Post by: Broken Arrow on September 22, 2008, 10:40:49 AM
Ok...now for the rest of the story! After a 4 mile hike in to spike camp, our party was welcomed by the worst mosquitoes I had ever seen, let alone hunted in. It was hot and I decided to pack in my "perforated camo"....not a good choice, nor was Deet that was not 100%. Made it 2 days in spike camp until we decided to hike back to base, gear up in heavy thick camo, get some real Deet and pick up a some Benadril for the 500 or so bites I endured. Back up to spike, and ready to dig in. As most of you know, both the weather and moon phase made things tough. We all saw elk the first week, some nice bulls, had our obvious blown chances, though overall hunting was tough. The elk movement was basically the first 3 hours in the am, with sporadic bugles at best. I'm sure most of the rutting activity was happening at night.
On the 7th day I made my way into possibly the thickest vine maple i think i could find and found abundant fresh sign. I cow called and got a growl back up wind from me. I thought this bull may have been by himself and would try to wind me, so i kept working down the thicket, however I soon found that if I was going to continue in this direction i was going to basically need to get on my hands and knees. I proceed on to the point of basically getting stuck and then that's when it happened. In a matter of seconds a heard of about 25 animals descended upon me and i was right in the middle of the heard. I could make out the heard bull at about 15 yards....and he was huge, though there was now way in hell i could even draw my bow, not to mention my pack was stuck in-between some maples. I small spike then walked directly towards me and came within 3 yards....cows were every where...so here i am stuck in the middle of a heard, knees shaking with adrenaline and about to have a heart attack. I remember thinking if i dint get unstuck and move i will never have a chance, so i lunged and pushed my way about 5 yards. The elk at this point began running everywhere and it was mayhem, luckily for me there were still elk upwind that didn't know what was going on. Once free 3 more elk came into range and i saw i had a small window of about 6 inches and a good vital shot on a cow. I knocked, drew back and took a 10 yard shot. The cow maybe ran 20 yards if that and piled up. I ended up with the only elk taken this year from our party. Who knows, maybe if i stuck to my guns I may have had another crack at that bull, or maybe i go empty handed, all I know now is I'm pretty gratefull just to have the opportunity i did.
Pics are from spike camp, elk, what i was shoot in and meat back at spike camp. Pack out was pretty good, maybe 5 miles max and all down hill.
Post by: Broken Arrow on September 22, 2008, 10:48:06 AM
Post by: saylean on September 22, 2008, 10:49:38 AM
Post by: Broken Arrow on September 22, 2008, 10:51:40 AM
Post by: Broken Arrow on September 22, 2008, 10:53:39 AM
Post by: DeKuma on September 22, 2008, 11:14:41 AM
Post by: Gobble on September 22, 2008, 12:08:18 PM
You should feel lucky, you were one of only a few on the site that actually got an animal so far.
Great story too.
Post by: Ray on September 22, 2008, 12:15:05 PM
Post by: wackmaster on September 22, 2008, 01:03:41 PM
Post by: X-Force on September 22, 2008, 02:05:24 PM
Post by: LongTatLaw on September 22, 2008, 08:34:24 PM
Post by: Mangy on September 22, 2008, 08:50:49 PM
Post by: finnman on September 23, 2008, 02:22:22 PM
I talked to the guys in our group who said the same thing about the skeeters!
My cousin said 2 guys originally from Minnesota set up camp down the road from him, he went down and talked to them and gave them the low down on the flying feast, they gave him the ol' were from the state where "they are the state bird" speech! He said the next day after the morning hunt they were packed up and HEADIN OUT!! They said they didn't quite get the gist of what he was saying. They said they had never seen mosquitos that bad!!!! :chuckle:
Post by: bowsandhose on September 23, 2008, 02:49:50 PM
Post by: robb92 on September 23, 2008, 05:56:58 PM
Post by: jae on September 23, 2008, 06:59:24 PM
Post by: mwhite on September 24, 2008, 08:53:49 PM
Post by: WAPITIHUNTER on September 26, 2008, 07:05:04 AM
Post by: bloodtrail on October 23, 2008, 02:57:45 PM