How scared have you been?

[Broker]

Not elk hunting but I remembered this video after watching yours Norsepeak. I would have craped myself if I was this guy.

Way too Close to a Grizzly

If that bear wasn't big enough to shoot, I sure don't want to be near his big brother!  WOW!

[Fullabull]

I started still hunting for deer years ago and it changed everything. I saw lots more deer but also starting seeing a lot of other animals I had never really seen much before (and a lot closer). I had never seen a bear in the woods (this was in CA) but started seeing them every year after I started still hunting.

Most of the time they just turned and ran. One time though, I was still hunting up a drainage trying to get to a logging road about 3/4 the way up. Just as I'm getting to about 20 yards before the road (and its nothing but small pines up to the road) I start hearing low growling. So I figured, OK, no big deal just another bear. I start making some noise and talk a little to let it know I was there and coming up, figuring it would just run back up the hill where it came from. As I step out onto the road through the small pines, I see a huge sow standing on the other side of the narrow dirt road with two yearling cubs right behind her....OOOPS!!! Luckily I was hunting with my rifle at the time. I stood there and just talked to her softly hoping she would back off, she just stood her ground and started growling again. I pull my rifle up on my hip just in case, then out of nowhere I hear a logging truck (which I haven't heard all day) way down the bottom of the hill. The sow heard it and it broke her focus on me, she huffed at the cubs who ran back up then hill. Then she turned to follow them. I have never seen such a large animal run so quickly up a steep hill like that before. In a flash she was 50 yards up the hill standing on a log looking back down at me. I started walking down the road whistling all the way so she knew exactly where I was and I wasn't a threat any longer. I didn't realize how hard my heart was pounding until she ran up the hill.

[RadSav]

Never scared elk hunting, but once out scouting for new bear spots I got caught up in a bunch of fishing line.  I got so irritated that someone had strung the line all over the place I didn't realize I was standing in the middle of a Mary Jane grow.  A BIG Mary Jane grow!  Two guys walk up to me with guns drawn.  One say's, "What the F(*& you doing here?"  I say I am looking for new places to run bear baits.  The other guy says, "I strongly suggest you get the F(^* out of here and hunt somewhere else!"  He didn't have to ask me twice   That's probably the most scared I have ever been in the woods.

[DoubleJ]

Never scared elk hunting, but once out scouting for new bear spots I got caught up in a bunch of fishing line.  I got so irritated that someone had strung the line all over the place I didn't realize I was standing in the middle of a Mary Jane grow.  A BIG Mary Jane grow!  Two guys walk up to me with guns drawn.  One say's, "What the F(*& you doing here?"  I say I am looking for new places to run bear baits.  The other guys says, "I stongly suggest you get the F(^* out of here and hunt somewhere else!"  He didn't have to ask me twice   That's probably the most scared I have ever been in the woods.

And you want me to go hunting with you?

[pd]

Hey Bull.....


Awesome

 

I have to agree: That is awesome!  (........hey bull........)

[2labs]

Bristol bay, right out of high school. Went from indestructible to despensable in about two weeks.

[manni7mm]

First bear I ever shot was from 20 yards out.  His head was all I could see leaning into the trail ahead of me.  3 or 4 yr old Boar.  I put my sights on him and waited until he stepped into the trail at full broad side view.  After I shot, he charged straight at me and dropped about 10 feet in front of me.  When it was all said and done, i figured I would not have got off another round in time because my arms were shaking so much.     

[Pigfuz]

I took my girlfriend out hunting last year for the first time.  We walked right into the middle of an elk herd and watched them for a while then started calling and talking back and forth with them.  As we turned to leave (deer season) I called a couple times on our way out.  Well a spike bull thought his hot cow was getting away and he came at a full charge.  Lets just say I pushed my girlfriend off to the side of the trail next to a tree and started yelling at the elk.  Luckily he figured out what we were and hit the breaks on all four hooves coming to a screeching halt at about 8-10 yards.  I was more in shock  than in fear but my girlfriend on the other hand... Well she questioned my sanity 

[Dan-o]

I got treed by a cow moose a long ways back. 

I was pushing timber for elk for my dad and I got too close to a cow and calf moose without seeing her.

I heard her stomping her hoof and she was close when she came at me.

Good thing I was young enough to go up a tree.....   Now I'd be screwed.

[NoImpactNoIdea]

Never really been scared of an elk, but have been mildly concerned....   This was two years ago, and really up close and personal.  3 feet! 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XurEihAmag&list=UUurVHoLv6F0P1zro8yw6dbg&index=15

I had someone show me that video a year or two ago and I could have sworn he said it was him.  Your name isnt Dan by chance is it?

[huntnnw]

Hiking 6 miles in the dark to a elk spot by myself..at 3:00 am about a mile in I had a cougar start growling and hissing at me....I was a little freaked 


I shot a elk in ID 2 years ago..went to blood trail it and walked up on 3 cubs and momma..I knew immediately this wasn't good..she stood up at 20 yards..started grunting and chomping teeth

[Johnb317]

Hiking an hour back to camp after dark listening to a pack of wolves howling.
Same trip my headlamp picked up a pair of eyes looking pack at me, based on the distance between the eyes it wasnt a small animal, and since lighted pins aren't legal in Idaho.    (Bow hunting)

[boneaddict]

I've puckered a couple times. 


I had a huge herd bull really worked up one time.  He was targeted many times by hunters, but he was about as call shy as they come.   I had him fired up and frothing and finally brought him in with a challenge.   He liberated a tree of all its limbs right in front of Idabooner and I as we crouched on the ground watching.  He walked by within inches and I was just praying Idabooner was smart enough not to move.  I think he would have perforated us if he had.   I am not sure I had ever seen a bull so pissed off.  I was hoping I wasn't the next random bush he was going to curb stomp.   

A year later working the same bull, I couldn't pull him in out of this patch of trees, but I brought in a satellite that decided to rub on the tree I was hiding behind.   I was really getting skinny hoping a tine would hook me.    Same night black dark, coming off the mountain  a damn love sick spike was by me and wouldn't leave even after seeing/smelling/hearing me.   SOB followed me in the dark and barked at one point within feet behind me.   About sent me up a tree.   

Then there was the time I was night calling and my bulb in my flashlite died.   Told the wife to stay put and went back for a backup light.   A cow elk walked by her and pissed on her leg.   She came running full speed in the black dark almost running me over.......

[slim9300]

Those are the times that make elk hunting so special.      It is a feeling that nothing in the world could replicate.  Not gonna lie, just reading your post make the hair on my neck stand up.  Can't wait for this years elk hunt.

This is exactly right. I have never felt fear when a bull is in tight and I can feel the reverberation from his voice hitting my body, only a sense of excitement that cannot be matched nor explained.

I will take that back for one small exception. Way back on my first backpacking hunt in MT when I was 19, I was sleeping in a bivy sack near a small meadow and apparently a big mature bull decided to wander over and check me out. I didn't hear him approach since bulls had been bugling all night already and I finally had some silence, but at spitting distance he screamed his baddest challenge bugle right at my head. That bivy sack must have looked like the biggest caterpillar he had ever seen, because I struggled to get that zipper open for about 30 seconds after I awoke from a dead sleep. Lol.


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[slim9300]

Hiking an hour back to camp after dark listening to a pack of wolves howling.
Same trip my headlamp picked up a pair of eyes looking pack at me, based on the distance between the eyes it wasnt a small animal, and since lighted pins aren't legal in Idaho.    (Bow hunting)

Time for a sidearm or some bear spray, I don't think your bow would have helped.


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