Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Any 3rd season Colorado elk/deer hunters?

I'll be in Unit 12 with an outfitter hunting coal company property, elk only, I didn't draw a deer tag and my Landowner tag just disappeared. It looks like we will be getting some rain or snow. Good luck to all and be safe.

Heading west in the morning to set up camp in 77. Grandad hasn't missed a year since 55' and he's packed and ready. We'll have 11 guys in camp, one buck tag and 5 bull hunters. The rest of the guys aren't buying tags so we'll have lots of cooks this year.

Going up to 77 on Thursday. Hoping the forecast holds and we don't get too much more snow. Don't mind being the guy that cuts tracks on the way in, but I'm also not willing to walk the line between sanity and insanity just to kill an elk. I'll leave that to the guys who are really mad at em. Good look all other 3rd season guys! Weather is shaping up to move the elk around.

I’m heading to 62, not a unit I would normally hunt but I’ve got some friends coming from Alabama who wanted to hunt 62. I am praying hard for a major snow event, it’s the great equalizer for a hot and dry fall.

Heading to 12 on Friday, Cow tag for 12./23/24, OTC bull tag and buck tag for 12/23/24.

The weather forecast keeps getting better and better - rain and snow low, which means more snow high. We hunt the migration and it is looking like there might be enough weather to get it started - or at least a false start, which is all we need..

Also headed to 12, leaving in the morning. It sounds like it's going to be crowded there around Buford! I'm not worried, though; I know the mayor...

I will be hunting my same old haunts (Unit 39). I have a doe tag for the upcoming week and am thinking hard about getting an OTC cow tag for the following week. Probably won't hunt till Tues. of next week so I have the place to myself. The weekend crew will be gone. Good luck to all of us!

I have a Unit 52 cow tag. I was in 52 in second season with a couple friends and we didn't see much. We might have some weather in third and it can only get better!

Meeting my crew in Unit 61 on Friday. We all have cow tags.

Good luck all, leaving now!

4 of us headed to 62 tomorrow... 3 drawn deer tags and 2 OTC bull tags

Not 3rd but am heading to Durango for the 4th season have private land tag for Deer.

For all those going to Unit 12 and associated areas, the weather forecast is starting to get interesting. Rain and snow early in the season.

Never 3 but hunted 4 out of a tent in neg 5 degrees for a week. Ran out of water and had to melt snow. Froze our dickens off. I will leave the tent at home next time.

I would pass on a 3 season for a 4th only because of crowds. When I hunt I don't want to see anyone. Yea you're gonna freeze your ass off and wake up cold and go to bed cold but to me that's just part of the fun. It needs to snow while I'm there and the conditions need to be awful. That way I don't see any of you people out there.

I just got back, 5 hunter (5 OTC bull tags and 3 deer tags), 4 for 5 on bull elk including clicking on an empty chamber on a 300 yard shot for the unsuccessful hunter and 3 for 3 on the deer. Saw a lot of bucks, elk started getting plentiful on the last day of our hunt (Wednesday). I shot a 5x4 meat bull at 489 yards with a 7RM and 168 Bergers.

Got back from our annual trip to 771, I had mistakenly stated 77 earlier. Anyway, deer were plentiful and I was inside of 75 yards of 5 different nice bucks at different times, including one real bruiser 7x8 non typical. Unfortunately Dad was the only one in camp with a buck tag and he’d already shot a nice 4x4. Elk were scarce, weather was warm and they just hadn’t moved into our corner of the unit yet. Saw 2 small bulls killed by other camps. Watched one for a while and by the time we determined him to be legal he slipped into the brush and we couldn’t catch up to him, smallest 4x4 bull we’d ever seen. Watched in the glasses the next morning as a guy from Oregon rolled him up a half mile from me.

While the meat pole was pretty light this year it was, as always, a great trip. Found some sheds and got lots of exercise, drank a few beers, caught up with the guys and laughed a whole lot.

Kid sounds like fun... Sometimes it is just relaxing to just go along!!! Haven't done it much, but when I did it was sure fun..

Four hunters got three cows- area 17.
Snow started Saturday and by Sunday night the Elk were coming down in the hundreds
I wasn't one of the four, came down with the worst case of Vertigo ever, taking more sideways steps than forward, getting better but still can't drive.

Finally got out Saturday night, glassed up a small herd (I had a cow tag) on a spring from a ridge next to a road. They were about 1000 yards away, had about 1 hour til dark, bombed straight down hill, bumped into a herd of 20, couldn't get a shot in the oaks. Kept going to the original herd, when I got in sight at about 250 yards they were all balled up and spooked due to the thermals dropping my scent on them. No shot. Yesterday morning went back, saw a lone cow at 500 walking through the oak flats below, tried to head her off before she disappeared in the aspens, but no luck. Called it an hour later. Got out for a total of maybe 3-4 hours of actual field time. Busy season. Oh well.