Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Muzzleloaders Muzzleloader Elk

It has been a while since I posted. Retirement, training a new bird dog and getting all the honey due stuff in order has taken a bit of time. This fall I was able to get out quite a bit for birds (upland) but injured my knee in late October so that placed a restriction on walking much. As I had been drawn for limited entry either sex elk I wanted this to be my hunt for the year so no deer hunting trips where I might bugger up the knee rehab. My draw was on a Military base that has permanent danger areas (PDA's) that are out of bounds and can close areas randomly for training.

I knew going in it would be a hard hunt with low success rates. Last year there were 10 elk harvested with 50 tags given out (plus a number of first nations hunters that do not need tags). So the true hunter success rate is less than 15%. The way the hunt is set up is the first 3 days are muzzle loader or bow. This is followed by two weeks of rifle hunting. The base is approximately 610 sq km and there are approximately 500 elk at a peak time on the base. My goal for the hunt was just to get an opportunity at an elk. I am a meat hunter so the first elk of any type was fine with me.

I had set aside 9 days for the hunt and hoped my bad knee would be up to the walking I would have to do. My plan was to treat the 3 day muzzleloader season as scouting for rifle. For this hunt I had chosen to use my T/C ProHunter 50 cal with a 290 grain Barnes T-EZ over 100 grains of 777.

While I am confident with the front stuffer out to 200 yds I was less sure I would run into an elk within the first 3 days. In my past hunts on the base I have run into elk at fairly close quarters while still hunting for either deer or moose. So, my thoughts were to still hunt, track if snow was good, watch funnels and travel corridors.

Opening morning I had selected the east side (walk in only) to scout and spent the first couple of hours checking locations for travel routes into the PDA, marking gps coordinates on crossings, cutlines and trails etc. I was looking for travel areas that if my knee gave out I would have a good spot to sit and watch. I found two areas with a number of travel routes that I wanted to take a better look at and started walking at about 9:30.

I started out making a big loop to get the wind right for the area I wanted to check out. There was very little snow and what was there was crunchy. There was a fair amount of old sign and a few fresh tracks once a person got away from the road. Spending a few hours walking edges, checking sight lines from a few rises above large basins and funnels a plan was starting to come together. I continued to slowly walk along edges and down cattle trails glassing. Coming to a location where my gps showed that were a few crossing locations on the PDA, I found a saddle on a long ridge coming down into a flat area which was leading east towards three ridges that were in the direction of the crossings into the PDA.

A few pictures taken on day 2 after it snowed overnight of the country that I was walking through.





12:30 -- I came to a good spot to stop with trees on my left, funnel in front, ridge ahead to my left that I could see a side hill, watch for a bit, have some water and lunch. Around 1 two big bull moose came out and walked along the side of the ridge to my left headed north. Watching them for a bit, they stopped and turned around looking towards the south. Then they turned and moved north a bit further, turned and looked back south again. I started watching the saddle started on the ridge (basically a lower area clear of brush) and a bull elk came over the ridge followed by three more.

The first elk came down and went into the basin. The other three bulls came down the funnel at a pretty fast trot and into the basin following a line towards one of the finger ridges on my right. At this time, I was up, behind a few trees and waiting for a shot opportunity. If they went on the north trail they would be out of range, centre trail they would be at about 150 yds, southern trail they would run over me.

The bull in the basin started on the north trail and the other three came down the centre trail. I was standing behind some scrub poplars with the wind from the elk to me. The lead bull was the biggest body by far and had what looked like the largest antlers. He was trotting and as I lifted my gun preparing for a shot on the last bull, he suddenly stopped broadside to me at what I later ranged as 130 yds. I had been watching him and the last bull that was lagging, walking slower, a little closer and more in the open. The lead bull stopping broadside to me, made the decision for a shot at him and I could hear the whoomph. Once the haze cleared the lead bull was walking off slowly with a bad limp from what looked like a broken front shoulder / leg on my side.

My reload cycle is slow and while reloading I watched all four elk walk over a small hill a little over 200 yards away. Reloaded I checked the area where he had been standing -- no snow all grass - no blood and no tracks. So, I go to the small hill and the tree I had marked where I had last seen them. By this time about 15 minutes had passed so I thought being quiet and going slow would not push him as he had looked to be hit pretty hard. Reloaded and going over the hill I found this. No blood around him or on the grass -- with a crease across the heart and no exit wound all of the blood was in the chest cavity.







Great feeling and then a realization that I was a long way from the truck. Checking the gps there was a cutline within 500 yds to the north. Vehicles can be used for pick up of game with guns having to be unloaded cased. Tagging, a quick clean up to let it cool down and then the long walk back to get the truck. Called the desk to let them know I was taking my vehicle down the line to pick up an animal, organize the sled and cutting gear and in for the hard part - the hunt (fun) was over quickly and much sooner than I had planned for. The elapsed time period from first seeing the elk to making a decision on a shot was very short.

As I could not get the full animal out before dark, I left the ribs and neck to come back to the next morning. Here is a picture from the next morning of the protection on the pieces left behind -- under my sled with rope, jacket on a tree and few hats on small bushes around the pile.



Going in to retrieve the remaining meat there were three hunters walking down the cutline so not being in any hurry I let them get out of sight. Once they were well past the kill site, I walked in to finish the clean up on the carcass and pulled the sled back to the cut line. By this time they had left the area which allowed me to drive down and pick up the gear without disturbing their hunt.

With fresh snow I cut 2 elk tracks within 100 yds of the remains and a small group of 3 /4 crossing the cutline. Would have be a great day for quiet tracking but I was done.

Here is a picture of the antlers --- funny looking rack with the bent fronts, curves and the right side.

Congratulations! Thanks for the write up!

congratulations. Beautiful bull and a great story.

good deal nice write up &pics .congrats

Great hunt and great bull. Thank you for the write up!

Congratulations, and thanks for sharing!

Excellent!

Waidmannsheil !!

Excellent!

Nice!

Nice, Very Nice!
Congratulations.
Buncha fine meals over the next year!

Heck of a deal Hugh, you're doing it the right way, enjoy your retirement, and many more hunting seasons Sir.

Nice Elk and great write-up, much appreciated.

It seems like exits on Muzzleloader Elk are the exception. I have never hunted Elk with a MZ but am considering for future hunts. I was planning on using the 290 TEZ. Not so sure now...

Tom the 290 T-EZ worked very well. I think the bullet deflected a bit before hitting the elk as I was shooting through some light bush. The impact was about 2 inches right of my aim point. Broke the front leg bone below the knee, centre punched through a rib, hit the heart and made it through to the underside of the hide on the opposite side. I think that a petal or two may have come off as there were a few other parts sliced up inside. I have used this bullet successfully on moose before and also a bison so no qualms on using it again for elk.

Good to know, Thanks for the follow up.

Awesome job and awesome write up!

Great report! Congrats on a very nice muzzy bull!

Nice bull on what sounds like an interesting hunt. Congratulations!

Thanks for the comments guys. This was an interesting hunt and I certainly was lucky in seeing elk the first day let alone in a position that allowed a shot with a muzzleloader. This was the only elk take on the 3 day muzzleloader season.

Certainly a hunt that I will try for again if father time as it creeps up allows me to. I think a couple of more tries in the future would be nice to get in. As this is a CWD zone we have to wait for test results for a bit longer before we can start having a few meals.

Stats for the overall hunt had 7 elk taken from the 50 tags available for resident hunters thru a draw and 3 more by FN. Unfortunately there were 5 taken by one group of folks that were in a PDA and ended up being confiscated.

Here is the picture of the sled that is not showing