A week in the mountains...

[Hornseeker]

this is a long story, skip through, read it whole, whatever…I enjoyed writing it, recalling all the events and feelings that occurred last week, but I don’t expect that many of you will want to read the whole dang thing word for word! Enjoy what you can

Elk Hunting… I look soooo forward to this trip every year, 7-9 days out in the hills, bustin ass, chasing bulls, good buddies, cool clean air, hard ground, campfire smoke, sore back, howlin dogs (feet), autumn colors, smelly elk, and bugles… Then…after a years anticipation…its here…then its gone!!! OH THE HUMANITY!!
Me hiking into some helle-elk-country


I missed my girls like crazy…always do, but there is something about these trips that just makes you want to stay in the hills forever…not an option…and that’s fine….but man on man….
 
Well..I picked Chris up at the the airport in West Yellowstone at 6:15 pm on Saturday. We made 2 quick stops in town then headed to the trailhead. At 8:00 we were getting our packs topped off and making sure the batteries in our headlamps were charged. All was ready…except..holy crap, I cant find my glove! You’ve got to be kidding me. I have enough gear in my truck to stay at this camp till at least February, but I forgot my glove! No stress, I have my tab, just a couple arrows through to make sure it doesn’t effect my POI. (all was well…dead on…I just don’t like hiking around with a tab on versus a glove..not conducive to climbing brushy slopes and fidgeting with calls and such)…

Off we go. The moon was bright enough, unfortunately, that there was no need for lights. Moonlight can sure make a small bush or tree look like a sasquatch or grizzly bear as you catch it out the corner of your eye…but as many trips as I”ve done into this place, dark and light, I knew there wasn’t anything to worry about….still had to catch my breath a time or two after spying a dark shadow in my peripheral :0)
Fall is Here!!


Ahhh…1 hour 45 minutes…camp. Camp is a fairly flat spot right on the edge of a really nice, clean little creek that gushes out of a series of springs in the mile of canyon above us. There are a few wallows on those springs, but in 4 years of guzzling down gallons of the unfiltered water, I am willing to pay the price when I have to. Just too yummy and convenient to have to filter it!! 15 minutes in the dark and the tarp and bags are set up…morning will come early, its nearly Midnight. No bugles yet, but that’s not uncommon, I rarely hear a bugle from this camp, but a guy can usually walk 200-400 yards in any direction at first light and hear a bull calling nearby…its heaven on earth if you ask me. Up one hill 12 minutes and you are overlooking Lost Canyon, where you will normally have 3-7 bulls bugling at light…up the other hill about 17 minutes walk and you are listening down into Grizzly Gulch….sometimes its Teaming with bugles…others its quiet. You are camped at the base of Red Hill…where massive elk trails Criss Cross the slope into and out of bedding areas, where bulls will bugle at noon during their mid-day stretch…
A simple, but effective camp...


Well, as anxious as I was to get after elk, Chris, my buddy from CA that came up to spend the week with us, was Beat from traveling AND I couldn’t figure out where Andrew and Pat were. I thought they’d have their camp set up already, but there was no trace. It led me to believe that they stayed in Coal Creek cause the hunting was unreal or they nocked something down and were working on getting it out (Pat and Andrew had been hunting since Wednesday afternoon).. So, in the morn, we slept in to about light 30, then got up and hunted our way back towards the trucks and Coal Creek, to see if we could locate those guys. I knew it wouldn’t be the best way to get a bull, but first things first. The day got hot real fast and after determining there was no way I’d find them, we headed back towards camp via a longcut through Black Canyon, where we napped near the creek for about 3 hours…half heartedly cow calling to see if we could rile something from its bed. Nothing. About 4 O’Clock we got up and started pushing towards “the lake” where there were some big meadows with a couple bedding areas adjacent to them. As I was heading up a maintained trail I caught a glimpse of something coming round the bend behind us… dang it…more hunters. I then rounded a corner and here are 4 wall tents set up with fire wood stacked up around each one. No hunters though. Outfitter had them set up for later, maybe even rifle season…not sure. We sat down on a bench near the tents to await the other hunters and see where they planned to hunt so we wouldn’t be bumping into them. Around the bend they came…it was Andrew and Pat! Wild coincidence…In about 40 square miles of area, we ended up in the same spot at the same time, with no prior arrangements! The stars were aligning!
Camp Creek...its been over a week and I'm not sick yet! :0))


