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I took a daily journal, so I'll start from day 1 planning, to scouting, right on through to the end of the hunt. I was by myself, and took a few pics, but it won't be as picture laden as some threads are -sorry.

Because I do have a "real" job, I'll post a day or two, every day or two...

Congrats, again, to all those that filled their freezers, and a heart-felt "...go get 'em next year!" to those that weren't as lucky. ...I've been there!

Chris

1) I was sick of sitting on my points when there are a number of good 1, 2, and 3 point units out there producing good bulls each year!;

2) I had enough to draw Unit 1, but not enough to draw 2, 201, 10, etc. and didn't want to wait until I could draw a good RFW tag;

3) Unit 1 won out over 61 ( a REEEEAAL close second) because they only give out 2 archery tags, and I had never hunted that country before; and

4) A good friend's brother-in-law lives up near there, and knew a bunch about the unit!

There you have it. With those benefits, I was also fully aware of the unit's limitations, however:

1) A lot of private land, National Wildlife Refuge, and National Monument that makes access to a BUNCH of the unit impossible, or very nearly so, without a MAJOR effort on foot or horseback;

2) It is a dry, steep, RUGGED unit;

3) It is a LOOOOOONG way up to the NW part of the State and into the actual unit itself; and

4) If the bulls are there - its a great hunt. If the bulls AREN'T there (i.e. they're over in 201, the Dinosaur National Monument, or in Utah), you are OUT OF LUCK!;

I have been fortunate enough over the years to harvest some really nice bulls in OTC units, so I was willing to risk NOT harvesting a bull (...well, until the end of my season anyway...) in an effort to get a really big bull. My goal was 350" or better, and knew that I was looking for the upper "one percent" that might - or might NOT - be up there.

Next post: The scouting trips (or lack thereof)!

:-)

LOL, my "most productive" part of the day used to be between 8 pm and 2 am. Then I got married.. :^)

You must have very long big toes.

Merle - how do you think I get up those steep hills??? :-)

Well, as they say, the "best laid plans of mice and men..." Even before I knew I had the license, my plan - if I had drawn - was to spend a LOT of time up in the unit looking for a 350+ bull and trying to figure out every nook and cranny of where he was living. With that, the plan was to then go in and whack him on day one or two of season! If I DIDN'T find a 350+ bull (which again, I knew was a very tall order) prior to season, I was thinking of turning the license in, getting my points back, and trying in a subsequent year. ...again, for this season, my goal was a big bull - not necessarily filling a tag (or... at least not for the first 12 days of my 14-day hunt anyway).

Well... my spring and summer work schedule did an outstanding job of keeping me out of the unit the entire summer until the first couple days of August. A buddy of mine - Kurt Geist - and I had literally two days free, so we headed up for an evening and a morning "look-see" before I had to head back for seminars and more work.

Kurt's bro-in-law lives in Maybell, and had some good info on what portions of the north end of the unit looked like (as far as elk), so we decided to start there. After checking the maps and taking an hour or so to figure out how to get around the north end of the unit, we positioned ourselves over the river, overlooking an irrigated alfalfa field and other open meadow bottoms along the river. Long story short, not a SINGLE animal showed themselves that night. Nothing. Nadda. Zip. How's that for a morale booster?!?!? ...burn 12 points, drive 6 hours, park yourself over probably the most productive forage area in the region, and not one animal can be found with binocs OR spotting scope!

...afternoon of Day 1 of scouting was a miserable bust, so it was early to bed, with a plan for an "early to rise" start of Day 2; we were optimistic that by morning, something would be out and about...

Well, daybreak came the next morning with Kurt getting out of his tent before I got out of my truck. While getting dressed, his lack of comments, and his broad scanning of the area had me guessing that this morning was going to be much like the night before. Upon getting out and taking a look for myself, my guess was proved right; again, not a single animal - deer, elk, raccoon, or otherwise was out in the meadows. ...no - check that - there was a small family group of geese out in one part of the field. That was it!

We bailed.

Looking at the map, I decided to check out another part of the unit. A couple hours of driving later, we were tucked back up in next to the wilderness boundary and looking forward to taking a couple-hour hike around to see what we could see. As we parked the truck, however, we began to realize that we weren't going to have been the only ones up in this spot...

Someone had driven in from the Utah side, knocked down the Colorado/Utah boundary fence (aka, wilderness boundary fence), and driven a mile into Colorado - into the wilderness area - with their trucks and 4-wheelers. Even better, they had driven right up to two separate wallows, and placed a mineral block on one of them! Great. We find a potentially good area, and the "Utah boys" were in there trespassing and baiting. ...we could tell whoever did it was from Utah, because their tracks were all over the valley coming up out of Utah, and tracks led to likely spots of other wallows throughout the valley.

Well...we had driven this far... might as well go for a walk.

Despite the human activity in the area, it looked as though elk were using the wallows some, and it even looked like one had VERY fresh sign in it suggesting the animals might be fairly close by. As we continued on into the area, "nature called" and I split to go take care of business, while Kurt continued on.

As I headed out to catch up to Kurt, I heard him whistle. As I scanned to find him, a familiar shape caught my eye up the slope; it was a small group of bulls, with one REALLY nice bull standing there, facing us, locked in on what we were doing. We were able to snap a couple of pictures before they made their way up through the rocks and out of sight (...and out of my life forever...).

As they left, and I got caught up to Kurt, I mentioned that, "I might have had to shoot that one if he had come in on opening day..." Kurt laughed and said, "I thought you were after a big bull!" We joked a bit, compared "notes" on what we each thought the big one would score, and then talked about the fact that in this area, with the thick junipers, a hunter might get only a couple of seconds to see a bull, decide whether or not to take it, draw, and make the shot. With that scenario, field judging might just be limited to a quick look at the eye-guards, the spread, mass, maybe the thirds, and MAYBE length of beam before you had to be at full draw ready to take the shot. ...NOT a lot of time to make a decision.

Here's a couple of pics of the bull...

After they left, Kurt and I continued on, and - long story short - didn't see much or find much of importance after that. ...we did find a couple of small sheds, and after a PILE of looking over maps and Sat. images, we decided to call it a day, and head back over the hill and back to work!

Back on the east side of the hill, with no time to get back up to the unit, all I could do for the next couple of weeks was lean on Kurt's brother-in-law to keep me up to date on what he was seeing up there; he had a buddy that drew a rifle tag (hunting up there right now, actually) and the two of them were going to be making a couple more trips up there before archery season kicked off.

By the week before the archery opener, the only bulls that had been seen up there were two more 330ish bulls, and a couple of raghorns; no shooters ANYWHERE - and they had covered the unit fairly well.

Not good. Especially since they had received more rain up there than anyone could remember; antler quality should have been phenomenal - at least above average!

Again, for many folks, a 330 bull is a great bull (heck, it is for ME!) but for 12 points, I was really hoping for better; there are a bunch of 1 to 3 or 4 point units out there producing 330 bulls on a regular basis... For 12 points, I was still hoping for 350+...

So...with a week left to go until season opener, I had a dilemma; keep the tag, go up for two weeks, and hope to find a bull, or turn the tag in, and wait until next year. After some serious internal debate, I finally decided I should keep the tag and go for it; primarily because I hadn't been able to get up there myself and look around like I had wanted to (so I really couldn't say a big bull WASN'T there), and because the vegetation was the best it had been in a LOOOOOONG time. ...and - to be honest - because a nagging little voice in my head kept saying, "C'mon Chris, put your money where your mouth is.." If I'm going to give seminars each year, and ask folks to come listen to me, then I had better have the goods to back it up! ...I think sometimes (often times) internal challenges to one's self can be more of a motivation than external ones!

I kept the tag...

My plan was to spend the few days before season looking for bulls, checking out new access points, and looking for a good camp site so that come opening day, I had a concrete game plan (or as close to one as possible). Getting up to the unit on Tuesday evening, I headed to the alfalfa field to do some glassing and see what - if anything - was using it.

Upon getting to the overlook, I heard the bulls before I could see them; MAN I love hearing the first bugles of the season! Looking through the binocs, I could see quite a few animals down near the field. Looking through the spotting scope, there were a TON of animals near the field. In all, 120 elk were using the alfalfa and surrounding lands, with only about 10 smallish bulls, and one mid-330's bull. Well... at least I was seeing elk!

I spent that night looking far and wide from my vantage point, but the only animals I could see were right below me. Because any searches to the west of my position were essentially looking into the sun, I figured I'd have to wait until morning to really get a good look of the area, so I camped there for the night. There is something so peaceful about falling to sleep with faint bugles in the background every-now-and-then.

...and for those that are wondering, NO the alfalfa field is private and off-limits to hunting!

I spent some time looking at the biggest bull in the group (pictured above) to make sure I knew exactly what he looked like so that if for some reason I ran into him later on, I would know - with some level of certainty - which bull it was. Good length, good spread, good mass, but not much in the way of tine length.

As I sat looking at him, I started to think back to when Kurt and I had come up earlier in August. On that trip, we had seen a bull that was similar to this bull over in Unit 201 on another private alfalfa field. Really similar. Actually VERY similar. Hold on a minute...

After a quick look at my maps, I realized the alfalfa field we had seen the bull in two weeks or so prior, was actually only about 2 miles away, almost straight to the northeast. I looked back through the spotting scope and realized I was QUITE likely looking at the exact same bull! The bull seen during the scouting trip had about a dozen cows out in the field with him, and given the closeness in proximity, the easy terrain between the two points, and the quality of BOTH fields, I was pretty certain it was the same bull. ...a neat coincidence yes, but problematic, I thought, if I ever wanted to come back (should I need to) and try to harvest this bull. If this bull had been over in 201 before, it was quite likely he could go back at any time (keep that in mind for later...).

...if I wanted to make a play for this bull during the season, it would have to be earlier than later, I thought. Great. I have a bull just shy of what I was originally looking for, a NICE bull, but it wasn't likely to stick around waiting for me to make up my mind.

Upgraded programs and new back-ups. Sweeeeeeet!

One look at the photo and you probably know where this story is headed.

So...I'm sitting there glassing the alfalfa field and searching as much area as my spotting scope will cover (and that's a LOT of area), when all of a sudden the elk below me start running all over the field. By the way they were running I could tell they weren't having any fun, so I quickly scanned the binocs around to see what was up. A person? A bear? Coyotes?

Nope. Superman.

