My Winston creek cow tag is good until Friday, but I'm bagging it as of today and finishing up on some summer projects.
The DNR land that was open got pushed pretty good and moved some of the elk that I did find over into the closed off Weyerhaeuser other timber lands. In all fairness, I should say that I did see two elk. One small cow that I took a very bad shot at. Still kicking myself for a lack of professionalism on that one. She was 80+ yards in timber, quartering away after I pushed her out of a very thick hole. I knew there was brush in between us, but took the shot anyways. Well, after the smoke cleared she was still standing there just looking at me like "that's it?" and trotted off. I spent the next two hours on my hands and knees looking for any sign of hair or blood. Thankfully, I found neither. It was a clean miss and a well learned reminder that bullets are not dozers. They don't just cut down brush and stay true. I am very lucky that she did not get wounded. The second elk I found in another brush hole was a 4x4 bull at 30 yards with a good enough path to guarantee a good lung shot. My elk draw tag was antlerless only, so for the next 10 minutes I burned holes in the brush looking for any cows; found none. He was alone. After that, I pushed creek bottoms and alder thickets for another four days and never found another elk. I'm sure they could hear me a mile away in that dry woodland. I seem to have a gift of finding were they were last week. No bugling except for a couple of road hunters who I (even with my very bad hearing) could hear drive up to an old landing, slam the doors. talk for a while, bugle and stomp around then leave. At least they were easy to keep track of.
This dry weather hunting in the brush was a real learning experience for me. Normally, I'm drowning in rain, not getting a sun burn. I found tracking to be almost impossible on the hard baked ground beneath the underbrush. Droppings were the only real indicator of fresh sign that I could trust, but straightening out the trails was a real trick, and I used to archery hunt in my younger days. Several times I found foliage that I figured for being damaged last night, only to find fully completed spider webs a hundred yards later on the trail; so much for that. I was also surprised to find the elk were in singles, or cow calf pairs. I would have expected 4 to 12 like I have seen in other areas this time of year.
I may someday put in for a cow tag again, but never without another hunter or two. I know there are draws that I pushed that had elk in them, but by the time I cleared the thick bottoms they would be long gone. Another hunter or two could have been posted to help even the odds.
The last thing I was surprised to see was a lack of hunter orange. In fact, I was it as far as I saw. years ago when I archery hunted during the muzzloader / archery overlap there were two different times where I came out of the brush only to find a muzzleloader lowering his gun off of me
. Last Sunday, I crossed paths with someone who at 11:00am was driving the roads looking for elk or deer. He had an open bottle of Jack Daniels that was clearly missing some of it's contents, a scoped rifle and a gray colored pitbull dog. He asked where the elk were. He said he had drove down from Lakewood to shoot an elk and make a day of it. I pointed out that this area was muzzleloader only he only said "so?". I ended the conversation by saying if he had other game questions, there was a game warden at a game check station just another half a mile down the road who he could ask. The driver remembered he had to go somewhere else, did a U-turn and left quickly. I had no cell signal, so I could not call it in. Had he saw some brown motion in the brush, I have no doubt he would have taken a shot or two. He was in no condition to drive let alone shoot a gun. Another reminder to wear orange during hunting season.
Hope to hear others did better than I did.
