don't show. Often you need to stay back until the evening downdraft starts and then haul ass in. The wind will also often switch back and fourth for 30-45 min.

If you find bedding areas higher than you camp, I wouldn't get up early and get there at daylight. The morning down thermals usually last until 10-11 before heading uphill. Get there before them and they will not show up. I've seen some great bedding areas we've killed many elk in finally ruined by gung-Ho types getting there early and scenting up the areas before the elk get there. We used to kill elk there by getting there about 10:30, easing around for hours, waiting a good while at different spots and calling sparingly and not aggressively.

Keep a sharp eye out for one sneaking in to check you out. Normally the rut seems to hit in muzzleloader season. The bow season after it can be great if you can find elk that haven't been too buggered.

Canyons running down and north from east-west mountain ridges with heavy black timber often have little scattered flat meadows which elk will bed below. In the evening, after the breeze heads down and told its tale, they work up a little way to feed in those meadows.

The wallows in those places can be tempting but are hard to hunt in country with a lot of hunting pressure. The bulls won't be there at the crack of daylight and often come in the morning and from below. You never know if one was bumped by your scent while coming in or not, unless it was talking.

They may try to come in later, but from above with the thermals going up.

Watch for tracks crossing or near ridge tops. They like to lay over the top on the north side but cross late in the evening to feed in the more open areas with southern exposure which catches more sunlight.

They can be hard to hunt, seeming to me anyway, to be more thoughtful than most deer.

This is an example of why it's good to get as many different opinions as possible, because I disagree with both of these statements. It's true that a bull you hear bugling can be quite close, but that doesn't mean you can't move in on him. In fact, some times it's a the best way to go. If you haven't been calling yet and he doesn't know you're there, you can move in undetected easily. (not saying you can't get busted too though) Even if you've been calling and he's been answering, you can still move in. That's exactly what I did this year to get my bull; we were bugling back and forth but he wouldn't come down to me. IME, this is quite common. So I closed the gap between us not once but twice, and he finally got worked up (or pissed off) enough to come in to 15 yards, where I shot him with my muzzleloader.

And I was wearing a solid orange baseball cap and vest at the time.

I agree with smoke'. Most of the people I know that kill elk regularly (mature bulls) are not afraid to be aggressive.

The ones that over think every move, not so much.

I will agree that if a bull is bugling you have a chance to move in on him. I was referring to a bull that is in timber and coming in to your call. Sometimes while covering country and calling to locate elk, one will open up and be much close than what I thought they were. 3 have busted me by seeing me move from 70-90 yards through the timber, when I thought they were much farther away. It is sure to piss off a short tempered brother.

If you get on a hot bull I will agree with being aggressive. In the early bow season the rut has GENERALLY not started and finding a hot bull is a rare occasion. Muzzle loader has many more bulls getting into the swing of things. As I previously said, the archery season can be great after the muzzle loader season as far as the rut goes, but on NF its hard to get into elk (in my experience) that have not been buggered by hunters.

The man I hunted the last 8 years with that I hunted archery elk has killed about 16 elk the last 18-20 years with a bow. Iirc about 14 were bulls. Some years he did not get an elk and some years he filled his bull tag and went to town and got a cow tag which he filled. He taught me a lot, and I have heard of no one who gets one week of elk hunting per year to have near that record with a bow.

I have hunted early rifle in NF and gotten herd bulls worked up to the point of having them 'scream' a bugle at me. When I blew back with the same intensity, they left with their cows, though sometimes vacating in a direction that ended up with me getting a killing shot.

I have called in satellite bulls in the high timberline country south and east of Silverton in the country just north of Whitehead canyon with a cow call.

Research the last several years reveals ungulates have much better color perception than we previously thought. Wear what you wish, and I like carhartt tan in archery season, but I will steer clear of oranges and red, though the brightness they perceive may well blend in to light colored rock and downed timber where the bark has slipped.

I can only relate what I know from the experiences of myself, my brother, and the elk sticker from Ok.

Needles to say, a chance to hunt with Smokepole, even as cameraman, would be worth a lot.

It'd be worth about the price of a cup of coffee, or less if you're at Starbucks. I'm no great elk hunter but even a blind hog finds an occasional acorn.

I think part of the difference in our outlook is because I like to hunt out of a backpack and get at least a few miles in where the animals are less disturbed by other hunters. More work on the packing in and out part, but the hunting is easier and the animals less spooky.

I think I saw on a previous post that ltpowell is thinking about a hunt right at the end of the archery season, so that would put him there at the right time to find them rutting pretty hard.

Yeah, I wish I knew of a decent area to steer him to. To me, its hard to find a large roadless area to get into, unless its Wilderness. I hear most the bulls found in the Lizard Head are not very big but I don't know if that's true. I also hear it has plenty of bow hunters in season. What's your thinking on this?

Smoke, I have 20 freaking preference points for elk but after getting a few good ones the desire has shifted to easier critters to deal with. I wish I could trade them for deer points.

Man, it would be a joy to just camp with you in the rough country and pack a LITTLE meat.

I have a couple of deer PP and will probably apply for archery or ML deer this year.

I think designated wilderness areas are easy for people to identify and draw lots of people, including outfitters who run drop camps and guided hunts and non-residents looking for a place to hunt. I've had better luck with areas that aren't designated, just roadless. I've been to LH during the season, and you're right, there was no shortage of people back in there.

man, what I wouldn't give for 20 elk points!!!!!!

I don't need much meat off a big one and you can't eat the horns.

Archery Season and the Rut! Like Peas and Carrots. Nothing like it in the world.


It will totally change the way you hunt even if you never do it again.

OP, what state are you trying to draw a tag in? Units in the Gila wilderness have huge bulls, but also a ton of guys on atv' s and other motorized vehicles....get off the beaten path but also find the elk. Water is key here in NM, swallows are your friend too.

You can be too aggressive with a herd bull, but often times a satellite bull will be more than happy to oblige you with coming in. If you have a bull that is answering you and then goes silent, chances are that he will be headed in. That being said, when calling and a bull answers you, cut the distance...I like to move about 100 yds closer and be quiet, elk can pinpoint your location from a long ways off. If you have a caller as he is cow calling or bulging move ahead of him.....he will pull the bull past you and offer you a shot at the elk.

Having hunted elk for about 45 years I still learned a lot by buying two things from ELknut Productions. One is the Playbook and the other is the set of DVD's sold. You can learn a ton of stuff about calling and talking to elk that upsets all the old myths. Particularly about calling elk in area where calls have been over used, what elk are saying to each other, and when to call and when not to call.

Their Little Chuckler bugle is great as you can take the mouth piece off and use it as a cow call. Because of dentures and caps, I could not use diaphragm calls, and this call fit the bill.

With 20 points, you can be close to drawing a tag in 201. It isn't as good as it use to be, but I hunted it in 2009 and I could put some X's on maps for you and where to hunt.

I've never tried crack cocaine, but I'd imagine there's some similarities. If you're hunting in September you've got way more action and will see way more animals than you will after mid October or later. Stars have to align to kill a big one with an arrow, but odds are super high to call in a juvenile elk and arrow him - much higher than hunting elk in later rifle hunts.

Just my opinion, I've probably bow hunted 3-15 days a season for 2 decades, lots of planning. Plenty of options for great hunts in many states where you can hunt annually. Good luck!

My 12 year old bowhunted one day this fall, with some decent preparation and took a nice P&Y 6 point, 2 yards, he's hooked.

So you should take a gf with you?

Give me a call if you want Pat -

Greg is that in AZ?

Yes -

Tuff for you to get a tag?