That evening we, who are all expert map readers and orienteers….basically could not figure out where the hell the lake was! It was wild. With a good topo and a GPS we were stumped! Oh well…there was a bull bugling on the ridge above, so lets just head that way! It got dark before we could ever get to him, but he liked to answer. So at camp that night, after Andrew and Pat recapped their previous 4 days of hunting Coal Creek (good stuff) we decided one group of us needed to hit Grizzly Gulch and the ridge the bull was bugling on tonight, while another would hit Lost Canyon, then work their way to the treestands over Frank’s Bog (actually a wallow created by a fictitious bull named Frank…Long story :0))
"Franks Bog"


Chris and I worked Lost Canyon and the treestands while Pat and Andy headed to Grizzly Gulch. Lost Canyon didn’t disappoint, we had at least 3, likely 4, but possibly 5 bulls bugling at us (it gets hard to tell after 3, especially if they are close together and not bugling too often). I had Chris stay back and gently rub a tree with a stick while I tried to sneak in on the closest of the group. Something I haven’t mentioned yet, which had a large impact on my hunting all week, was the dangerously dry conditions and the ridiculously loud stalking conditions. It is no exaggeration to say that you were walking on cornflakes or rice crispies…only magnify that by about 2-3 times! Anyhow, this bull wouldn’t come in and the rest of them were becoming distant and rare buglers as the sun climbed the sky. Its cool…first real day of hunting, we’ve got time.

That afternoon we were sitting in the treestands by 2:30, actually “situated” and ready to go by 3:00. I told Chris, “I’ll give a cow call about 3:30 to see if that helps bring something in”…24 minutes later I looked up and snaking through the timber, directly down the trail that winds 7 yards past the stand, is “Lucky”… he’s a 5 point on the right and a gnarled ball with 2 points on the left. He was coming like a robot and I thought, “dang, my first bow bull is going to be a retard…oh well!” I took some deep breaths, got my tab on the string and watched as he stopped at 30 yards, head on, to take a gander to make sure Frank or one of his big buddies weren’t using the bog at the time All was clear, he took a step forward and WHOOOOSH a massive gust of wind (15mph from dead calm)  blew directly to him from us… that was the end of that… We sat till dark, hearing bugles 400 yards away, but nothing showing itself… the walk back to camp in the dark was fine… I was content with the day, things would only get better!
In the stand


When we got back to camp it was cold and dark, no Andrew or Pat. I looked at Chris and said, “well, since they aren’t back, they either got sucked deep into Grizzly Gulch by a whord of buglers and are working their way out still…. Or they killed something and are working it up”… About 45 minutes later, 9:15 or so, the headlamps come bouncing down the trail. I ask them how the day was and they exclaim, “Great”… “We saw tons of cool stuff today!” “Did you hear anything??” “Oh yeah, lots of bugles, check out the pics we got!”, they say. So Andrew busts out his cam and starts scrolling through some pics, Pat standing with the lake in the background, Pat set up and blending in with his camo, a rock bluff over looking a nice canyon, a wallow… and then, “here’s me with my bull!” Sweet, Andrew nocked over his first bull with a bow! Down in Grizzly Gulch too! Scroll, scroll, “and…here’s Pat with his bull!”

No WAY! Doubler! They killed both bulls in about 8 minutes from the same setup…not to mention they didn’t kill the first bull  that came in, Andrew hit a branch on a shot at a cow, and after the 2nd one was down…a dang nice 6 point came in!! 4 bulls came into the same setup in 15 minutes or so! WOW!
Andrew's First Archery Bull!


Andrew drilled his at 7 yards and it went 70 yards and piled up. Pat pulled his shot and was very disappointed, a 25 yarder….he THOUGHT in the guts. Well, they left him to sit while they worked Andrews bull up, then went to track Pats bull 2 ½ hours later. Andrew found a bunch of blood! Wow…blood everwhere…100 yards later, dead bull! Well…long story short, Pat got lucky like we all wish we could a time or two, and hit the Fem…bled him right out! 1st Big Game bow kill! Congrats to Pat and Andrew!
Pats NICE 5 Point!


