Upper Smith Creek Bull Tag!

[HUNTINCOUPLE]

I'm thinking they are all cozy in there tent together boiling some water for there last meal before Squtach eats them both.

[h2ofowlr]

Hopefully they didn't buy a new two man tent for the trip and find out upon setting up its about 1-1/2 man tent.  The stories of spooning in the back country will be on the DL.   

[HUNTINCOUPLE]

Well no report is a good report I guess? Hope you two are hunkered down under a blue tarp for the night and staying dry. Its going to be a long wet night.......... This rain is good though it will knock down your stinky poo poo smelling stuff if you know what I mean?? Oh ya shot straight and keep the poweder dry!

[DIYARCHERYJUNKIE]

Got extra windy here.  Seen lots of deer though.  Fogged out later.  Should have been a good day in the elk woods.

[D-Rock425]

I made it home this afternoon stang is still on the mountain hunting.  We had a couple hours of good hunting weather on Friday morning then we got pounded with high winds and rain.  Couple very wet nights on the mountain for sure.  We saw lots of elk but didn't have any chances at shooter bull's.  Stang is holding out for a solid 5 or better.

[HUNTINCOUPLE]

Sounds like you had a fun time! How far back in there did you leave the Stangster? Or is he coming out each day?

[D-Rock425]

He's in over 4 miles.

[HUNTINCOUPLE]

He's in over 4 miles.

 

[DIYARCHERYJUNKIE]

That's funny only storm in the entire year hits those two days.  Just cause you said something d. Glad you got some good weather.  Hopefully stang gets what he's after.  I was out those days w my son and we got into deer but the fog was so thick and it seems to hold the black tails up from moving as much too.   

[luvmystang67]

Well, very bad news.  I'm back two days before the end of the season with empty coffers.

I went on 3 scouting trips for 6 scouting days, the last one being 2 weeks ago.  I was everywhere in the unit.  The elk were in basically the same places from June through the end of Sept.  I was in shape, had a plan, had scouted the crap out of the unit, and then a weather formation ruined it all.

Day 1:  We knew rain was coming.  Right off the bat, saw a herd of 4, cows and a spike.  Kept walking.  200 yards later, a bull, but alone.  The one I was looking for had an obvious herd of 20 with it, not my bull.  200 yards later, I poked over an embankment, cows at 150 yards.  I pulled back to get my buddies to come witness a possible kill (and video), as I poked back over the hill it became apparent that they were on their way downhill, either due to weather or due to sniffing us out, I watched a very good bull slip into the bushes at 150 yards on his way out of the unit (I didn't know that at the time).  I tried to pursue, and saw 4 more cows in a different area on their way down.  I walked probably another 400 yards and came across a herd of 9 cows at 170 yards, no bulls.  We all gathered up to discuss what we'd seen and decided it was time to go set up camp as it was now about 10:00am and the rain was supposed to start.  Got camp set up as the rain began.  Gathered some courage and dropped into a big bowl.  As we got to the bottom we spotted a herd of probably 15 up high on the other side.  I jumped up the hill (super steep, not a jump at all) and right as I got there visibility went to 30 yards as fog rolled in.  Had a raghorn and 3 cows at <30 yards on a ridgeline and decided to pass.  Had 2 bulls and a whole herd on my right at >30 yards that I could hear so close I could almost touch them, but the fog put the end to that.  We went to bed and spent on of the worst nights in a tent of my life.  Virtually zero sleep, tent whipping in the 40mph+ wind.  Sleeping bags were soaked, clothes soaked, and every hunting partner miserable.

Day 2:
We woke up, went for a similar walk as day 1, saw the same 3 cows and spike that we had seen on the opener but way lower than they had been and in a place where humans shouldn't go.  This is all we saw for the morning.  We went back to the tent and decided we had to go back to the camper, 4.5 miles back at the parking lot, to dry off.  On the hike back we were completely BEAT my 40+ wind and rain.  Our packs weighed a ton with all of the wet clothes and water they absorbed.  DRocks waterproof cover had a several pound puddle of water that had blown into it during the hike.  We left the tent with its 12 stakes and guy-wires and all of the stuff we'd need when we came back.  When we got to windy ridge the rain and wind were POUNDING.  One side of my camper looks pressure washed, its beautiful.  On the not so beautiful side, it ripped my awning off, which wasnt even deployed.  It just ripped it off in stowed condition.  It is honestly the closest thing to a hurricane that I've ever experienced.  I'm not sure what the wind speeds were, but the gusts HAD to have been 60+.  It was absolutely brutal.  The amount of water was extreme.  We did see a couple of herds on the way back that were bee lining for lower cover.  2 herds to be exact.  One was the raghorn and 3 cows I had seen the night before and the other had a 4 or very small 5x5 and were headed down as well.  They were both in mostly inaccessible locations and we were kind of doing the same thing, getting out of that mess.  We decided to grab burgers and a beer that night and went to Randle.  Randle had no power.  We went to Morton and had burgers at the Bucksnort (great burger btw).  It was a long trek for a burger, but we didn't realize the power was going to be out in Randle.

