Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Colorado unit 441 elk hunt

My old hunting pard slymule and I arrived at the campsite mid-afternoon Friday the 4th. The temp was in the 50's and no snow on the ground but with the threat of snow coming in early Saturday morning. We set up camp and tended to the mules. The forecasters were correct in their prediction of snow. Saturday morning we had 4"-5" at camp and 8"-10" up the mountain a ways.



The first day of hunting we saw only 6 head of cows we jumped from their beds. Day two consisted of one lone set of elk tracks leading uphill into dark timber, I followed them a little ways but could tell this was going to be futile. Day three took us a different direction. We hiked off at first light into promising looking country. After a mile or so back in we cut tracks freshly left by a fair sized herd, 20+ we were guessing. Less than a 1/4 mile later as we opened up out of the aspen below us 150yds I spotted a cow bedded in a meadow just above a small pond. We were walking through chest-high oak brush and she did not spot us. With a little glassing we were able to pick out half a dozen more cows that were bedded a little further back in the quakies. We edged further up the trail to a better vantage point on a little knoll. We were belly crawling part of the way as the oak brush thinned down a bit. From the knoll we were able to stand full upright again behind chest high oak brush. By now we were seeing the better part of 20 elk, but no antlers. After a minute or so back in the quakies a bit I see a particular elk walking towards an open area and he's rolling his head back and forth as bulls do. After a short whispered discussion on whether he had enough points to be legal...it was decided he was. I picked out a lane and he slowly walked into it. The shot was offhand at what we both estimated to be 175yds, the bull was quartering slightly towards me. The bullet entered his neck just forward his shoulder and he dropped like he'd been hit with a hammer. I jacked in another round as 40+/- cows came out of the quakies and lined up and slow trotted right in front of us and straight up to the trail in front of us, over the top and out of sight. Only one bull in the herd, and he was now dead.



This picture shows where we were standing halfway up the hill in the background.



I'd forgot to bring the camera so we just opened him up and went back to camp. We were 1.5 miles per GPS from the trailhead, likely 2 miles as the trail winds.

The following day we rode the mules in.





We boned him out and estimated the young bull netted about 220lbs of meat. This was loaded up on one mule and slymule rode the other leading the now pack mule. I had a good hike back carrying the antlers.



We had a great time. It's been a number of years since I've been able to get done with harvest early enough to do an elk hunt. There were supposed to be a couple other guys going but they backed out the last week so it was just the two of us with me holding the only tag.

[img]http://i212.photobucket.com/albums/cc309/scottscritters/064.jpg[/img]

Well done, and great pictures. Congratulations!

Nice congrats.. Somewhere near Rabbit ears pass??

What a neat experience--great pics too!

I thought it was funny that your handle is muleshoe, your partner is slymule, and the very first pic is of two mules. But, what else should I have expected?!

Great job!

Good to see others using mules. Nice looking ones too. Looks like the country north of Hayden.

The weather stumped quite a few hunters this year. Dry and warm the 1st part of 2nd season and then the threat of snow drove alot of hunters out mid week. Then that snow on Sat the 3rd season hampered some.

Nothing like the day after snow that makes the elk hunting great.

Congrats on a fine animal. I pulled a raghorn 5X5 out of 441 the second day of third rifle. No where near as nice as yours.

Congratulations on a nice bull! Looks like great conditions and a fun hunt. Thanks for sharing the pictures.

Bingo.....north of Hayden.

That sure looks like some fine country - congrats on a nice bull.

Almost forgot...

The rifle is a common m700 7mmRM in a McMillan Edge stock. The round was a home rolled 160gr Accubond on top of a fair amount of 7828 leaving roughly at a trace over 3000fps. At first inspection I was not too impressed with the bullet's performance from lack of an exit. But upon boning the elk we found the bullet first hit a near baseball size vertebrae smashing it into many pieces on it's way into and breaking the large bone in the off side shoulder. Not sure where the A-bomb ended up as we couldn't locate it. It might of somehow got lost in the chest cavity.

Nothin like elk heart, eggs, and taters for breakfast.

Thanks for the kind words, it was a fun hunt.

Congrats on a fine hunt! Well done.

Great bull and pictures. Thanks for sharing!


ddj

Looks like a great time...beautiful pics, really like hunting that kind of country.

Very nice! I especially like the country there, the see-through aspens. How do I always end up in a 20-foot visibility thickets?..