After hearing the stories around the campfire and sharing the few bud lights we brought in, the sobering reality of the work ahead set in! Grizzly Gulch was one spot I always dreaded killing a bull in! I”ll skip the details, other than, Tuesday morning we were on our way well before light, we tried to call a bull into me right at light, then proceeded to Pat’s bull. Andrew, Chris and I packed Pat’s bull 4 hours 20 minutes to a road that Pat drove around to, 4 hours 40 minutes! To get us… THEN…Andrew showed some major sac and hiked 2 and ½ hours back to his bull with Pat, while Chris and I drove around to the trailhead with Pat’s bull… then He and Pat packed Andrew’s entire bull back to our camp! OUCH.. lastly, they spent the entire day the next day, Wednesday, packing the bull to the truck and finally came in Wed night to spend one last night with us! Every pound of meat multiplied by every mile = YUM YUM! Tastier by the mile!
Up and Adam...O'Dark:30


Pickin up the meat the next morn!

Chris salvaged the neck meat using his Nepalese Gerka knife!


Loaded up and headed out...90+ pounds each...


While they were packing meat, Chris and I sat most the day in the treestand. Very uneventful. A spiked walked around for about 10 minutes but never got closer than 65 yards.
Mr. Spike


Another view from the stand...


And another...


We heard bugles galore back on the bench to the west, so finally we succumbed and went bugle chasing! Weird thing was, about 20 minutes before dark the bugles shut up…just when they usually get fired up real good. Hmmmm…. We kept giving searching bugles and a random cow call, heading towards where I knew the elk were, when I caught movement…it was a hunter stalking in on me! We waved at eachother and met up. 2 dudes with a guide. The hunters were real friendly, introducing themselves and asking me if that was one of them “black widows”…hehehe…. Nope, not a widder I said… funny. They were good dudes. The guide never said a word and never cracked a smile. I wanted to ask him why he was setting up on me directly up wind, but thought I’d hold back… oh well. I knew why the elk shut up anyways…

We then began trucking full speed back to camp…might as well get as much of it out of the way in the light as we can. I don’t mind hiking in the dark, but there was no reason to be in the upper basin any longer that evening. The cool part was, as we were just about down to the creek, we heard a good bugle. Light was very marginal, but I figured if I could get to 15 yards or less I could still make a confident shot! We finally got to the edge of a park and I could barely make out some tan forms across the creek 100 yards away. 7 cows and a nice 320 bull with sweeping mains and a long, ivory sword! Oh man…visions of him can keep me going for days! He would answer every call I gave, and answer it with attitude, but alas…he had NO INTENT of coming in, he already had ALL he needed!
Headin down the hill


Back to camp to meet the slayers for their last night in camp…oh sweet, they brought more bud light in!  AND…before they hauled out the last of the meat I snatched a 3 pound chunk of back strap. Had it all steaked up and ready to go when they rolled into camp. Roast backstrap over a fire with a couple budlights, 5 miles from your truck at 8200 feet with 3 great guys…. Well… it doesn’t get any better than that!

Thursday morn…up again at 5:00, only a 12 minute walk up the hill to the ridge above Lost Canyon and Big Bull Bed. Things would be shaking up there…I knew we’d be in elk right away. After some NICE hot coffee we headed up the hill. Standing in the darkness on the leeward side of the ridge, I was very surprised not to hear some bugles or cow talk on the ridge or down in Lost Canyon. What gives? Just wait them out…they’ll show up. 5 minutes after light…nuthin…10 minutes after light…nuthin….weird. Oh well, I guess I’ll give out a locator…. “meeeeeeooww” and in the distance…”eeeeeeeuuuuuuuuuuugh, eeeeeuuugh, eeeuugh, eeugh” and again…and again…and again. Oh yeah. They are there, just not quite where I expected them to be! Gotta boogie, they are down near the trail bogs and one is even across the canyon, basically up the other hill from camp. Wait a minute, there’s a 5 point with 3 cows walking across that hill right there…he’s heading up the canyon towards this growler that just sounds like a toad! There’s also another 2 classic buglers up there, probably all withing 200 yards of eachother… boogie, boogie…get down there quick!
Big Bull Bed...12 minutes above camp...

