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We then went back to where we got into the most elk the first morning. There was steady bugling, so we took our time and set up, waiting for goats to bed down after feeding. This time we had a bull come in right on top of us, fairly unaware of the goats, and they did great by staying bedded. I passed this bull up too, just a 5x5 but a bit nicer than most raghorns. I'd shoot him in less limited areas, but I suspected I could do better. Also ran into a spike on the top of ridge, along the burn/dark timber border. He came in silently, but the goats alerted to him by all staring down his direction. He got under 50 yards before he knew something was up. These are all video screen shots, so kinda hard to get a good image.






We stayed in the burned timber most of the day. At dusk we headed back into the pocket meadows and bumped into a herd of about a dozen silent elk. My buddy tried to keep the goats behind me, and in the last light I could see there was a good bull in the group. Frame looked like a solid 300ish class at least, but at 75 yards, I was too close to want to screw with glassing him up. The wind switched and cows looked up at us, and like they were Secret Service or something, they all gathered around the bull, giving me no clear shot while they stamped around, deciding whether to run or not. I couldn't do it, at best I'd have a neck shot between a bunch of cows. In under 30 seconds of milling about, they finally decided to bail.

The next morning, we decided to leave the goats in camp. At this point, I hadn't heard a coyote, seen any bear or lion tracks and knew we had occupied camps within 1/4 mile of us in two directions. We went further down mountain to a saddle where the burn came up over the top of the ridge. As we crept through the black timber pre dawn, we knew we were in major elk country, but didn't hear a thing. We hung up at the edge of the timber and did some little cow calling, but nothing happened. We headed out into the burn to look down toward the creek below (maybe 1500 below off the ledge). Still nothing, but lots of sign. We went to a ledge with a better overlook and could glass elk on the far ridge about mile away, and it looked like there were some good bulls there too. Probably saw 100 in 4 groups. I opted out of hunting that mountain due to ATV access, and that's where I heard an outfitter was working. It was hard to place the bugles, but I suspected some were coming from straight below us, but I couldn't make them out. We stayed here all day, but there wasn't much action. We were tired, so we started contemplating a route home.






Just then a bull bugled nearby, so we took cover and waited.


Nothing happened for a few minutes, but eventually I could see a rack coming toward us.
I was getting impatient, and was tempted to shoot him. I cocked the hammer, and my buddy looked at me like I was crazy. We had lots of time left. We had seen two shooters so far, and a guy who had killed something likely bigger than anything we had seen. This bull came within 15 yards of us, he was by himself, just a little 5 point.

I let him go too.