This little unlucky bugger decided that the piece of old tarp laying partly buried under old hay bales made a great target for his antler thrashing. Unfortunately for him, the tarp was hell bent on revenge!

I can only guess that when his antlers stuck into the tarp and he pulled his head back - with it firmly attached - it scared the ever-lovin' bejeebas out of him!

When I saw him for the first time, he was doing Mach 20 across the field, headed right for the largest group of cows. Him being a younger bull, and him needing the "safety" and "affirmations" of the larger group was every other elk's worst nightmare. The more he ran toward other elk, the more those elk ran and scattered. The more they scattered, the more he "knew" this scary thing on his head MUST be trying to eat him. For 20 minutes or so, they all ran around the field, him with the tarp stretched out over his neck and back flapping in the wind...

For about the first few minutes of the ordeal, I was concerned for the poor bugger (and all the rest that had to deal with him), but as he ran for a little while longer, I could see the tarp starting to come loose; I knew it was a matter of time before it fell out, but whether that was going to be sooner than later was unknown.

Like I said, the whole ordeal lasted about 20 or so minutes, but the interesting thing was that at about 10 to 12 minutes in, the herd bull and all the other branch antler bulls bailed on the rest of the group, and headed OUT! They flat. out. LEFT! ...out of the field, over the fence, and up into the mountains they went, and they BARELY paused to stop and look back. While the rest of the cows were scattering and figuring out what to do, the "boys" were leavin'!

As the elk started into the timber, I could keep track of both the bulls and the cows as they entered timber clearings and popped out on small ridge lines. Eventually, they all got grouped back up together (for the most part) and somewhere in the timber, superman lost his "cape."

Although the little escapade sent all the animals out of the field, I wasn't too disappointed because I had at least discovered a possible escape route. Should the other archery hunter (and/or ML hunters later) bump elk out of the field (by screwing around on the field's "edges") - and I was interested in a bull out there - I knew how they would likely leave the field and where they might go. Not bad info to have... Now I just needed a bull out there I was interested in going after.

The next couple of days had me driving all over the place trying to find access through some of the private ground (with very little luck) and trying to get a game plan together on where I wanted to be, and find a camping spot once I was there!

During this period of the trip, the most "exciting" thing to report was the fact that I almost dumped the camper out of the back of the truck heading back up in on one of the nightmarish roads that the unit pummels you with!

Headed up a steep slope, with the truck in 4-low and crawling about 1 mph, I hit a couple of rocks that twisted the truck so violently that the "S" hook attaching the camper chain to the truck-bed anchor stretched almost straight, and came flying off. ...oh yeah, and the camper rocked violently to the side and then came slamming back down in the bed.

I stopped the truck.

Here I was, half-way up the side of the mountain, NO way to simply turn around at this point, and with no other "S" hook to attach the chain back up. There was no WAY I was going to continue climbing with only one front chain hooked up either!

Tearing through the truck, I found the only thing I could use - a large Master Lock that I used for job sites. BINGO BABY! Using the lock, I hooked the now-cockeyed camper back up to the truck and started to figure out how to get the heck out of there for one, where to go to get the REAL parts I needed for locking down the camper for two, and where to CAMP so I could pull the camper off and not have to have this happen again, because - oh yeah - I had bent the front of the bed earlier in the trip going DOWN a steep rocky road...

Driving around with the camper attached was not a reasonable long-term plan for this hunt. With no 4-wheeler, I was stuck with my "leather personnel carriers" or the truck. Time to find a camp site.

After what seemed like a million miles on the truck, and a few tons of dust later - I finally settled on an area that gave me several options as far as access to public ground, and put me in an out-of-the-way place where the cattle wouldn't bother me (they were EVERYWHERE - and being worked/moved daily by the ranchers), and I would have a little peace, quite, and privacy.

As if it was meant to be, the camp spot I found had a large, nearly perfectly level, and perfectly flat, section of bedrock and crushed granite that was PERFECTLY positioned to allow me to pull the camper off the truck; no more crawling over rocky roads at 1 mph praying not to lose the camper!

I had found "Camp Sweet Home" - at least for a little while! ...its AMAZING how well a truck can crawl around on nasty roads without a camper shell! Who knew???

The best place I had found to glass the alfalfa field and surrounding areas was actually within Unit 201. As I approached my lookout point, I noticed a few elk out in the wide open BLM and thought to myself, "Hmmmm, look at that." As I continued driving however, my thoughts changed to, "uuuuuuuhhhhh... which elk are these?????"

As I drove, elk started to stand up out of the grass EVERYWHERE; there were elk all OVER the place! Just about the time I got up next to the closest animals, they all turned and started running toward the river and - I had guessed - toward the field. I punched the gas and FLEW to the lookout to arrive just in time to see all 120 animals come down out of Unit 201, swim the river, and enter the alfalfa field again!

Great - they're using BOTH sides of the river. My idea of "keeping" the big herd bull as a "back-up" bull was starting to fall apart. Had I not accidentally spooked them back over into Unit 1, there was a good chance they would have continued on that evening back to the private ground in 201 from whence the herd bull originally came.

Not good; tomorrow was the opener, I still hadn't found a "shooter" and the best bull so far was flirting with heading out of the unit. ...and I still hadn't run across the OTHER archery hunter, and had no idea where he/she would be heading!

On my way back, I swung into the camping area at Brown's Park to find a camp set-up and a couple of guys enjoying an evening beverage. "Bingo, there he is," I thought. After a quick chat, I found out that they were NOT hunting, but that they had seen a guy with a fully loaded 4-wheeler head south across the river who had made the statement that he was "packing in camp."

Hmmmmm... that meant that he WASN'T going to be hunting on the north end (no overnight parking in the Refuge, and I never saw him heading in on the road while I was glassing...), and that the herd bull might just make it through the weekend. ...maybe my back-up plan might still hold together.

If he wasn't hunting the north end, then the only other place within 4-wheeler distance was up the same draw that Kurt and I had explored back in August - the same one that had been hammered by pre-season activity. "Sweet! ...he can have that area!" I thought to myself... "I'll focus on the south end for the weekend..."

So you can picture this next scene, let me say that it was 10:15 or so by this time - pitch black out - I was rooting through my truck cab - so both doors were open (thus the dome light was on) - and I had the lights on in the camper, with the inverter generator going (albeit on the "economy" setting so it was quiet, but... on none-the-less).

I grabbed my backpack and turned to head toward the camper when right above camp - not more than 400 to 500 yards away, in PLAIN sight of camp, the deepest, nastiest, "jurassic" sounding bugle ripped forth off the ridge!

"You've got to be kidding me!" I stood dumbfounded, staring blankly into the darkness in the direction of the bugle trying to figure out whether or not I really just heard what I thought I heard, or was the other hunter up there messing with me? About 2 minutes later, I got my answer, when the bull bugled again - this time a bit closer; he was still up above me, but was moving somewhat toward me along the ridge! There was NO WAY he didn't know I was there, he simply just didn't care!

I'd be lying to you if I didn't say my heart jumped up into my throat and my adrenaline didn't spike; the only bugles I had heard up to this point were made by the largest bulls seen so far (330ish bulls), and had only been light squeals. What the heck was THIS bull?!?!?!!?!

I got up, grabbed a bite to eat, threw my cloths on, grabbed my gear, quietly snuck out of the camper, and headed to where I thought I could set up on the bull and either catch a glimpse of him above me, or simply call him in.

As I cleared the timber surrounding camp, I looked east and noticed the sky was pitch black - with not even a hint of pink in the horizon. I looked at my watch and it read 4:33am. What the...? Apparently, the iPhone had the wrong time-sync... Note to self: check your WATCH from now on...

Nothing like being out in the field - within striking distance of an animal - and having more than an hour to kill before you can do anything. While I don't mind getting out early, I do mind being really close to an animal with the wind shifting back and forth. While the thermals were coming down the slope from time to time, a front had moved in overnight and the prevailing winds were taking my scent roughly parallel to the slope; if the bull dropped too far, too fast, he was going to wind me before I could ever see him!

The plan was simple: wait until it go light enough to glass up the slope and lay eyes on him, and if he was big enough, call him in. Simple enough. Well, that is of course as long as the bull keeps doing what the bull had been doing all night.

Apparently that wasn't his plan, because juuuuuuust before it was light enough for me to see him a couple of hundred yards away from me, he decided he was going to head up and over to the OPPOSITE side of the ridge! Son-of-a....!!!! I either needed to call to him now - in the relative dark - or risk not being able to get on him later; the ridge wasn't exactly an easy one to get up and over!

As he was starting to head over the ridge, a second bull bugled down-ridge from the "jurassic" bull, and was working his way in our collective direction - there were now TWO bulls above me - and a third bugled from way off to the east of me (remember that bull for later...).

I dumped my pack, got ready with the bow, and popped in my mouth call. ...all I needed was about 5 more minutes of light and I'd be able to see both of them, but I knew one call was likely to put the "jurassic" bull in my LAP! eeeewww. EEEEEeeeeew. ...I gave them a couple of lost mews as if I was a cow that had heard them and was coming in looking.

"Jurassic" HAMMERED me as soon as he heard me! And just as I had feared, he was instantly on his way. Down through the sagebrush he came and snapping and tripping over dead sage as he descended, so I was able to follow his progress. Luckily, after he had covered about half the distance, he paused above me for several minutes, allowing it to get light enough to see him thrashing a juniper. Unfortunately, he was behind too much cover that filled the gap between us, and I couldn't get a good look at him. Based on the light in the sky, and the distance he still needed to cover (if he continued at his leisurely pace) I figured that it would be legal shooting light by the time he stepped in front of me if I called him in. The second bull was also getting closer, but "jurassic" was definitely going to beat him...

All of you guys that came to my seminars this past summer know EXACTLY what I did next; I pulled out my Hyper Lip Double, and sounded like a mature cow and told "jurassic" to come to me. His response? A perfect bull mew that might as well have been a "Yes, ma'am!" and here he came.

At about 80 yards, I could see tips of antlers coming through the junipers; my heart was POUNDING! Come on - PLEEEEEEEEEEESE be a shooter! At about 50 yards, I finally exhaled when I saw that he was an absolutely PERFECT 310 to 315-class 6x6. Figures...I never get lucky...