[Hornseeker]

Just as I got 100 yards above the bottom I could hear some grunting and could not figure out what the heck this bull was doing…I snuck in, Chris on my tail…caught movement ahead…Big…Black…NICE bull moose walking and grunting….and oh how I’d have loved to pull my cam out and dog him around getting photos, but dang it, there’s a bull bugling not 100 yards down the hill! Heck, I think he’s getting closer!
Did I say Bull Moose?


As they lay...4 feet apart...


“Chris…get right there by that spruce, hold still and squeeze the hoochie mama a few times when I get over here about 30 yards” About 15 yards towards my 30 yard set up I see movement and freeze! Dang bull is moving in fast. He’s  a good 5 point..would make me REAL happy, but dagnabit if he didn’t move through the lane I’d hope he’d move through before I could get setup! Oh well, he’ll come around. The bull then circled up the hill above me, maybe 25 yards, heading straight towards Chris. This is basically a creek bottom and the spruce is THICK. I can see him clearly as he moves along, but there are NO clear shots. The wind is perfect. Chris is dead still, kneeling. The bull makes a turn and starts heading towards where he heard the cow call come from! (by the way, this is the same 5 point I saw on the hill with 3 cows…but the DING BAT led those 3 cows into one of the gnarliest sounding bugles I’ve ever heard…and Voila… No cows now!) I notice that I’m totally calm. I’ve got the Hawk at about ¼ draw with a scary sharp grizzly and a 100 grain steel insert “smoothon’d” to the tip of a 29” Axis 400. I am ready and abnormally calm…however, a big smile creeps across my face as I see this bull walk directly towards Chris, a camo blob on the forest floor! As he gets closer I start to laugh under my breath, thinking what a thrill Chris is having! Finally…as I laugh and smile to myself, I have a “thread the needle” shot at a “quartering to” bull that is sporadically looking straight down 5-7 feet at this camo blob on the ground! Cant do it of course, no bull would EVER be worth the risk of an errant arrow skewering my best buddy in the noggin! Just imagine what that old single bevel could do to Chris’s noggin if it can split Water Buffalo Femurs and Shoulder Blades!! :0)

This bull stands there by Chris, literally 7 feet away at best, for about 3 minutes. Then he starts to walk back into a lane. Just before he gets into the lane I come to about ¾ draw, he’s going to be at a whopping 12 yards! Of course…he stopped with his vitals perfectly hid just before the lane. The Mountain Mimmicry did a nice job, I was wearing a head net too, the juniper bow was at full attention, ½ drawn for about 2 minutes before I had to let down and rest my elbow on my side. He never noticed…stood there for maybe 4 minutes, then turned without exposing his vitals and headed straight away, then to the right back through the timber. Chris “hoochie-mama’d” and he turned and headed back again! Game on baby… this time he was going to come through an opening right at 30 yards. I was ready…as he entered the opening I came to full draw and chirped at him, he skipped through the opening like it was hot lava, never offering a shot opp! Baah! This proved about as much as he could handle. Finally…I trailed him diagonally up the slope, keeping him in sight for maybe 4 more minutes as he gained ground on me… man…that was fun. I’ll tell ya this though….as fun as it is to get them close…its “just” starting to get “old hat” and I am NEEDING to take it to the next level… the bloody level!!

Camp is 14 minutes away… we go back…its 9 am…. Nap time!

At about 2pm we decide to head another direction…over to the lake. Never been there, gotta find it (we actually saw it from the ridge as we packed out Pat’s bull) and it looks real good on the map! Just as we came down the last little draw that will spill us into the lake, we hear a faint bugle. A lot of times, depending on the terrain and the direction the bull was facing as well as the intensity of the bugle, it can be real hard to tell which direction it came from or even how far it was. Anyhow, that was the only one were heard from him, so after a ½ hour setup waiting for him and mewing for him, we headed the last ¼ mile to the lake.