[luvmystang67]

Day 3:
We decided to glass close to the road in the morning as it appeared that nobody was hunting up by the road at all.  Saw a herd with one spike in it.  Decided we'd better get on our hike back in.  As we walked, the fog rolled in and ruined our plan to glass-as-we-hiked.  DRock turned around about halfway in and went home.  My other buddy, J, and I rolled on.  We did some glassing from a high point as the fog cleared and did manage to see one of the same herds, in the same hole, as were there on our hike out the day before.  It was a couple of cows and some small bulls, again, in a place that would only really be suitable to hunt with a drone, plus the weather was looking up and I was convinced we'd find one of the two bulls I was after.  Then... we spotted the tent.  It had blown off a cliff and was hanging there like a popped balloon.  It was probably over a mile away from us.  We decided we'd better go see if we had a place to stay that night or not.  We ended up finding most of the stakes.  Took us 3 hours to find the rain fly, the tent was actually unbent and just minorly scratched after its tumble off of a mountain.  It had gone probably 150 yards and needed major deconstruction to get everything apart and out.  Fortunately, it all went back together and our air mattress wasn't even popped (probably the only good thing to happen on this trip).  We went back up to our same favorite high point to glass that night.  Saw the same bulls/cows down in the hole and happened to spot a REAL nice 5x5, one that I had seen in every scouting trip, across the bowl, too far for the evening hunt.  We planned to hunt him in the morning and if that didn't go well we'd go down in the hole and hunt these other ones as a consolation prize and get out of here.  The hike back to the tent was beautiful, the pics behind the mountain were amazing.  Beautiful pink colors.  We were really ready to kick some butt the next day.

Day 4: We woke up sick.  Sore throats, low energy, J had pinkeye and his eye was sealed shut.  J went to the top of the ridge to spot, I took my radio and went to where we'd seen the 5x5.  No sign on the ridge that held so many elk the first day and every day I'd scouted.  Nothing since the rain storm.  J spotted 1 elk on the hill, and I wen to work.  He thought it must have been the 5.  I tried to get into the thick stuff it was in and wind changed, he bumped at probably 50 yards.  J watched him from afar and he bedded again.  We made another plan and then J realized it was actually a very young spike.  The 5 was nowhere to be found on that whole hillside.  I decided that was it, time to go down in the hole where those smaller bulls and cows had been for days.  We looked, they were gone.  For the evening hunt we decided to walk that finger all the way down again, and down the other side where we had so much action the first day.  Hoping that maybe some animals would be coming back up with the nice weather.  We went all the way to the end without a trace.  All the way to where we had seen the 5 the night before and waited.  A bull showed itself... it was the young spike again.     I had an opportunity to shoot it there, but decided that where we were, about 5.5 miles in, the meat wasn't worth it and shooting a spike wasn't going to thrill me.  We left it and returned to camp, exhausted, sick, and deflated.

Day 5:
We woke up feeling absolutely terrible.  Couldn't hardly hike, definitely not well uphill.  Coughing, low energy.  I had the chills and a fever the night before.  I was nauseous and couldn't eat anything.  We made it to our glassing hill only to find it too foggy to see.  When it cleared, we spotted our spike again first thing.  The elk in the hole still weren't there.  We did see 2 cows and a calf  above us, they were moving quickly and headed somewhere else.  Not sure where.  Didn't matter, I couldn't shoot them anyway.  Then, as we were about to give up for the morning, we spotted the 5x5 over a mile away, right where he  had walked onto the hill side 2 nights before.  He was leaving, going somewhere.  Had he bedded, or fed or something, I'd probably be telling a different tale, but somehow he had managed to stay hidden in our entire spike game the day before and now had simply decided to leave.  J and I looked at each other and decided we didn't have the energy to walk all the way down there to look for an elk that we probably wouldn't be able to find when we got there.  At that point we decided we had to go home.  We were too sick, the elk were too few and far between, and we didn't have enough vacation days to spend them doing this.  On the way back, (which was brutal, weight wise), we saw probably 80 animals bedded in Pumice Plain.   No other hunters up on top anywhere that we could see.  Saw one other hunter our entire time there and he drove in and went running towards the spike we saw on the morning of day 3 (with no orange).

All in all, it was probably the most preparation I've ever done for a hunt in my life, which makes it all the more painful that it turned out as one of the worst hunts I've ever been part of.  My only REAL opportunities were on the first day and unless I knew the storm was going to be that bad or that it would drive all the animals out, I probably would've still played it the same way again if I had the chance.  You can't plan the weather, but it really ruined what could've been an awesome hunt for us.  Getting sick didn't help either.  I know J isn't on here, but a big thanks to him for taking off so many days of vacation to help me in my misery.  A big thanks to DRock for coming to help out and instead experiencing the worst storm I've ever had to sleep in.

I'll post some pics later, when I get out of bed and get my camera.

-Stang

[rosies or bust]

Sorry to hear about the bad luck Stang. My hunting partner and I dealt with that same storm too. Had a HELL of a time getting his Whittier bull out, AND we nailed him opening morning. Brutal conditions!! Better luck next time.

[clearwater]

Sounds like you gave it everything you had under some rough conditions. Thanks for sharing your experience.


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[HUNTINCOUPLE]

You guys definently get an "A" for effort! That's why it's called hunting and not killing. Boy that night in the tent sounded bad!  Maybe more or better tent stakes next time. Or at least hurcane strength ones!!!!!!

[h2ofowlr]

Sounds about in line with our hunt.  Stuck in the tent for over 13 hours, due to it coming down sideways and windy as hell with zero visibility the one day.  Day after it cleared, gusting up to 40.  Sounds like it was really nice back home, different element up there.  Chased our tails and hiked our legs off.  One of a kind experience though.