I would never had thought that we would be doing this today with the weather being what it is, but alas, we have 3/4 of my bull out and we will be getting the rest out today, plus my friends son's bull that he took 4 hours later and only about 200 yards where I got mine!
This was his first bull!
Story to follow later, got to get the work done first.
Ok, here is the story. First my story starts at work, I had two day shifts to pull and then my season started. I have never been hurt before at work, but wouldn't you know, I was on my first day shift. Nothing major, but I think I seperated a rib at the sternum, the one right under the collar bone. I felt a loud pop and felt it, but no pain, the next day it was sore, but not bad. Let's just say each progressive day, it has gotten sorer. Now I hurt pretty good to cough.
Ok, to the hunt, I scouted the three days up until the opener. This is in a locked up area and I did a lot of bike riding. I never saw an elk and I was scouting from daylight to dark. I was seeing some tracks and this was the key to our success. On Wednesday, I had seen some tracks at the edge of a clearcut, traveling over a ridge. I knew there was two raghorn bulls in this area this summer. On Thursday I took a road that goes up on the ridge and saw where the herd had crossed over as suspected, but I also notice two animals that had split off and returned in the direction from where they came. So on Friday I scouted the first road again and ran into another hunter scouting. He asked what I was doing and I said looking for the thing that made that rub on that tree. There was an old rub that had been rubbed recently. We conversed a little and talked about not stepping on each other toes in the morning. Both of us didn't commit to the spot that we were at, I had a lone bull (tracks) spotted for the opener. He said he didn't see anything on down the road. Being an elk hunter I decided to look for myself, as soon as he left I noticed new tracks across the road. In fact one of the two sets went up to the rub and I noticed new shavings on top of the leaves.
That night I called my friend Jim and told him that I thought there were two bulls in this area. Jim's son Marshall (sophmore in college) had a tag and had never taken a bull before. They decided to try the spot and I would catch up to them if my loner bull didn't pan out. So that was the plan.
Opening day I staked out my clearcut watching for the loner, it didn't pan out, so I head towards Jim and Marshall. I found Jim standing in the spur road, with a grin on his face. They had hiked up through the timber from a road down below and walked to where the bull had rubbed. Just past the rub they jumped two animals and did not get a good look. When I came along Marshall was taking an old railroad grade in the direction that the animals went. Jim and I conferred and I decided to go back out a railroad grade that him and Marshall had just came in on. I had not gone 150 yards from the edge of the clearcut that the grade started in when I heard a noise. I heard the noise again and moved slightly ahead and sure enough it was an elk, once the scope came on the animal I could see it was a bull. I could not see if it had enough horn (3pt. area) so I waited and soon I could see it had plenty, but all I had was a 100 yard head shot. I waited some more, the bull was feeding and soon he turned broadside, I let him have it. He ran away from me and stood, I debated for a minute and decided I had better throw more lead. I shot two more times and the bull disappeared. I slipped over to where I shot and found no blood,
, the ground was flat where I was but then the ground fell off over an edge. I moved towards the edge and then to my left, the bull was laying there with his head up. One more round and he was done.
Not a monster, but I will take him, especially with the weather we have to hunt with. You can see the first shot, just a little back, got the liver and one lobe on the lungs. He would have died from that, second shot was a miss and the third was in the front shoulder (he was running on that one). I was excited but a little sorry that Marshall had not gotten into the bulls. I had only seen one bull, but suspicioned that the other had been over the break in the terrain. Jim and Marshall showed up and we field dressed the bull. Jim and I kept encouraging Marshall to keep hunting, that the other bull must be somewhere. We gave a few pointers and he took off. Jim went to his pickup and I had to go get on my bike and ride the 4 miles out to my pickup and then drive around to Jim's rig.
I drove up to Jim who was waiting at his rig and he had a big smile on his face. :grin: I knew something was up, sure enough, he said Marshall had just shot a bull, just up the ridge from the pickup!
Marshall had made a semi-circle loop down below my kill and then down the ridge into the wind, he was slipping along when he heard a noise and then a crash. Looking in the direction of the noise he saw the bull, but did not have a shot, he waited what he said was 10 minutes and finally the bull moved and offer him a shot. The bull disappeared and when he got to it, it was down, but then tried to get up, he shot it again and it went back down. He grabbed his radio and started talking to his dad down on the road. Jim said he was pretty excited and then he blurted "I got to go, I have to shoot him again!" The bull had got up and started running over the small ridge. Let's just say the real shooting began then!
The bull didn't go far and piled up in some vinemaples.
The bulls were almost the same size, mine was a 4x5 and Marshalls a very symetrical 4x4.
The pack ended up being great, only .25 mile by my GPS, almost all down hill. My ribs did fine also, I was really worried about that! Who would have believed???
This is the bull I helped pack out on Monday.
Interesting story; the dad and son both ended up on this bull that was in a herd of 20. It was about 1:30 in the afternoon and the herd was out in a clearcut. This is a walk in area. Luke the son passed on shooting since he wasn't sure it had enough horn. Whe Dad showed up the herd spooked and he saw the horn and took a shot, either a miss or a hit in the horn. Luke took the tracks and chased them down and the darn herd went out into another brand new clearcut and Luke took him with a head shot. No question this time, he could see the double eye guards. This pack was .9 of a mile each way, down hill pack and a stream to cross. That's why we had hip boots on, we just used them at the stream. Boy I'm starting to get into shape, but my ribs need some rest!
Rank Amateur
Guess who's packing bull's today? Now with pics!
Expect Nothing, Blame No One, Determine Your Priorities, & Do Something.
)
Linear Mode