The lake was beautiful, surrounded by a big park on a couple sides and THICK bedding timber on a couple more sides. It was mid afternoon..the elk would be bedded for a several more hours, so Chris and I had a photo opp with the great scenery and “smelly cow”, a Montana Elk Decoy that Andrew sealed in a giant Ziploc with a bottle of cow urine!
Me and "smelly cow"...


We took some pics, then sat down to eat a snack or two… I looked up and said to Chris, “there’s a bull heading straight towards us across the meadow!” It was too funny, mid day, 75 degrees, and here comes this spike out the timber. He didn’t even see smelly cow as she was facing the wrong direction, however the breeze was drifting his way. I could tell he was fighting conflicting urges…..human scent….cow scent….human scent….cow scent…. He disappeared behind a small fold in the hill, then came bolting out with a big cow in the lead. She had already been in the park at a spring/mineral deposit and must have finally winded us…not letting smelly cow get the best of her!
Off they go!


That evening was uneventful. Chris and I shared the campfire alone and talked about what the next morning might bring. It was the last morning and the only time I had left to make this into a 3 for 3 hunt instead of a 2 for 3!
More Fall Color...

[Hornseeker]

5 am came extra early that morning. With all the talk of getting in shape, Tabata, the rigors of elk hunting…..of course….I wasn’t in shape! I mean, I do alright, especially once I’m up and going, but not being in shape just makes it harder and harder each morning to actually get up and get going. Its real easy to say, “ah hell, lets just sleep in and hunt the bedding areas at mid day!” We only did that one day this trip… next year! IRONMAN!! :0)

We headed up the draw to the trail bogs and were standing there 15 minutes before light, waiting to hear a bugle, something to chase.  Almost light…nothing. Not surprised, these dudes move around so much, the same bulls that bugled yesterday could be in the parks at the head of Baldy this morning, or at least over the ridge into Lost Canyon. I’ll give one little Meewww to see if anything wants to respond. Oh Yeah…there’s one just up the canyon, maybe 400 yards on the south side, but wait…there’s old growler across the canyon and uphill, maybe 300 yards away max. Oh man, this guy sounds like a monster and you know what, it’s the last few hours of my hunt so I may as well go for the Gusto! The little guy would probably be easier to get in, but I can never walk away from a bugle like this pig has…

Across the creek and up the hill 100 yards, Chris tight on my tail. Eeeeeeeeuuuuuuuuuugh! Dang, he’s just out of sight in the tree line at the top of the park, but its not going to be easy, I can hear a cow or two and I know he’s a herd bull. Gotta get closer, REAL close before I try anything. Eeeeeeeeeeeuuuuuuuuuuuugh! He’s getting closer…heck I think we may be close enough! I move up the hill 40 yards and get setup with lanes in all directions. The wind’s perfect. Chris, you give a quiet cow call and I’ll throw out a weak bugle to make him think there’s a small bull between him and one of his cows. Well…it sounded good on paper, but he immediately shut up and disappeared! Not sure what happened, but something made him boogie. Well…it was early and I had a real good idea where he was going. The weather has been so hot that when the sun first shows itself the thermals start flipping real quick…so I needed to gain a bunch of ground so I could come down on top of him in his bed!

As we headed up the hill we crossed through a spring and something caught my eye. On the hill above was a little spike/fork and a 22” 4 point muley. The ground was hideously loud and I knew there was no chance at a stalk. I let them feed away..but they were going the exact place I wanted to go…so if I bumped into them…so be it! :0) We snuck up a trail and stopped to look around for a bit when I saw Chris’s eyes focus on something and he slowly pointed up the hill. The 4 point was feeding above us about 45 yards, just in front of him was the spike. If they kept going they’d feed into a lane and I’d let fly! Well, those thermals I was talking about…gave us away promptly, but what was cool was, there were 3 22-24” 4 points and the little spike total…I filed that away..if the ground was quieter it would be a sweet spot to put a stalk on a muley someday!