Unfortunately, I had dumped my pack and moved about 20 yards from it - and my camera - so I didn't get to snap any pictures of him. He stopped about 15 or so yards, broadside, and stood there looking for the cow he had heard. Not seeing anything, he continued on past me and started to get down wind. As soon as he winded me, I stood up to lay eyes on the second bull, and to kick "jurassic" out and away from the other bull. No matter, though, the second bull was nearly the same size, and "jurassic" just stood there, at 20 to 25 yards, staring at me. ...I literally had to start talking to him and walking toward him before he finally got the picture that maybe he ought to get out of there.

As he trotted up the slope toward the second bull, I had a revelation about myself; I realized, at that moment, that I didn't have a problem with killing elk, I had a problem with NOT killing elk. In NO other year - in any of the OTC units I hunt - would I have EVER let that bull walk!!!!! AAAaaaarrggh - it was almost PAINFUL to let him walk away after being that close, and offering such a PERFECT shot opportunity. Oh yeah, and he was 300 yards from the truck, 20 yards off an old two-track BLM/ranch road!!!!! ...it was painful, I'm telling you... Painful!

BUT...after a few moments of personal clarification of why I had burned 12 points, I was content, and off to do more searching...

Rob

After not more than a couple of minutes of me sitting there, a SMALL 6x6 (possibly just a medium 5x5) all of a sudden popped out from behind a juniper with his head up, and his chin poking in the air. Uh oh...busted! Although the wind was blowing parallel to the elk from where I was sitting, apparently the thermals and prevailing winds conspired somehow to make a 90 degree turn down the ridge from me, and carry my scent straight down to the elk.

Before I could even try and figure out what to do/where to move, the bull turned, trotted downslope to the bottom of the valley, and then turned and followed the valley all the way down to a stock pond that was at the bottom, continued up and out the other side, up and over three ridges, and out of sight. ...approximately 1.5 to 2 miles away! Note to self: when these bulls get spooked, they DO NOT mess around!!! ...the cows on the other hand, stood around looking around, and finally slowly made their way a short distance up slope and out of my scent path, and disappeared into a small patch of timber.

As I watched the bull, I could see him periodically stop, check the wind, reconfirm that something wasn't right, and continue on. ...the way he was heading out, it seemed as though he was keeping the wind at his back the whole way. ...keep THAT in mind for later as well...

After a good nap, I drove around to where I could check out the stock pond seen earlier that morning. ...definitely some use, but not recent. As I continued on, I found a second pond that had a separate wallow being formed downstream from it; this one was a little more used. "Hmmmm... might have to put a camera on this wallow and see what's coming in."

I didn't have the camera with me at the time, so I headed back to camp and got ready for the evening "scout." Back up the ridge above camp that evening with the bow and spotting scope, nothing showed itself again, so back to camp I went to hatch a plan for Day 2 of season...

Just as I got back to camp "jurassic" let me know he was right back where he was the night before; just above camp, watching me get ready for Day 2! "...well, at least he'll be talking, and hopefully he'll get the bull I heard to east this morning talking again tomorrow..."

The plan for Day 2 was to head east in search of the "mystery" bull...

I quickly learned that "in no time" had a completely different meaning when the "plugging along" entailed navigating through 3 miles of old, decadent, overly-mature sage brush! If I haven't already stated so - I HATE sagebrush. Yes... hate is a strong word, but here it is wholly inadequate to describe how I feel about sagebrush! ...besides making the trip an exercise in "two steps right, one forward, three steps left, two forward, one step right, two forwar - CRAP - two steps back, one step right, NOW forward..." the fact that they absolutely sent my allergies off the charts didn't help any either!

Luckily, I had left early that morning, so I was able to get through the sage, through the cattle, and over to where I had heard the bull the day before right at daybreak.

Not a peep.

I set the spotting scope up and scanned the flats in front of me from several different vantage points, and nothing. I focussed the scope over into areas within the Monument just to see if anything was over there, and still nothing! What the...? There was a bull right here yesterday morning - somewhere!

Well...at least I hadn't been spooking things out in front of me, I guess...

As I traveled along - stopping and glassing still at each new vantage point - I came across these rock formations...

While the rock structures could have been sandstone, they were REALLY hard rock, so whatever created the "basins" must have taken a REEEEEEAALLLY long time. ...but the fact that they were each their own little basin, so stacked up on top of one another perplexed me. ...I don't know... I thought it was pretty interesting!

Other than noticing how cool the rocks were (both literally and figuratively...), I also noticed how well they would provide a stable platform for my tripod, so - up went the spotting scope again.

As you can see by the shadows in the photos, it was now about 9 in the morning... and other than the mulies, I hadn't seen hardly a thing...

As I scanned far and wide, out of curiosity, I scanned back toward camp (roughly 3 miles away) and WHAM - elk! ...right above camp. ...the same elk that were there opening day - plus, apparently, the cows from the opposite side of the ridge. They stuck out like sore thumbs in the morning light. They also hadn't said a PEEP that morning as I was out at daybreak, and they were still out feeding in the wide open.

"Well," I thought.. "good news is the elk are still out and in the open. Bad news - apparently - there aren't any elk anywhere on MY side of the valley."

As I continued scanning, WAAAAAY off in the distance, up a draw that was a good distance from camp, and hidden from view from pretty much everywhere but the spot I was standing in, I just caught a glimpse of two decent bulls heading down in elevation, heading into a pocket of thick junipers from the open slopes above. Based on the brief look I got, they appeared to be in the 320 or so inch class, and - for some reason - I got the impression they were FOLLOWING other elk down into the timber. Well.... I now knew where I needed to be that evening!

Packing up the scope, I continued on to check out the rest of the area on my side of the unit, before heading back to the west, and back to camp for the mid-day nap session...

Although it showed some potential, nothing really caught my attention, so back across the valley I headed, but now it was getting close to noon. With no clouds. With very little breeze. With 3+ miles of dry, dusty, pain-in-the-blankety-blank sage brush to navigate through.

I bundled everything up onto my pack (the Mainbeam pack ROCKS by the way...), grabbed my water bottle, and headed out... plugging away toward camp...

Oh, and if you want a mid-day nap to feel REALLY good - round out an 8 or 9 mile hike the morning right before it... It works, trust me!

Rob

Knowing it was going be another long hike, I decided to leave early and take my time so-as not to get too sweaty on the way in. In addition, smoke from the California and Utah wildfires was starting to filter in more and more throughout the day, so huffing and puffing and sucking wind wasn't too enjoyable.

An hour after leaving camp, I topped the ridge and paused to catch my breath. Almost as soon as I paused, however, I looked in the direction of where I thought the elk had been, and caught BOTH bulls moving upslope toward a hidden bowl roughly 1,000 or so yards in front of me. Again, they looked as though they were following somebody...

Well... no rest for the wicked, or anxious I guess, so with the wind in my face, I took off running toward the bulls as soon as they dropped out of sight below a ridge horizon in front of me. About 300 yards into the run, jog, walk, catch-my-breath ordeal, I noticed my right boot heel felt a bit weird; I had blown out the interior heel of my well worn-in boots! Great. Another 200 yards on steep angles, rough country, and nasty sage, and I had a hotspot!

"Oh well, suck it up, you can tape it up later..." As I approached the false horizon where I lost sight of the bulls, I peeked over the edge just in time to see the bulls STILL moving up slope, and disappearing behind another false horizon. In the distance, I heard a faint bugle, and could tell it didn't come from the ones I could see. BINGO BABY! ...there WERE other elk in there!

As I continued to search for the second bull I had been seeing on my stalk, the wind suddenly shifted from about my 2 o'clock position (noon = blowing directly in my face) to my 4 o'clock position. ...I'll give you one guess as to where I found the second bull...

As soon as I noticed the change in wind direction, a head and rack popped up out from behind a juniper about 250 yards below me, and directly down wind. With chin in the air, he did an about face, and did exactly what the other bull did the day before; flat out left the county!

Luckily, his buddy - the other 320-class satellite bull - was too busy wallowing to notice (he was still out of my scent path for the time being), and the herd bull and cows were either out of sight, or too busy feeding to notice. One bull down, but several more in front of me to look at...

I guess hind-sight being 20/20, I should have taken the initial wind shift as a warning...

There went bull #2, with chin up, and hooves-a-pounding as he trotted and stotted up and over the opposite ridge in front of me. Somehow, the herd bull thought this exit was due to his "awesomeness" or something, because rather than getting spooked, the herd bull - still out of sight over the false horizon - bugled aggressively, with the cows above him continuing to feed.

I guess hind-sight being 20/20 I should have taken the second wind shift...

Uh huh, famous last words...

As I crept forward, the stinkin' false horizon kept going, and going, with the bull still farther down in the bowl. The cows, however, were being exposed more, and more, and more, to where I had to start timing my movements to coincide when they all head their heads buried in the sage.

Just as it did during the previous 15 or so minutes, the wind shifted again, and before I could lay eyes on the herd bull, it shifted and blew directly toward the herd bull. It blew good and steady, too. About 10 mph straight and true, right at him. In about 15 minutes the wind did a complete 180 at THE worst and most critical time it could; I was - shall we say - NOT a happy camper! ...yes, there were some mumbled choice words for the wind at that moment.

I didn't wait for what I knew was going to come if I stuck around. I whirled around and hauled butt out of there, doing my best to stay low so the cows didn't spot me, but moving fast enough to get my scent path out of the nose of the herd bull.

Remember that hotspot? Here I was, roughly 800 or so yards away from any sort of terrain, timber, or other cover, and with no way to get above or below the direct "wind-line" of the bull. My only choice? Run as fast as I could, into the wind, back the way I came in, and hope, HOPE that the wind swirled down in the bowl enough for him to not pick me up.

I never stopped, and I never looked back until I was up and over the ridge away from them. At the time, my plan was to get the heck out of there so I could come back another day and get a look at him - if I hadn't blown him out of there already.

By the time I reached the ridge above camp, it was near pitch-dark, and the "hotspot" was now the worst blister I think I've ever had, smack dab in the middle of my heel!

So much for day two...

The wind, she is a fickle mistress!

Excellent story. You are bringing us right into the hunt. Great job!

(If only we didn't know the ending already - LOL!!)

Lou - when I think of a "mistress," I'm thinking of someone who...well... let's just say one might "enjoy" spending time with. ...she was NO mistress on this hunt. "She" was more toward the opposite end of the spectrum on this one. ...we'll get into that over the next few "installments."

And you THINK you know how it ended... You can do amazing things with Photoshop these days!!!!! :-)

Because it was dark, and because the route I had taken INTO the area was REALLY steep and nasty stuff, I decided to take an "easier" route around the side of the mountain to a more gentle slope down to camp, rather than straight down to camp via the "quicker" way, yet more technical and - so I thought - painful way...

