Archery288,
You were spot on as well. I saw a small herd with two branched antlered bulls in one of the areas you described but they were on private land so I had to just watch from across the road.
The hunt well set the alarm for 3:40am and hit the rack. Woke up at 530 and said S__T. Got going quick since it was an hour plus drive. As I was driving to the area I saw the first small herd of elk on private land. I sat and watched them for a short while but I was running real late. So I drove around a bit more and found an area I thought I would hike in at a gate. Although I had the code for the gate I figured some exercise would be good. About a mile in I/we came into two clearcuts one of each side of the road. We saw a big pile of old logs and thought it would be a good lookout to do some glassing. As my nephew (15) started climbing up I turned around and saw a herd of about 10 heading out way a couple of hundred yards out. THey were already alerted to us and had stopped. I tried to get my nephew to stay put but he was too excited which caused the elk to turn around and head back up the road. I quickly manuvered to a stump about 20 yards away to rest my rifle on. There was no way to make this 200 yard shot standing. As I came to a rest I didnt have time to range the elk so I figured 200 yards and put the cross hairs high shoulder. The second to last elk, all cows had stopped and turned broadside to check us out. BOOM! It looked as if she limped some and the elk went into the trees.
I didnt feel great about the shot so we waited 20 minutes before going up to track. I was able to range the elk which showed they were 300 yards out. I felt a little worse then. When we got to where they were standing I didnt see any blood we walked the direction they went and found a small drop in first picture. The blood never got much better than an occasional drop or two. After about 40 yards we found her piled up. We got to skin and quarter the elk and by noon we were ready to pack out. I wasnt positive I had the gate code for the gate I parked at so we each packed out a quarter. When we got to the gate we unloaded out packs and I found that I did have the code to the gate. SO we drove in and picked up the other half, plus. We saw another herd of about 17 elk two bulls I think both spikes in the same area. Loaded up the truck and took off. Dropped the meat off at butcher's to hang. I will butcher her in a few days. I decided to go rifle because my nephe, who I just got into hunting has never shot anything, or been with me when I did, so it was well worth it.