Up the ridge and above the bedroom…I told Chris, “I’m gonna slip down the hill a ways, you just take a big stick and rake the heck out of this dead tree! I bet it pisses him off Royale!” It did, he fired a massive bugle at us, but was down the hill about 200 yards further than I thought. I motioned for Chris to beat it down there with me, we closed about 100 yards and stopped and setup again. This time I bugled a challenge and Chris raked as I ran forward about 60 yards to get setup. He fired back another challenge…the type bugle that you can feel the air moving even when they are 100 yards away! The type bugle that you don’t say, “I wonder if that’s a hunter or a bull” :0)
Me set up and ready for him....


I continued to close and Chris raked the tree some more. He was all about it for a few minutes, then something clicked in his brain saying, “you know, I have all these cows..and they are perfectly content with big old studly me…so why the heck should I invite this guy in for a fight…heck…he just may be a bad hombre then I’d be singing the blues out here on the hillside all by myself!”…and the next time I heard him he was 300 yards away and gaining ground!

We traversed to the ridge, basically heading towards camp where we’d pack up and head out…one more trip down. As we got about ¼ mile down the ridge I noticed a bunch of fresh sign crossing a big park and dropping into a steep, nasty, thick little canyon. I had a hunch…stepped to the edge of the draw and let out a screaming bugle! The dude was Rude! Flat out interrupted me mid bugle from about 100 yards down the slope in the thick stuff! GAME ON buddy! I basically motioned for Chris to follow,  but I was done playing cat and mouse. In my mind I was going to run head on into this herd and just see what the hell they were going to do about it. I’ve actually heard several tales of people doing this successfully…and frankly, I was fed up with this guy. Plus…it was getting late and I knew things would shut off very soon and we were still slated to get out of the woods that day! Short story shorter…he wanted nothing of it. The faster I ran down the hill the faster he moved away. The last time I heard him bugle he was a ½ mile away…

That is the end of that story…we went to camp, packed up and got out of there. This trip was as good as any I’ve had and adding in Andy and Pat’s success makes it the best trip ever. A bull for me would have really put the cherry on top of the icing that was already on the cake, but that would just be indulgence!

[jackelope]

awesome...i read every word.

too bad you didn't connect on a nice bull, but you got everything else one could want.

[X-Force]

+1 Great pics and enjoyed it thoroughly

[Ironhead]

Thanks for the read and photos sounds like a blast. I missed Elk camp this year and it's nice to remeber what I missed  through you guys.

[DeKuma]

Never worry about writing something long like that again, it was a great read and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Thanks for the great Post!

[NW-Eric]

beautifull country and great elk

[backwoods_boy]

this is the reason i am a hunter and i decided to join to this website.
for stories and pics like this.
Great job!
and nice pics!
very impressive

[WDFW-SUX]

 

[boneaddict]

Awesome Ernie.  Glad you put that on here.  Man I should have went back.  That was such awesome country to hunt.  I was certainly happy to have that as a backup.   Hornseeker was extremely kind enough to show me this spot and provide me maps and such when my other hunt failed due to an onsalught of unexpected hunters.  I spent a couple nights in there.  I should have stayed in country and met with you guys but I didn't want to intrude into your hunt.   I sure wish you'd got that 350 bull.  Man he was big.   Maybe next year.  I'm pretty sure Andrews bull was one of the ones I let walk on my last day in, with his corkscrew eyeguard.  Thats a great first kill for him.  I don't think I would have enjoyed packing him out by myself.    I need to get off my butt and write up our hunt and my solo trips into there.  Very nice write up and great pics.   

and I still think you are a *censored*  for finding those sheds.  I was sure looking. 

[boneaddict]

PS  were they all hunting with Sapphire Hawks?

[Fullabull]

Well done!!!

That was fun to read and look at some great elk country. Wish we had some country like that here in western WA. The only parks we have here are clear cuts 

Fulla

[Little Fish]

Nice story and pictures. I read every word and may even reread it. Thanks for sharing.

[Hornseeker]

Doug, all four of us in camp had Sapphires and so did you...so thats pretty cool eh!?

Fullabull...I spent 27 years in W. Washington...I feel your pain buddy! Montana is Fantastic!!!!!!!

Doug..I'd like to get another explanation on where that big bull was...I still dont think I'm clear on it... I KNOW at least two of the bugles I heard were good mature bulls...and they were separate from the 320 bull I saw... so there are some decent bulls in there for sure!

E

PS...thanks for the compliments all!