Hindsight being 20/20...

To spare MYSELF reliving that trip back to camp, let me just say that unless you actually SEE what contour lines on a map represent on the ground, hoping that contour lines represent an easy, leisurely, route across the hills can be sorely (literally) disappointing! The series of "gentle" secondary ridges and swales around the mountain - in fact - turned out to be a series of cliffs and rocky crags, and deep and steep drainages. What would have been an hour or so hike straight down the mountain back to camp, turned into a 2.5 hour hike around the mountain back to camp. It got so bad, that for the last portion of the trip "around" the mountain, I hiked straight to the top and up and over to spare myself having to go through ANOTHER round of technical traversing and bushwacking!

I finally got back to camp and could tell my heal was SHREDDED! Pulling my sock off, what I thought was a bad blister was actually THREE bad blisters - one inside the next! Hiking around the next few days was really going to be fun now...

Little did I know that THAT blister was just the start of it...

So, I decided to sleep in on the morning of day 3. I had hiked more than about 14 miles the day before, likely spooked the only "promising" group of elk I knew about, and had a heel that wasn't really up the challenge so-to-speak. I figured a good resting, letting the elk settle down and hopefully come back to the area, and letting my heel heal up a bit was a good plan; I still had nearly two more weeks alloted for the trip, so I had time...

I slept in, woke up, ate some breakfast, and went BACK to bed. By now, the smoke was REALLY getting bad, my allergies were having a blast, and for some reason my bed was feeling REALLY GOOD right then.

I finally got up and moving around at about 1 pm or so. Knowing I wasn't up for doing much hiking, I decided to take the truck over to the water holes I had seen a couple days before, see if there was anything using them - and set a camera or two if there were - and then head back up to the alfalfa field to see if the "herd" bull was there.

I parked the truck and hobbled over the pond/wallow, and immediately whipped around and scampered my way back to the truck to get the game camera; elk had hit the pond either that morning or the night before, and it looked like a PILE of elk had hit it, and at least one branch antlered bull was in the group. With no real tree nearby, I found some old dead wood lying around, fashioned a way to prop it up near the pond so the elk wouldn't mess with it, and set the camera. ...with any luck, in a day or two I would see who was around and if they were worth a closer look with my bow. Because the drainage the pond/wallow was in was impossible to glass into, the camera was really the best way to see what was going on in there without just hunting it all day.

As I left the area, the brakes continued to squeak - nothing I did would clear the dust while I was on the rough roads, but I figured a couple hour drive to the alfalfa field and back would eventually clear it out, so I continued on. About halfway to the lookout however, the squeak had gone from just a squeak to a grinding squeak. "Great - did I get a rock in the pads or something???"

NOT being in ANY sort of place to do anything about the noise, I continued on to the lookout; I'd get up there, check the brakes - pull the tire if I had to - and then see what was in the field.

On arrival at the lookout, the brakes were sounding really bad, and upon a quick visual, I found a long shard of metal stuck in the brake pad/caliper. A leatherman and a good tug later, the shard was out, and I was setting up the tripod and dreaming of big bulls... I was good to go...

Broadening my search, I ended up searching every inch of what I could see from my vantage point and found nothing! By now, the sun was starting to get pretty low in the horizon, and the field and surrounding mountain sides were already in shadow. Finally, as the sun was about halfway below the horizon, WAAAY off in the distance, a couple cows popped out of the junipers and headed toward the field. Here they came...

Well... some of them anyway. The last time I was there, 120 elk were traveling together and using the field. Tonight, 30. ...and no "herd" bull. Did the other hunter kill him? Was the other hunter even over here, did he spook them out of the area? ...or did the big boy take the majority of the group back across the river into 201? The more I thought about it, the more I was convinced the herd bull and most of the other elk had gone back over into 201. Great. Who knows if they would be back...

Sitting until it was too dark to see the field anymore, no other elk showed up, and no elk were talking anywhere. It was quiet. Climbing back into the truck, I looked at my maps again, and finally figured that focusing on the water hole, and the elk I had spooked the day before, were my best bets in looking for a shooter. So... I cranked up the truck and headed out...

"What in the...?"

I got back out, looked at the brakes, and couldn't see anything glaringly wrong. The pads looked worn, but there should have been enough pad to keep them from grinding... Unless one broke and had a chunk in there lodged somehow...

Luckily I had cell phone service, so I called home and talked with my wife about what was going on. Still figuring it was the left-front brake pad/caliper, her and I did some separate investigations into whether or not Maybell had any brake shop/repair shop where I could have them looked at. ...maybe I could simply spend the night with Kurt's parents or brother-in-law - or CAMP if I needed to - and have them fixed in the morning.

No such luck; Maybell's got nothing! Closest towns? Either Craig, CO (roughly 2 hours away) or Vernal, UT (another 2 hours away). After pondering for a bit, the little voice in my head kept saying, "...better head to CRAIG and get this fixed now..." so I told my wife that I was going to drive to Maybell, stay the night there, and then head to Craig in the morning to get the brakes fixed. Knowing I was probably going to chew up a rotor, I figured it wasn't going to be a cheap repair, but at least they would be fixed.

Well, at least I had the, "...it wasn't going to be a cheap repair..." right...

I headed down the road and it quickly started to get worse. ...luckily I had several miles of severe washboards to drive over before hitting the highway. As I turned onto the highway, I started to realize something was REALLY going wrong up front; now it wasn't sounding like the brakes. I stopped the truck, looked at the caliper again, and this time found that the caliper was rubbing on the inside of the rim. Great, did the caliper break loose??? A flashlight wasn't much of a help, so I called my wife again and gave her the news; I was going to try to continue on to Craig - slowly - that night and see if I could hobble the truck into town by morning so I could get whatever was wrong fixed as early as possible. If I went slow, kept my braking to a minimum, I figured I just might be able to keep the grinding to a minimum and hobble into town.

I hadn't gone two miles when I could feel the tire start to lock up. "You've GOT to be kidding me!!!!"

I got out, and for the first time got a REALLY clear picture of what was wrong... Somehow I just didn't think that a wheel sitting at a 45 degree angle was a good thing... The front wheel bearing had blown out, and I had ALMOST lost my wheel! Apparently, that shard of metal I pulled out of the caliper was a chunk of the housing of the wheel bearing!

Luckily, I was down in a hole on the highway and had ZERO cell signal! "Un-flippin-believable!" ...I was two hours from Craig, in the middle of NOwhere, a LONG ways from camp, and a two mile hike back to where I had cell service. ...with a torn up heel. At - now - 10 o'clock at night.

Rob

Can't wait to here what Chris does. No truck, No cell, bad blisters. This is when a lot of guys throw in the towel and end a hunt. It is rarely easy.

WW - That is why I am with, and will stay with, Primos. Will Primos himself has said in the very commercial advertising their Silver XP that NOTHING is 100% fool proof, and that Silver XP simply reduces your scent enough that in NORMAL conditions, animals shouldn't perceive you as a threat. Well...hiking that far, up that steep of slopes, in 80 or so degree heat (again, I had to leave early to get up there and was hiking full on in the sun), carrying a heavy pack, isn't an ORDINARY or NORMAL condition in my book - at least for ANY scent control product... I have absolute FULL confidence in Silver XP - I love the stuff - but on that hike, I would have had to pack a gallon of it just so I could keep up with my sweat and stankiness! ...Ol' Silver XP will come back into the picture later, under "normal" conditions... :-) Your post did make me smile, BTW...

I'll post some more tomorrow night... right now I have to spend time on the SAG Facebook page discussion Lake Trout issues at Blue Mesa Reservoir...

It sounds like you should have shot the bull close to your camp! No blister, no brake problems in the mountains, and your story would have been finished! We are all waiting to hear the rest of your saga.

Rob

Oh, by the way, I saw a picture of a bull taken in that area by a rifle hunter this year. Almost a twin to yours. Again, congratulations to you.

OK, now back to the story.

WW - like I said, it brought a smile. ...but I couldn't resist adding a little!

...and see if you can get a pic of the bull - post it on here, I'd love to see it! ...I'm wondering if I know them; a buddy of mine was hunting up there in first season, but we haven't connected on the phone yet! ...would be interesting if it was killed on the alfalfa field or down in the private land with the Walk-in Access.

So the wheel is hanging by a thread, I'm in the middle of nowhere, its late, and I have no cell service. ...and a monster blister that has me NOT wanting to hike the 2+ miles back to GET cell service.

Within 5 minutes of me coming to grips with the predicament I was in, two things happened; one based on a freak instance of "proper prior planning" on my part, and one based solely on luck (or... Divine intervention... I know which one I go with).

Thrasher, this next part is for you...

Last year, my wife and I purchased a SPOT satellite messenger (I've talked about this unit on other BowSite threads). I say "Wife and I" because "we" got it primarily for my "wife's" piece of mind while I was out who-knows-where in the mountains hunting. IT. IS. WORTH. EVERY. PENNY! She NEVER worries anymore. ...well, OK, I don't think she ever NOT worries - but let's say it is GREEEEAAAAAAATLY reduced.

On the unit is a little button labeled "Help." Unlike 911 that goes to emergency folks, the "Help" button sends an e-mail to whomever you designate (in my case my wife) and can mean whatever you want it to mean via a pre-designated message you plug in either before you leave the house OR you work it out with the person getting the message. Given the troubles the truck was having, my wife and I agreed - over the phone - that if I got stranded somewhere, the "Help" message meant send a tow-truck. I hit "Help."

The luck came when as soon as I hit the button, headlights started to appear down the road off in the distance. Within two minutes, a truck was headed straight for me. ...in the middle of nowhere. ...at this hour. Thank you, LORD!

I turned on my hazard lights and the dome light in the cab. The truck went by, hit his brakes, turned around, and pulled up besides me. ...I don't think I've mentioned yet that as a sportsman, I think I DO love some of the oil and gas guys...

Not only was he kind enough to stop and see if I needed help, he had a cell phone with reception!!!!! I called home, told my wife what had happened, and where I was. As we hung up, she was going to call a wrecker and have them come out and get me. ...from there we'd figure out what to do with the truck.

I thanked the good samaritan, climbed back in my truck and settled in to wait for a tow-truck. Given my location and distance someone was going to have to travel to get there, I figured if I was on a wrecker by mid-night I was doing well.

