I have an opportunity to hunt cow elk and the group I am with will also be hunting bull elk this fall. We cannot start hunting until Oct 27, which is typically post rut where I hunt. Does anyone have any tips or suggestions that will increase the chances of success?

Find their refuges

If you already have snow when your hunt comes, and elk have migrated, they can be patterned just like whitetails. There are even resident elk that live in lowlands all year that can be patterned.

I killed a big cow last night because I had watched them cross from public to private all summer. Sometimes they can be very predictable. This is assuming you have been able to scout properly.

FInd a good spot to watch along game trails, ridge crossings and hunker down. Let the other guys move the animals and take them when they come your way.

Hit them when you shoot at them.

Hunt where the elk are - something that is oft overlooked.

captaincanuck:

Here's an article that I wrote to respond to questions like yours.


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 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.

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.

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.

It�s valuable when learning to hunt elk to go with the attitude that killing a cow would be great. The big bulls will come in time, after you�ve educated yourself.

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.

By late October the rut will be over and elk will be responding to hunting pressure more than anything else. They hide in sanctuaries, usually very remote wilderness or on private property. Learn where the sanctuaries are located and which routes they will use when they begin to filter out of the sanctuaries and back onto huntable land. Then setup an ambush on the exit routes.

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

Most Western hunters are not going to tell you where their honey holes are. You're going to have to find your own spot. But there's lots of info available and if you do your home work, you might be able to find a good place to start. If you want to hunt in Colorado, here's how to locate an area.

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, look on the CO DOW big game web page for the recap of preference points required to get a license in limited draw units. http://wildlife.state.co.us/Hunting/BigGame/Statistics/ 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.

Finally, go to the interactive game management unit maps. http://wildlife.state.co.us/Hunting/GMUnitMaps.htm They contain 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. You can buy this info in a CD that�s a little more user-friendly. http://wildlife.state.co.us/wildlifestore

If you want to put in for the computer draw, here's a link that gives draw expectations. http://huntodds.monstermuleys.com/

I hope this helps. Good luck and safe hunting.

KC Keen

Really good advice!

Thanks for the thorough, detailed and concise advice. should help in my hunt and preparations.

Wow, great article.

KC,

That's got to be the 5th or 6th time I've read that article and I both learn and enjoy it each time. I even have it saved on my computer somewhere for referencing. Thanks.

68W

68W:

Yeah, it seems easier to write one article and save it than write a new long article evey time someone asks the same question. I try to improve on it each time that I re-post.

KC

KC,

Did you write that article originally for pulishment? If so, who do you write for? I'd read more of your work on elk hunting if there is any to be read. I'm just trying to self teach myself and your advice always seems to be understandable and down to earth helpful. My hunt opens 15 Oct, definately post-rut, I'm trying like hell right now to sneak time in between 2 jobs, full time school, national guard duties, and a family to locate some elk. I am optimistic for this years chances. Any and all tactics and advice are welcome.

68W

Are their any types of calls that may get a response around late october to early nov?

68W:

I write for the fun of it. The only things that I've had published are some articles regarding mountaineering that appeared a couple of decades ago in the CMC magazine Trail & Timberline.

Are you the guy from the Frazier/Winter Park area?

KC

machinistbutler:

The only call that I carry during the post rut period is a cow call. Once I had a bull nearly run me over, after just a couple of squeeks.

KC

KC,

No I'm not from that area, I go to Utah State Univ. but am still enjoying ID residency, as that is where I grew up, so I jump the border just a few miles north of me to do my hunting. Elk opens in 4 weeks...you have an open invitation in my one-man camp. Take care.

68W

[/quote]

KC,

No I'm not from that area, I go to Utah State Univ. but am still enjoying ID residency, as that is where I grew up, so I jump the border just a few miles north of me to do my hunting. Elk opens in 4 weeks...you have an open invitation in my one-man camp. Take care.

68W [/quote]

68W:

Thanks for the invite. I have a pretty full hunting schedule already this year. Maybe next year. Let's keep in touch.

KC

What is the general consensus of scents post rut?

Good thing you hunt so you don't have to watch their football team. I went to Idaho. For years, UI and USU have fought it out for the basement.

As a former Aggie I should be insulted by that statement. But as a former Aggie, I also know how true it is...

I can take it. Its currently deserved. On that thought though I do honestly believe that the current coach, Gary Anderson, in his 2nd season is affecting a very positive change in that team. Certainly can't go from where they've been to the status of Utah (where Anderson was the defensive coordinator their Fiesta Bowl season) or Boise St. in one year but there is an attitude change around the team...they are starting to believe they can compete. Its a great place to live and go to school. The access to the mountains and rivers is tough to beat while still living in a small city. take care all.