HammerTime Bagley:
The first respondents have given you good advice. DIY hunts are the most satisfying. Remember even that high priced outfitter can't guarantee that you will kill an elk. Go for the fun of camping, for the pure joy of seeing the sunset over the Rocky Mountains, for the adventure and the comraderie. If you get an elk that's icing on the cake.
But don't expect to kill a big bull on the first trip. The way to learn how to hunt elk is to start by hunting for cow elk. Pick an area and stick with it year after year. When you know your hunting area like your back yard, that's when you will start being successful.
Here's an article that that tells you how to do it.
ELK HUNTING SUCCESS
I get an elk every year. Sometimes I get both a cow and a bull. My hunting buddies rarely get an elk and one guy asked me why. I replied that there are no secrets to hunting elk. You already know what you have to do to be successful. But most people won't or can't do what it takes to be successful.
You have to hunt throughout the entire year. You should be engaged in something relating to hunting all the time; reading, studying, gear maintenance, shooting, scouting, etc.
You have to hunt every day of the entire season. You should arrive at camp no later than the day before opening day and don't leave until the day after the last day of the season. You can't expect to be successful if you hunt on just the weekend or if you hunt for just part of the season.
You have to hunt all day. The most productive times to hunt are just after dawn and just before sunset. So if you want to hunt during those times you have to do most of your hiking to and from the truck, in the dark. Stay in the field for the entire day. Don't go back to camp for lunch.
You have to hunt the places that others won't or can't. Get away from the roads and hunt in the mean nasty hollows, where it's hard to get into and hard to get out of.
You have to learn to think like an elk. Pretend that you are an elk and you know that hunters are trying to kill you. Then go to the places and do the things that you need to do to avoid getting killed. That's how you find elk.
Hunt where the elk are. 75% of the elk live in 25% of the available suitable habitat. You need to find out where that 25% area is and spend your time there.
Once you've committed to do all that, you can employ the following strategies.
ELK HUNTING STRATEGIES
Rule#1: Be safe with your rifle. Assume that any firearm is loaded unless the breech is open and you can see that it's empty. Always point the muzzle in a safe direction and never point your rifle at anything unless you intend to shoot it. Don't rely on the safety. Carry your rifle with the chamber empty and the safety on. Don't chamber a round until you spot a target. Never shoot at a target unless you are sure what it is, sure you can hit it and sure of what's behind it.
Rule #2: Be proficient with your rifle. Always make a clean, quick, humane kill. In order to do this you must be proficient with your rifle. No matter how good you have been in the past, you need to practice several times each summer to ensure that you are current. Don't just sight in your rifle. You must practice to ensure that your rhythm is smooth and habitual and you can hit what you aim at. Practice at 200 yards and 300 yards so that you can determine in the field, if you should take that shot. Also, get off the bench and practice in the prone position resting your rifle on a daypack and also in the sitting position. There never seems to be a bench rest in the field just where you want it.
Guideline #1: Be in good shape. Altitude sickness is a real concern in the mountains. You need to be in good cardio/vascular condition to deal with it. Also, everyone must do their share and you can't do that if you can't hike the hills, and haul out your share of the game, collect firewood, carry water, setup & break down camp, etc. If you are in bad physical condition, then you will be miserable and you will not enjoy the adventure. It's really endurance breathing that you need to develop before you arrive at high elevation. Bicycling, climbing stairs, swimming and high altitude hiking are excellent exercises for this purpose. Also drink lots of liquids in order to minimize the effects of dehydration and Acute Mountain Sickness. By the way, alcohol and caffeine are not good liquids to drinks because they are diuretics and you will end up even more dehydrated.
Guideline #2: Scout, Scout, Scout. You need to know your hunting area like your back yard. Don�t expect to travel to Colorado and be successful the first year. Pick an area and hunt that same area year after year. That�s how to get to know your hunting grounds. Take several camping/hiking trips and several backpack trips into your hunting area each summer. Know where their winter range is, where their summer range is and where the migration routes are that connect the two. Know where the game trails are concentrated crossing saddles on ridges, where the bedding areas are, where the water holes are, where the hideouts are. Take a couple of long hikes where you expect to find game, just before the season opens.
Buy US Forest Service maps, USGS maps, county maps and BLM maps of your area. These maps contain different information. Copy this information onto the USGS maps. You can only reasonably hunt the area on one USGS 7.5' map. But as luck would have it, the best hunting area is usually where several maps come together. Tape the maps together. Memorize your map. Update it with field data from your scouting trips. You now have a map containing information in a way that no one else has.
Guideline #3: Hunt where the elk are: Seventy-five percent (75%) of the elk live in twenty-five percent (25%) of the available habitat. You can waste a lot of time hunting unproductively in an area where there is always some thin sign but never enough sign to indicate the presence of a large herd. Sure there�s the off chance that by pure dumb luck you might encounter a lonesome elk and every year someone gets lucky and fills their tag that way. But your best probability of success will be in the vicinity of the large herds. You scouting goal is to discover where that 25% hotbed is located. When you find that area it�s hard to miss. It will stink with elk musk and urine, there will be heavily used game trails in every direction, the grass will be cropped short, there will be lots fresh elk droppings and you can hear elk scurrying away just beyond in the trees.