When I was talking on the phone to my wife, I was sitting on Highway 318, and said I was approximately 15 miles east of the Utah/Colorado border...

I TOLD her I was on Highway 40.

...are those two even CLOSE to one another? ...15 miles from the State line?

As I sat in the pitch dark waiting on the tow-truck that I knew was "on its way," I never even thought about the directions I had given or anything, really, about the conversation I had had with my wife. ...the truck was on its way, and all I could do was wait. ...might as well get a couple hours of sleep while I waited.

Back HOME on the other hand, my wife was trying to find a tow-truck out of Maybell, and not having any luck. She looked around Craig; again, no luck. The CLOSEST SERVICE SHE COULD FIND.........was out of Steamboat. Take a look at your map again. Go from "approximately 15 miles east of the Utah/Colorado border" and trace it AAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLLL the way back east to Steamboat. Oh, this one was going to be CHEAP!

Luckily, she got in touch with a guy in Steamboat that was towing partners with a guy out of Hayden - American Towing I believe if I remember right. ...GREAT guy! Anyway... she got in touch with HIM, and was JUUUUUUUST about to tell him where I had told her (again, 15 miles east of Utah on Highway 40) when the SPOT messenger "Help" e-mail popped up on her computer. Clicking on the link, she brought up the Google Earth map it links you to that has a little marker pointing to where I was sitting. ...on Highway 318.

She looked at the map, looked at her notes, looked back at the map, and remembered she had been talking with her husband. ...she went with the map.

At about 10 minutes past midnight, headlights once again started to light up the dark in front of me, and by 12:30 am or so, I was on my way to Craig with my truck strapped to a flatbed wrecker.

What could have turned into a NIGHTMARE of a miscommunications mistake, and a COSTLY one at that, turned out to be a flawless operation because of a little chunk of high-tech "insurance."

...being an avid hunter and having grown up in that country, and lived there all his life, we had a great conversation all the way back to Craig (2+ hours) talking about the units up there and the great bulls they can produce.

My loving wife waited up for me until I had gotten into cell range again, and after the obligatory jovial "dumb-a$$" remarks about my directions, continued on to tell me she had not only figured out where the Dodge dealership was (where she had already previously instructed Mike to take me) she also booked me a hotel room in the hotel right across the street from the dealership!

...no, she's NOT available... she's TAKEN!

I dropped the keys in the after-hours slot at the dealership at about 3 am, and headed across the street to check in at the hotel. ...the dealership opened at 7 am, so my alarm was set at 6:30 so I could be the first one in the door as they opened.

As I started across the parking lot at 6:55 am, I was third or fourth in line for the service department. "...son of a ...."

Finally my turn, I told the lady behind the counter all the glorious details of what had happened and what I needed. When I had finished, she instructed me to take a seat and wait until the Service Manager had a chance to look at it, and he would talk to me more then. 30 minutes of waiting later, I finally saw the manager and asked him what he thought about my truck. "...about what truck????" he asked.

That CONTINUED a REALLY long day. Long story short, what was supposed to take only a couple of hours (because the part was "just down the road," took the entire day. LUCKILY, they rolled the truck out of the service bay just a touch after 4 pm. ...with any luck, I would be fueled up, and back above the alfalfa field right before dark to glass the field again...

Pulling in to the lookout, I got set-up and braced myself for a repeat of the night before; NOTHING was in the field, again, tonight. Focusing the spotting scope in the direction the elk had materialized the night before, sure enough, a couple of cows and a few small branch antlered bulls materialized out of the smoke and were on their way down to the field. Unfortunately, however, the largest bull with them was only about a 300-class bull. "...no shooters, not YET at least," I said to myself. ...maybe one will come in late...

The elk made it down to the field about 15 minutes before the end of what would have been "legal shooting light." As I scanned what I could of the area given the limited visibility, suddenly gun shots rang out in the river bottom somewhere below me, and only about 200 to 300 yards from the elk! BAM BAM BAM... Three shots.

As I quickly scanned the area below me, I found a beat-up truck parked right down in on the Refuge. As I scanned for the person or persons doing the shooting, another three shots range out, BAM BAM BAM!

I quickly panned over to see what the elk were doing, and they were doing exactly what I feared they were doing; they were bunching up and getting ready to head out!

Quickly trying to figure out why in the world someone would be shooting down there, I realized it was Sept. 1st. "Dove, and Teal seasons likely opened up," I thought, but - didn't both of those technically end AT sundown???? It was almost dark now! No matter, because out of the darkness came walking - quickly I might add - a single individual wearing a bright white t-shirt. There ain't a Dove hunter or Teal hunter in the world that I know of that wears a white t-shirt in a sea of green and dark green vegetation to go hunting in.

I still don't know what the guy was doing. What I DO know is, is that he was definitely in a hurry to get out of there! Being a bit, shall-we-say, suspicious, I called the DWM who in turn immediately got in touch with the Refuge folks so they could go check it out. ...from what I saw, there should have been no way for that individual to get out of there without running in to one of the Refuge LE officers...

Meanwhile, the elk were leaving the field. It was too dark to see where they were headed, but they were headin'! So much for the alfalfa field for a while!

Back in the truck, I was on my way back to camp - finally.

Great story!

Really been enjoying your story. Glad you held off until after season. The gap between CO archery and whitetails over Thanksgiving in IL creates cabin fever that is tough to overcome. Fishing helps a little, but doesn't compare to bowhunting.

Been considering a Spot for the very reasons you mention above.

Get a SPOT - you will NOT regret it!!!!!

OK, I'm off to bed. ...more tomorrow hopefully.

I wish that didn't sound so familiar. Happy I've still got work but tired of home improvements and the "other commitments".

Good luck in KS.

Thanks!

winner

chris this has been fun to read, might we have more please sir.

winner

chris this has been fun to read, might we have more please sir.

When I had left the area the previous day, I had found a couple of promising spots that needed further looking into: the "herd" bull that I was never able to lay eyes on, and the group of elk (again, never seen) that had used the pond/wallow I had found. Because the pond/wallow was SEVERAL miles away (but at least had my game camera on it), and because the unseen "herd" bull was at least within walking distance from camp, I decided to go check out the "herd" bull in the morning, and then drive over to check the camera later that afternoon. Armed with those two pieces of information (should nothing happen in the morning), I would have a better idea on where to go for the evening scout/hunt.

While that all sounded fine and dandy, three little things were going to make the morning's hunt an interesting proposition: one was my heel (which was STILL not doing well), second was the smoke (which made visibility problematic), and third was the wind direction as I headed over to where I thought the bull might be.

Pulling some gorilla tape out of my truck, I taped up my heel in hopes that the tape would help make walking a bit more bearable, and give me the ability to cover the ground I was hoping to cover in search of the unseen "herd" bull. ...it was likely that I could end up covering another 6+ miles that morning.

Looking in my boots, I saw the hole I had blown through the interior of the heel, and decided to grab the "new" boots I had brought along on the trip. ...roughly a month old, I had had a chance to break them in OK, and hike around on uneven terrain a bit, but I never REALLY had the chance to give them a good field test. Today would be it. ...I hadn't had any problem with them so far, so I didn't give them a second thought as I put them on.

Stepping out of the camper, I was praying for a SW wind; if it stayed consistent with what it had been doing the last several mornings, I would have the wind in my face the whole way in to where the bull should be.

As for the smoke? Well, I was just going to have to make due...

I couldn't believe it... Just 20 minutes into the morning's hunt, and I already had another hotspot forming (this time on my LEFT heel), and the wind was absolutely in the perfect WRONG direction for what I needed to do that day!

Contemplating my options, I decided to suck it up and at least get to the top of the ridge where I could set-up and glass/listen. Judging from the hike I had taken previously, that was another 30 minutes or more away. By the time I got to the spot I wanted to be, I had ANOTHER nasty blister to contend with!

Luckily, however, as it started to get light enough to see, I could hear bugles in the basin below me, but just to the side and upslope enough to be out of my scent path. As the light grew enough for my spotting scope and binocs to be of use, a total of 25 bulls were out in the sage before me, feeding, sparring, and just milling around. THAT was a promising start!

As I glassed the bulls, again I found myself looking at a pile of small branch antlered bulls, with only a couple of bulls in the 300+ range. The largest two bulls were a really nice wide 320-class 6x6, and a bull I dubbed "Mr. Perfect."

"Mr. Perfect" was a beautiful 330-class 6x6 with great eye guards, really nice thirds that stuck way out to the sides, good length, and good mass. ...all he lacked were good top tines. I dubbed him "Mr. Perfect" because when he turned his head to the side, the other half of his rack disappeared; if he had 2 inches of deductions on him I would have been SHOCKED! It was if the two halves of his rack were mirror images of each other. He was beautiful.

While I was sitting and watching, the 320 bull and "Mr. Perfect" were wandering back and forth, bugling, and peeking over every high point and into every juniper patch looking for cows. "Mr. Perfect" was high on the ridge just a few hundred yards from me, and next to terrain that would have allowed me to RUN to within 60 or 70 yards of him - without him ever being the wiser - and call him in from a downwind position. Without exaggeration, it would have been a done deal!

2shot - your previous assessment regarding the bull on opening morning was QUITE at the forefront of my mind at this point!

So far I hadn't seen any "shooters", I'd blown out both heels, I'd trashed my truck, and now I have a GORGEOUS bull in front of me that I really liked. ...I've been very fortunate over the years to have taken a number of nice 6x6 or better bulls, but EVERY one of them is an odd-ball in some way; some have grossly uneven tine lengths, some have unmatched tines, one - my biggest - even has half of his main beam busted off! The one bull I have been longing for for quite some time now is a PERFECT mature 6x6, and he was now standing right in front of me in almost the most PERFECT position!

As the bulls headed over the ridge to bed down for the day, I couldn't help but think that maybe it was a GOOD thing that I got that new blister... Had I not, I might have been a bit more tempted to fill my tag that morning. As I got up to head back to camp, I realized, NO this WASN'T a good thing! Hobbling back into camp, I pulled off my boots and socks to see another compound blister right smack dab in the middle (actually ACROSS the middle) of my left heel!

Oooohhhhhh, the next few days were going to be FUN!!!!

...I've been wearing Cabela's Denali hunting boots for the better part of 12 years or so, and have gone through COUNTLESS pairs. Not ONCE have I ever had a hotspot, let alone blister, during the break-in period or in general wear; for my feet, they USED to be the best boots I'd ever worn, PERIOD.

