Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting i fought the elk..................

..........and the elk won.........after two weekends of hunting and not finding an elk for my fiance'(Darla) i have about given up. i was told "Theres 30 head of elk back behind the Burke Ranch" BS!!!!!!!!! we hiked back there twice from two different dirctions one muley buck and a couple does....no elk. "go out on Timber crick at first light, theres a bunch down there" BS!!!!!! we were in there twice at day break, just some mulies. better than last weekend though, the weather refused to co-operate; 35 mph winds on Saturday and a cold front moving through on Sunday plus every one we talked to after we mentioned we were after a cow elk started out "Well about a half hour ago one trotted right through here.............." we heard this 5 times in 5 completly different areas!!!!

so i have come up with 2 things after this weekend: elk can cover more ground than i can and anyone who packs a 9.5 pound rifle through country like that is either crazy or is a much better man than I.

the best offer we had and we are still kicking ourselves for not taking it is a guy that hinted that if we went in and packed out the front quarters and backstraps of the elk he shot a mile back in hills we would have more than likly gotten to keep them. we should have negotiated and packed it out.

i think my 416 Taylor project is going on hold and a light wieght 260 or 7-08 is going to take its place. well maybe we will find an elk this next weekend.

Rattler

I know the feeling. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />
DAL

One thing about elk hunting. You can kill one the 1st day or last day of the hunt. Many times, if they are not there at 1st, they move in later.

yeah i know the 2 groups weve been sorta chasing are moving quite a bit. going from the sign we are always a day or so behind them. oh well, 2 weekends left and one is a long one.

I feel your pain. Or maybe it's my own, it's hard to tell...
I like to say that one of my special talents is hunting where elk used to be. I've gotten quite good at it!

Sometimes we win, sometimes they win. When I would come home empty handed my father would say-Once again deer have proved to be smarter than man. Keep after them.

i spent the weekend hauling around for the most part an accurate as hell Ruger MKII in 6mm remington for mulies that belongs to my future father in law im trying on figuring a way to steal it and get a decent trigger in it. i didnt care for 6mms to much till i got my hands on that one. Darla was hauling around my 1895G in 45/70 both of which are in the neighborhood of 8.5 pounds scoped, loaded and ready to go. both of us agree we should be looking into a pair of nice light rifles in the 260-7mm08 range for packing over those hills, coulees and washouts. my 9 pound rifles are fine in the crick bottoms, i dont even notice their wieght but once the country gets steep the flat out SUCK!! also after this weekend i am a firm believer that noone should be hunting very far back in that country alone. we had a couple close calls scrampling up and down some sandstome boulders going up sides of some extreamly nastey and steep coulees where had one of us been alone and the worsed happened that would be the end of it.

When hunting elk I often have to remind my partners with the following, "No pansies allowed". Rufous.

What I love most about Elk hunting is how smart and crafty those beasts are. I revere the things and it is funny how nonhunters cannot begin to appreciate them the way you will after chasing them around in the mountains.

I took my wife out scouting (she regarded it as hiking) a few years ago and we hit this meadow that is @ 10,200 ft and jumped 2 Bulls. It was about 10 am in a pouring rainstorm and those bulls were really surprised to see us. They took off running at full tilt and then ran up a 45 degree, loose rocky slope into the talus like it was level ground. All my wife could say was "Oh my God".

They are awesome.

well the elk officially won. Darla didnt get one. a combination of no 4 wheel drive and heavy hunting preassure didnt help. but she is happy, she saw 3 cows in her district, within range but couldnt get a shot do to the timber being to thick. she practically stepped on them at 50 feet away but they disappeared into some thick stuff before she could get a shot off. had it not rained and snowed so much last Thursday and Friday she might of had another chance but with the 4 wheel drive not working in her new truck it was kind of hard to get her down it to some of the better places. boy did the guy who sold her the truck get a tongue lashing <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" /> but she is happy she wasnt completly skunked and is already trying to plan next years trip and its what 8 months till the next elk tag drawing? it was a fun hunting season though.

Rattler

Rattler:

As for the rifle, try a BLR in 308 WIn. Very Light and handy for those treks up and down hills. The 308 will do anything a 30-06 will do with good bullets.

Good Hunting,

BMT

I second BMT on .308. The others are maybe abit light on animals the size of elk. Won't weigh any more, or recoil much more.

Without knowing your specific circumstances, it sounds to me like you may be depending too much on mechanization. Do some map work, find some areas 2 or 3 miles from anywhere 4X4 or 4-wheelers can get to. You have just spent a whole season not getting into animals. Isn't spending a couple days and some sweat equity packing meat a better deal?

Good luck.

The BLR in 358 - I also built a 4 pound 358X44 T/C Carbine for the real tough to climb places. Remeber where ever they were, they will come back to. Probably not while you are there, and the thicker the cover the better for finding em, and the better for them when you find em.

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