Guideline #4: Hunt the right elevation for the migration: Elk accomplish an annual migration, spending the summer at higher elevation and spending the winter in some sheltered place, usually at lower elevation. In Colorado's 1st and 2nd rifle season, most elk will be found at higher elevations in mixed aspen/evergreen groves, with lots of grass and forbs for food. They can travel a long way for water. Look for them to start moving down their migration routes in the 3rd season.
Elk will wait as long as they can before being forced to migrate by bad weather. They will go back up if it warms. So if weather in the 3rd season is warm and dry, then look for them up high. Mule deer will migrate sooner and faster than elk. One day of really bad weather and deep snow, will result in lots of deer in the sage where the day before there wasn't an animal to be found. Deer usually stay down once they have migrated. In the late seasons elk can often be found in rancher�s pastures.
When the weather is warm, there will always be a few elk spread out throughout their entire range. So the population density (elk/square mile) is less dense and your chance of bumping into an elk is low. I hunt the 3rd rifle season and hope for heavy snow and bad weather to drive them out of the high country. They will concentrate in the foothills, at the bottom of the snow line. Since they are concentrated, the population density is higher and your chance of seeing an elk is improved.
Guideline #5: Use hunting pressure to your advantage. I hunt an area on opening morning where there is good vehicle access and lots of other hunters. I hunt in the places where I think the animals will run to avoid the opening day hunters. Most hunters will stay within a mile or so of a road. A few others will horse pack in five miles, usually more. So it's good to get back in 2 or 3 miles before the sun comes up and hunt the in-between areas.
Guideline #6: Hunt bedding areas at dawn. Elk like to bed down in isolated, gently sloping groves of mixed aspen/evergreens with lots of grass and forbs for food. They can travel a long way for water. Isolated means someplace where it�s difficult for people to access. Find several places like this when you go scouting. Hike in the dark to arrive at an overlook before the sun comes up and wait to see what comes out of the grove.
Guideline #7: Hunt the ridges at midday. Setup overlooking a saddle on a ridge where game trails are concentrated and wait to see what walks by. This takes lots of patience and works best if you have somebody stealth hunting through the dark timber to get the animals moving.
Guideline #8: Hunt the water holes in the afternoon. Find some isolated water source, maybe the highest place where a creek first starts coming out of the ground. Setup concealed from view, with a good field of fire 100 to 200 yards away, at least 3 hours before sunset, and wait to see what comes to drink. Wait until the very last shooting light is gone before going back to camp. I have field dressed a lot of animals in the dark using a flashlight.
Guideline #9: Hunt the hideouts late in the season. Elk know that someone is trying to kill them as soon as the first shot is fired. So they run and hide in the most inaccessible terrain around. Find some cozy little pocket surrounded by the meanest, nastiest country around; a place where it looks like there's no way that an elk could get in there; a place where you would hate to get an animal down because you would hate to have to haul him out. That's where the elk will be and that's where you should be (and where I will be) late in the season.
Guideline #10: Be persistent. You can't catch fish unless you have your bait in the water and you can't find an elk unless you are in the field looking for them. They're not going to walk up and surrender themselves to you. You have to find them. That's why they call it hunting and not killing. Many hunters give up after a couple of unsuccessful days and go home. Be prepared to stay the entire length of the season and to endure whatever fatigue and weather, you may encounter. Hunt an area for several days and if you don't find anything promising, then try a different strategy or different area, but don't give up.
Guideline #11: Be patient. Human beings are noisy, stinky creatures. Our dominant sense is our vision. The elk's best senses are their smell and hearing. Their vision is motion sensitive and they can't see colors. Many young hunters spend lots of time hiking and covering a lot of ground and wonder why they never see any animals. You should spend most of your time sitting quietly and watching. You should hike slowly and quietly and most of your hiking should be in the dark.
PICKING A HUNTING AREA
So am I going to tell you where my "honey holes" are? Of course not. I've work hard and spent many years to find them and I'm not going to reveal them to anyone but my best friends. You're going to have to find your own spots. But there's lots of info on the DOW web site and if you do your home work, you might be able to find a good place to start.
Get a copy of a road map of Colorado that indicates which land is public. Compare that to the map of game management units in the Colorado Big Game Hunting brochure. Look for units with lots of public land.
Next, buy a subscription to Colorado Outdoors magazine. The March/April issue includes a recap of preference points required to get a license in limited draw units. There are more licenses offered than there are applicants in those units that require zero points. Those are places where game populations are at or above management objectives. Look for units which require zero points and have lots of public land.
Update February 2009. I noticed that there�s a listing of minimum required preference points on the DOW web site now. So you no longer have to buy the magazine subscription to get the list.
Finally, you should buy a copy of the CO DOW Big Game CD. It contains maps of winter ranges, calving areas and summer ranges in each GMU. With all that info, you ought to be able to pick an area where there are lots of elk and lots of public land. And then you should be able to determine where they are in summer, where their winter range is, the most likely routes that they use to get from one area to the other, and therefore where they are most likely to be during hunting season,,
Here�s a link to the on-line store where you can purchase the CD and the subscription.
http://wildlife.state.co.us/wildlifestoreGood luck and safe hunting.
KC