For some strange reason, THIS year, Meindle (the makers of the boot) decided to change the style just a wee bit. Apparently, that slight change, changed how the boot flexed when going up STEEP hills (not general rough terrain or low hills like I was on during my "break-in" period) and that is where I found the problem!

Because of that, I just - TODAY - received three different sets of boots via UPS (the Cabela's store in Sydney is WORTHLESS anymore...) so that I could try on the new boots and see which ones were going to work for next year!

...blisters during a hunt will NOT be happening again if I have anything to do with it!

I enjoy your seminars and this story. Keep it coming.

Your story reminds me why I'm a AAA member. They have helped me out of a few jams in remote country. Just give them a call, and they do all the work in getting you picked up.

Mark

2shot - TELL ME ABOUT IT!!!!! I mean seriously... you have a great boot for more than 10 years, and you decide to "tweak" it for marketing purposes. JUST MAKE ANOTHER BOOT!!!!!

My replacements all showed up to the house, so I'll be "carpet" testing new boots this week, and then taking them for a walk from there...

A large part of the reason behind me putting my story on here was to quell the "rumors" around my season and Unit 1, and to share with you the realities I learned about the area that would have DEFINITELY affected how I perceived the unit had I known about it before I put in for the tag.

On "normal" years, you could draw Unit 1 with 9 or 10 points. Right now, I've had guys with 17+ points wanting to burn them in Unit 1. NOT WORTH IT... in my opinion, but we'll get to that in coming posts.

My heels were genuinely, 100%, pure grade-A torn UP!

For the remainder of the day, I snacked, hydrated, slept, and - through it all - kept my left foot elevated and "air drying" in hopes to have it dry out and be "tapable" for the evening adventure. When 4 o'clock rolled around, I got dressed, popped a couple of ibuprofen, taped up my mangled feet, and stared at the only two pairs of boots I had brought with me on the trip. "...great, which ones do I wear now?"

Grabbing my old - and previously trusty - boots, I spent a few minutes cleaning out the blow-out hole in the heel in hopes that the clean-up would make wearing them a bit more bearable - if not get them back to where they were before the problems began. Sliding them on my feet, it hurt... but walking was going to be do-able.

Ok...here we go...

As I started across the ridge, I was careful to pick my way along and stay out of sight of the bulls I had bedded that morning. A number of them, including "Mr. Perfect," had bedded near a knob that had decent visibility of the side-hill I needed to cross (the one I had to RUN across fighting the wind) and the last thing I wanted to do was blow HIM out of the country. As I took a moment to contemplate wind direction and approach strategy so I didn't spook the bedded bachelor group, a branch antlered bull showed up and took care of all my worries for me...

Three or four hundred or so yards directly in front of me, and DIRECTLY in the path I HAD to take to get where I wanted to be, a young bull fed his way up and over one of the false horizons on the slope, and parked himself there as if to run defense for the rest of the guys down below. I was absolutely stuck. The only way out of the position I was in, was directly backward, over the ridge line, and then - literally - back to camp! Given my throbbing feet at this point, THAT wasn't going to be an option! ...if I got up here, at least I could sit and glass the area again.

Sitting there glassing, the same group of bulls from the morning came back out, but another bull showed himself as well. Through the binocs I could clearly see he wasn't anything to be seriously looking at (probably a 300-class bull), but hey - I like antlers - so of course I had to check him out and give him a closer look.

As I turned the spotting scope on him and brought him into focus, I was instantly mesmerized and in total admiration. There in my scope was a bull that was AT LEAST 10+ years old. Clearly on the downhill side of antler development, he was a clean 6x6, very heavy, with OK tine and beam length, and a funky pedicle on his left side. His body was MASSIVE, but showed the signs of serious -yet healthy - old-age; large, deep sagging belly, muscular chest, but with a deep sagging brisket, sagging ears, and a drawn, grey face, with a decent roman nose. Imagine an old angus bull for the body, and an old golden retriever or lab for the face; a face that still has the underlying color, but with the muzzle washed with grey hairs.

He. Was. AWESOME! The cool part about the whole deal while watching him (which...he captivated a bunch of my attention that evening), was that he was definitely trying to keep himself separated from the rest of the younger bulls. Every time another bull started up the slope toward him, he slowly, calmly, confidently, swung his massive head in their direction, laid his ears FLAT back, and that was it; EVERY single bull that headed his way got the message and - without even breaking stride - turned around and went another way. It was great. They obviously knew who he was, and - even though he could've be "taken" by one of the younger bulls of equal antler size, or even "Mr. Perfect" - everyone seemed to know that he deserved a bit of respect, and a wide berth. He was cool.

With the evening light absolutely perfect, and with "Mr. Perfect" up against a great background, I decided to try and get him to come out of the junipers just a little bit so I could try to snap a picture of him through the spotting scope. For some reason, my digital camera was having fits about focusing and photographing through the scope (even though it had just fine several days prior...) and only bright light scenarios were doable. This was - well - perfect.

Camera ready, and spotting scope focused, I reaching into my pocket and pulled out my Hyper Lip Single. "A couple of Lost Mews, and he should lift his head to take a look and I'll get a great shot."

eeeeEEEEEEwwww, EEEEEEEewwwww... He lifted his head alright, but before I could snap a picture, a bugle ripped forth below me, startling me and making me snap around and look. About 200 to 250 yards away, his buddy, the 320 bull, was staring hard in my direction. From his position, I was somewhat sky-lined, so all I could do was freeze and wait for him to turn back to what he had been doing, or go back to feeding. No such luck. Here he came. And fast!

"Son-of-a...." My pack was open with stuff strewn about, my tripod set up over my lap, my bow off to my side, and me sitting in the wide open on the ridge with a bull running toward me!

As soon as he dropped out of site below me - just as he was starting to climb up to my position - I did my best impression of an octopus, somehow grew 4 more arms, snatched up all my gear in some sort of flailing motion, and bailed off the top of the ridge. Running, I headed downwind along the ridge to get out of the way of the 320 bull, in hopes he would simply come up, not see anything, turn around, and head back from where he came.

Well, he came up, didn't see anything, and turned around, but instead of heading back, simply lost focus, and started feeding right where he stood! Great! Now he was in between me and camp, and I was off the back side of the ridge where I couldn't see anything, or anybody...

As I packed up my gear (it was now getting toward dark), a bugle sounded out below me; it was "Mr. Perfect." Peeking over the ridge, I could see the tips of his antlers about 150 yards below me. Wind in my face, plenty of cover around me, about 10 more minutes of legal shooting light, him only 150 yards away, and a perfect travel corridor right to my location. Hmmm...

I headed back to camp...

Can't wait for the next installment!

Since I had another 8 or 9 days of the hunt left by this point, I was still on the "hold out for a big one" kick...

up until now I have quietly enjoying your adventure. Your issues have convinced me why I quick chasing the PP's and the hunt of the life time. Some of us (AKA Me) will be too old or light-weights to go through what you have already... I am waiting for your next chapter!

I could not agree with you more. I have 9 PP and I am 57 years old (I should have ten but I wrote a check one time that was $0.25 short - before we could apply online:). I will be 65 before I can hunt 2, 201 or 10. And I am already finding each hunting season a little harder than the year before (and I jog, bike, and backpack all summer).

I look at the limited units I could be hunting at least every other year that would have less hunting pressure than OTC units, and I ask myself why? So I have started researching and I am amazed at what I am finding. So I decided I am going to apply for unit 61 this next year, and then start hunting the limited units where one can draw with zero or one point.

And somehow I think Chris's story is going to convince me that this is the right decision.

The excellent story continues. Chris, considering where you are hunting and the amount of time you had left, I'd have passed on a 320 bull too, and not thought twice about it. But I'm not walking on your butchered feet, either, so depends upon the situation....

Great story, and really looking forward to the rest!

More tomorrow... AND we're getting close to more pics!!! I promise!

winner

Rob

I TOLD you they were bad blisters!!!!!

Before I continue on with it, let me take a sidestep of sorts, and share a couple of things I learned about the unit after drawing the tag, and WHILE up there hunting the unit, that helped shape my thinking a bit over the previous couple of days and the remainder of my hunt...

I always had heard that for Unit 1, the elk are either there, or they're not! My initial impression was that the saying was about elk in general, which is true, but I found out it REALLY pertained to LARGE bulls more specifically.

Talking with a few Utah hunters I saw while traveling between the central-west portion of the Unit and the north (the only way you CAN travel the unit via vehicle), a few locals that know the area well, and the DWM, Unit 1 can be a tricky place. On the north end, bulls use both the Unit 1 side of the river just about as much as they use the 201 side, so catching them in there is a matter of timing. Just like I saw with the alfalfa field "herd" bull, he was there for a few days, and then just GONE! Some years they are in there, other years they aren't. Luckily, though, the elk on the north are somewhat "shielded" from too much disturbance due to trophy elk management areas surrounding it. If elk are around, you're pretty much assured that no-one will mess with them before archery season starts - hopefully.

The south and western portions of the unit, however, are different. On that side of the Unit, elk routinely go between Utah and Colorado. I originally was excited about that - knowing what type of bulls Utah can produce - but unfortunately I overlooked two important pieces of data; how the Utah side is MANAGED for elk, and what the human traffic was like in that area of the Unit/State line.

As I shared earlier, in one spot, Utah folks had knocked down a wilderness boundary fence, and driven all OVER inside Colorado while they were messing around in Utah as well. Talking with the DWM, he knew there were problems from time to time in that area, but hadn't ever seen the fence knocked down like that before. ...talking to a couple of Utah hunters during my hunt, they were all too familiar with what goes on between Utah and Colorado. Even THEY were ticked about how many Utah guys drive all OVER the Colorado side, looking for bulls, and trying to spook them back over to the Utah side. One guy even passed along the fact that Utah guys poach "over there" pretty regularly as if it were common knowledge.

While that's just peachy in itself, the other little tidbit of relevant info is that Utah starts their deer and elk archery season on 15 August (I believe) each year. THIS year, that meant the Utah hunters would be running around in there a full two weeks before I was in there. ...if they routinely "hunt" both sides of the fence (not everyone, but one or two could easily be enough), what would that mean for my hunt? Before I had drawn the tag, I had thought the activity on the Utah side would help push elk over into Colorado. ...if one, two, or more "hunters" were taking liberties to follow them right on over, then the only other place the elk could go would be down into the Dinosaur National Monument. Not good.

Given that info, I essentially classified the Unit into two "opportunity sets"; the north end with bulls coming and going between 1 and 201 (wherein I was essentially waiting to get lucky to have a shooter bull come on over), and the "rest of the Unit" where bulls might have been pushed over from Utah (wherein, I needed to try and look over every bull I could, and go for the biggest one I found). ...I know that is pretty simplistic, but its how I classified it in order to figure out how best to spend my time; hence my periodic "checks" of the alfalfa field, with my concerted effort being done everywhere south of the northern 1/3 of the Unit.

Although I had seen some really nice looking bulls so far (Mr. Perfect was looking better every time I looked at him...), I hadn't seen "everywhere" I had wanted to yet, and - so far - all the "good" bulls had pretty much the same characteristics; GREAT front tines, decent thirds, OK fourths, and then not much for 5ths. Mass varied, as did spread and beam length. What I wanted to find - NEEDED to find - was a bull with good tops. Given the fronts on everything, a bull with good tops would (should) put me over my predetermined "shooter" mark, or at least gotten me close. At this point, the first good looking 340 bull would have been in SERIOUS trouble! My thought was that if I could somehow get over to the last couple of areas that needed to be checked out and see what was there, I could determine which bull was the best bull so far, and then decide on whether or not to make a play for him. That plan allowed for a week to 10 days of "scouting"/hunting, and left a week or so to "get 'er done."

As I limped my way back to camp (not hobbled... via better living through chemistry...) after having "passed" on the 320 bull and "Mr. Perfect" - AGAIN - I finally came to the conclusion that enough was enough. I HAD to get over into the last remaining areas and check them out; I couldn't keep wasting time sitting on a ridge looking at the same old elk, not "getting anywhere" so-to-speak.

Given the location the bachelor group was consistently using, I figured if I skirted WAY around them in the dark the next morning, I could get over into the area I needed to without spooking them. Then, if the wind wasn't perfect when I got over there, I would be far enough away from the group that should I need to move around to better position myself, my movement SHOULDN'T spook them too badly. It was a gamble, but one I decided I wanted to take. After all, I still hadn't laid eyes on the "herd" bull from several days ago - the one that actually had COWS with him.

Still walking, I did a quick calculation in my head and - figuring the distance, terrain, and my current state of hiking ability - I realized I would have to get up REALLY early to get over to where I wanted to glass from at a decent hour. From camp, it was going to be at least 4 miles away - one way - in order to get to where I needed to be. ...with some pretty significant elevation gains and drops, I might add...

By the time I had made it back to camp, I had made up my mind that with enough food, water, ibuprofen, etc., I could hike over in the dark in the morning, look around, stay all day, glass the evening, and then hike back again in the dark to minimize disturbance and wear and tear on my heels. If I needed to, I had even worked out a plan to pack a spike camp over near the area...

I was set for the morning! A good Mountain House meal (nothing like getting 120% of your daily allowance of Sodium in one sitting...), a little rehydration, and a good night's sleep, and I was excited again to get up early and check out a new area.

Though, each morning I put myself through it & I check it out just like an addiction!!!

Keep it coming! :)

winner

I just feed you dribs and drabs and string you along... :-)

Consider it MENTAL conditioning; if you can hang with this, then elk season should be easier next year!

Please don't just all of a sudden post "the end" and leave us all hanging.

Im enjoying the 'high'... :)

winner

Uuuuuuhh...they did what to to a bear? :^)

We should now be at the morning of September 3rd. ...although the alarm clock went off waaaaaay too early (that's the problem with trying to hydrate yourself prior to bed; all the "middle-of-the-night" trips to go pee...), I dragged myself out of bed and got ready for a long day. Again, I was planning on taking a long day and trekking into new territory to look for new bulls.

Once again with the backpack fully loaded, I headed to the top of the ridge, but this time, I was headed off across the mountain instead of continuing along the ridge line; it was going to be more work/hiking, but it was hopefully going to put me on the opposite side of the mountain from the bachelor group, and allow me to head to the new area undetected.

Well... that was the plan anyway.

As I crested the ridge, the clickety-clackin' of antlers stopped me in my tracks. It was pitch dark, and off in front of me by a couple hundred or so yards were two bulls sparring. Based on the location of the sound, they were ALMOST down wind of me given the early morning thermals that were sinking perfectly down the mountain. Luckily (knowing the terrain from previous trips to this spot), the bulls sounded like they were just on the opposite side of a deep swale, so although I couldn't move anywhere as of yet, I was confident that they wouldn't smell me.

As I stood there contemplating what to do, other bulls started sparring in the darkness, with these bulls scattered across the mountain in front of me. Soon after that, a familiar bugle sang out across the cold air; the 320 bull and companion to "Mr. Perfect."

"You have GOT to be kidding me," I hissed under my breath - aloud, but quietly! The bachelor group had literally crossed over the ridge, came down the other side, and were milling around DIRECTLY in the path that I needed to go! Until these bulls moved out, I was going NOwhere! Again!

Going back and forth in my mind for a while, I finally resigned myself to staying put, waiting for daylight, using the new location to glass at least a portion of new country, and figuring out which way the bulls went off to bed for the day so I could come up with a game plan for that evening. At that point, I was ready to DRIVE over to the new area, CAMP there, and figure out somehow to stash the truck in the junipers somehow to hide it from any elk that might be around and close by.

So... I waited. Sitting on a rock watching the elk mess around in the sage, I periodically glassed the chunk of "new" ground with the binocs. Now... this "new" ground was actually the far extension of the drainage where the 5x5 or small 6x6 from opening day had run to when he caught a whiff of me. Remember the wind currents? ...if not, revisit the post on 15 October...

Anyway... where I was now sitting was down the ridge a ways from where I was opening morning. I could see the first stock pond off in the distance, and a little more of the area where the small bull had run into several days before. Not seeing anything moving way out there as of yet, I hadn't bothered to set the spotting scope up...

After sitting there a while (and after the bulls below me and out scattered across the mountain in front of me had bugled a few times), a faint bugle drifted in from WAY off in the distance. "HELLO! Who are you?!?!"

Scanning the distance with the binocs, I finally picked up an elk moving through the sage way off toward the Utah line. From what I could tell, the sage was pretty tall, and as such, the bull was barely visible from time to time, so it was time to get the spotting scope out. As I set up the scope, one more bugle drifted in from that direction. When I finally settled the focus on him, I could see he was indeed wading through some pretty deep sage, but it looked as though he was headed in my/the bachelor group's direction; it looked like he had come up and over from the opposite side of a small ridge, and was slowly working his way closer. Although it was a long way off, I could tell it was another 310 to 320-class bull, similar to all the rest I'd been seeing. "Oh well," I thought, "he's new so I'll watch him for a bit more and see what happens..."

"What happens" is that while I was sitting there watching this new bull, a bugle comes drifting in from his direction again, only he hadn't been the one to bugle - he had been feeding. Zooming out a bit on the spotting scope, I started scanning the slope he was on and quickly found a second bull; another 320ish-class bull. This one was also heading in "our" collective direction, but he looked like he was following someone. Continuing my scan in the direction the bull was headed, I ran into another bull. Almost immediately it hit me... TOPS!!!!

This bull had TOPS! GOOD swords, GOOD 5ths, and from what I could see, nice 3rds as well. His head was down in the sage, so I couldn't see his eye-guards, but I didn't care; my only thought was, "Shooter!"

I watched as the bulls worked their way down their side of the slope, and within a minute or two, could tell where they were headed; the stock pond!

Between them and where I sat, there was a drainage that the bulls would either drop down into and follow down to the pond, or... they would pop up on top of the ridge above the pond, and then continue on. My bet was that they were going to follow the drainage down to the pond, so as the bulls continued on their path, I started to pack up; I was going in after 'em!

Checking the bachelor group to my left, I figured out a way to drop down behind a little terrain break next to me, head down-slope, and then, by the time I had reached the end of the break, I would be out of sight of the group and able to take off running toward the new bulls. Given the distance and the height of the sage (and the fact that the sun was in their eyes) I figured it was a safe gamble to head straight at them for a ways to close the distance, and then get sneaky when I got closer.

At this point, the wind had shifted and instead of heading down-slope, it was headed from my left to right - UP slope a little bit, and DEFINITELY in my favor. At this point, only two things could go wrong; the wind could switch, and/or the bulls could make it down the the pond before I could.

I'm sure you know how that turned out...

Well... it didn't. Just as I hit the road, I could hear splashing in the pond. "Son-of-a...!!!!" ...At least one bull had beaten me to the pond, and I knew which one that was - the big one that was in the lead the entire time I had been watching them!

"Oh well..." I continued on down the road trying to close the distance while he was still wallowing, but just as soon as he had started, it was quiet again. He was already done!

In this photo, you can see the stock pond, and at the 4 or 5 o'clock position from the pond you can see a relatively small "round" juniper. In general, I had made it to that point, when the big bull started to head up the game/cattle trail out of the pond. While it may not look like it in the picture, from that position, I was low enough that the pond was still hidden behind the low ridge in front of me. However, as soon as he stepped up onto the berm, and headed up to the trail, he - and I - was in FULL view! I was pinned. He wasn't more that a couple hundred yards at that point, but we were both in the wide open.

No sooner did the third bull step into view, I could feel the wind die down, go completely calm, and then reverse itself and refer back to your typical early morning thermals. ...the cold air was settling straight down into the pond!

For about 30 seconds I could hear splashing in the wallow. Then, it got quiet. I had HOPED the bull was simply done wallowing - STUNK TO HIGH HEAVEN - and was making his way up to the other bulls. Instead, he had stopped wallowing alright, but he climbed up onto the berm with his chin in the air!

Unbelievable.

As I watched the elk, the big bull was thrashing a juniper, and the other upper bull was feeding and had absolutely no idea anything was wrong. The lower bull was still nervous, but really didn't quite know what to make of the issue. He was looking upwind, but wasn't able to put his "nose" on where I was, or how much of a threat he was detecting. Here you go >-WW-> ...I told you the 'ol Silver XP would come back into the picture! That morning, I had DRENCHED all of my clothes, backpack, bow, arrows, hat, etc. with Silver XP to help cut down a day's worth of sweat and stink. By that time in the morning however, I really hadn't worked up any sweat, so I have to believe my "scent signature" was fairly minimal.

As I held my breath - pretty much literally - I waited to see what was going to happen. He knew something was up, but couldn't pinpoint the threat, and - apparently - couldn't tell I was that CLOSE; I was about 100 yards away, but DIRECTLY upwind.

About 30 seconds to a minute went by (an eternity), and the bull finally turned and slowly headed up the hill to the other two bulls, still with his chin in the air, and paused to look back when he got up to them. He wasn't looking toward me, instead, he was looking up the valley past me, way up slope. The only thing I can think, is that he thought the human he was smelling was up on the ridge way up above.

The other two bulls had noticed him by now, and were also looking around. Luckily, by this time, all three bulls were up-slope enough that I think they were out of my scent stream. No matter though, because with just a 5 to 10 second pause, the big bull turned and was heading out. ...and I mean OUT!

From the stock pond, all three elk headed upslope following the game/cattle trail. Knowing the wind was bad, and they were already spooked, I knew I wasn't going after them, but instead, as they cleared the ridge line, I turned around and started heading back up slope away from the bulls; if I gained enough elevation - carefully without them seeing me - then I might be able to keep track of them and where they head off to.

No sooner did I make it 50 yards, and the elk popped into view on the top of the next ridge away. Stopping to glass them, I watched them disappear over that ridge, slightly turning to their right and heading back to where - I presumed - they originally came from that morning.

As they disappeared, I again headed uphill. Again, just a few moments later, the elk popped into view heading up and across the large slope, heading for the junipers. I sat and watched, and as I watched, I noticed the two smaller bulls would stop every now and then to look back. The big bull never did. ...and he never stopped moving. He knew something had been wrong back there, and wasn't about to stop until he got to where he knew he wanted to be. None of them ever ran, they all simply walked, but it was that fast, purposeful walk you see them do when you know they're on a mission.

As I watched them head out of sight into the junipers (the thick patch that hangs over the ridge line just below and left of the white chalk cliff in the background), I knew I had my work cut out for me that day. If I wanted a shot at this bull, I was going to have to somehow figure out where they stopped in that timber (IF they stopped), where they likely bedded, where they were likely to come out that evening (if they did so before legal shooting light ended), and how to set-up given the myriad of "wind direction" scenarios I could be facing that night.

...it was back to camp to get to work!

(the previous two photos were taken on my way back to camp, not during the stalk, hence the reason the sun angle in so high in the sky)

Rob

Fantastic recollection of your hunt! After being recommended to check this thread out, I too have been following along. I've been pondering about putting together a jounal during my hunts, after reading yours as well others I'm sure I'll have a journal in my back pack on the next go around.

Oh yeah, what's keeping up the next installment! I'm dying here!

You're a great story teller, the amount of detail in your posts blows me away. You do a great job putting the reader in your shoes. I've been keeping a journal for the last 10-12 years but it reads more like "wake up 4am, full moon-rainy, 12pm-missed an elk, 9 pm ate a big dinner" I actually probably elaborate more on the dinner menu then I do the details of the day.

Looking forward to "the rest of the story".

This is so true. I've been limping around the house ever since reading about those blisters.

Rob

I didn't realize the benefits of a journal until a couple of years ago when I was able to look back over past entries, see a pattern develop in one of my hunting areas, and then plan my hunt according to what I had been able to tease out of the journal. The hunt was PHENOMINAL - all thanks to having taken the time to jot down detailed notes of my seasons.

D - hey, at least you'll be able to pattern your meal selection better! :-)

Rob - suck it up brother, we've got some more hikin' to do!

So I finally see what I believe is the first "shooter" bull in the Unit so far, and his buddy ends up winding me and sends the group up and out, and back from whence they came. Great start. [its great when you actually get to use "whence" in a sentence, isn't it? ...anyway...]

Heading back to camp, my mind started going through all the things that I knew, and that I didn't know about the bull, the area, and the upcoming hunt that evening.

What I knew: 1) The wind SUCKED lately! I probably wasn't going to be able to predict its direction later that night, and even if I could get in down wind of the bulls, there was no guarantee that the wind would stay consistent. My approach into where I set-up (wherever the heck that would be...), and my set-up itself, were going to have to be near perfect if I wanted a decent shot at getting, well... a shot.

2) Because the wind was so unpredictable, I was going to have to come up with a plan for nearly every possible wind condition I might run into that night.

3) The big bull appeared interested in the commotion the other elk were causing, and was pretty confident in his movements and purpose of direction. My guess was he was interested in finding cows, so carefully selected, and strategically placed, cow calls might be the ticket for getting him to come in.

4) I had a LOT of work ahead of me to to figure out the things I DIDN'T know...

What I didn't know:

1) Where the heck the bulls went! After they went into the thick junipers, they were gone; I had no idea where they went, or how far in/over they went after heading out of sight.

2) What the terrain looked like where they headed into.

3) What the cover looked like.

4) What the wind currents did wherever they went.

5) Where they would be heading - if anywhere - once evening came.

6) ...how the heck I was going to figure all this out in 8 to 10 hours without actually going INTO the area, and without spooking the bulls even more.

Pulling out all my maps, I figured out where I had first seen the bulls that morning, where they had traveled, and where I had last seen them, and started picking apart where they might have gone. Although the terrain they headed into looked relatively flat and uniform (albeit HUGE) - a gentle wide slope about a half mile wide or so and about 3/4 of a mile long - there was one little "hiccup" in the contour lines on the map; a little depression in the side of the slope where the terrain might have flattened out a bit. This "pocket" was a few hundred yards from where the bulls had disappeared over the ridge. Hmmmmm... wouldn't be too far of a stretch to think that might be a great spot for a bedding area....

While that was a bit of promising news, looking at the map a bit more, however, revealed there was almost no way to get to a spot to glass into the area. Only one spot way off to the southwest would give me a chance at seeing a small PORTION of the slope. "Well, a portion is better than nothing" I thought, so the truck was fired up...

In order to get to the vantage point, I had to head west out of the Unit into Utah on the same road I had traveled before when I set the game camera on the other pond/wallow. "Great time to check it..."

As I approached the pond, I could immediately tell someone else had been in the area; 4-wheeler tracks up and down the road and around the pond, and my note was gone. Because there was no way to lock up my camera, all I could do was put my trust in the decency of my fellow man to not steal it or mess with the Flash card. In an effort to persuade anyone who might see the camera to leave it alone, I attached a paper note to the log (in a way that it couldn't fall off - it had to be pulled off) that read something like:

"Password Protected - please do not disturb. Colorado Unit 1 Archery Hunter. If you are interested in seeing the pictures taken at this location, locate the white dodge pick-up or white truck-bed camper at [such and such location]."

The 4-wheeler tracks had been up and down the road repeatedly over the past couple of days; they were either in there during the middle of the day, or they were in there in the middle of the night. ...and the tracks traveled far into the Utah side, so my guess was it was one of the "Utah boys" I talked about earlier. "Great! ...have they seen the bull? Do they know what's over here? Are they just curious, or are they planning on/willing to coming over to find him if they DO know he's over here? ...or is this just a local rancher? ...or is this the other Colorado hunter?" I had no idea, but what I did know was that I was a bit uneasy about it. I finally found a possible shooter, and someone else was driving around in there, and pretty close to the area the bull was currently using.

I traveled on...

The entire slope was a huge expanse of junipers, with the trees petering out into the sage up toward the top of the slope, and growing progressively thicker the farther down the slope you went. ...and the pocket was in the thick portion.

Although I knew I couldn't see the whole slope, the "pocket" and upper portion of the slope looked like a great place for elk to bed and hole-up for the day. ...it was far enough from the edge I watched them disappear over for most elk to feel safe, and it was a distinguishable (minor - but still distinguishable) landmark on an otherwise monotypic expanse of terrain and junipers. If I were an elk I'd bed there - possibly...

Glassing all I could (which didn't take long...), I packed up and headed back to camp. Nothing more I could do now other than stare at a map, play with likely wind directions, and come up with approach routes for getting in there that evening. ...oh, and shoot the bow a little bit (the last thing I needed to do was miss or make a bad shot if I DID get a shot opportunity), take a shower, and re-tape my heels...

Given the fact that this was the first potential shooter I had seen, the 4-wheeler tracks up and down the road, and the uncertainty of where this bull might go after tonight should he get bumped by someone messing around out there in the dark, or should he simply get a wild hair to head out to somewhere new (kinda like he was doing that morning), I figured if I could get myself into a good position, I would make a serious play for him. He looked big enough, so if I had the chance to fill the tag that night, I'd take it.

I do not know Chris but from his humor on this thread I thought even he would appreciate that. Insert his laugh here. Muahaaa hhaaa hhaaa.

Just kidding of course. Great story! How bout the next installment

Signed: Mr. patient

winner

Should be able to add a few hopefully tonight. ...unless we want to go for a record and shoot for 400+ entries!

And I did forget to mention that the camera was fine, but only one spike bull was caught on film. Apparently the group of elk that went through that first night, continued on and went somewhere else.

Showered up, taped up, and packed up, I headed out of camp a little later than normal. Given the bulls had been spooked a bit earlier that morning, I figured they weren't likely to be overly anxious to get out and about; my guess was that they would be up and moving closer to dark than the bachelor group had been. Since the bulls had headed into an area with an unobstructed view of the low western horizon, my guess was they wouldn't show themselves until the sun had either gone down, or at the earliest, was very near the horizon.

Because of the way the terrain was, I knew I could drive the truck over the mountain and get a bit closer without being detected; a fact I was more than willing to exploit given the fact my heels weren't exactly happy about the morning's escapade. Parking about a mile from where I thought the elk were, I tucked the truck down into a hole and out of sight, and finished getting ready. I had fresh camo sealed in air-tight bags, fresh socks, and a pack with NO spotting scope and NO tripod in it! I wasn't going to be taking any chances, and this was no scouting trip!

Before putting on my clothes, I DRENCHED them in Silver XP. Stripping gear out of my pack down to the absolute minimum I needed to carry, I soaked that as well. ...my hat actually had XP dripping out of it as I left the truck and headed toward the bulls; there twernt gunna be any playin' around with wind that night!!!!!

As I approached the back side of the slope I thought (HOPED) the bulls were bedded on, I checked, double checked, and TRIPLE checked the wind direction. For nearly 10 minutes the wind was gentle and consistent out of the southwest - absolutely PERFECT if it stayed that way for the rest of the evening. "Perfect" because not only did it allow me to easily approach the area in which I thought the bulls would come out from the downwind side, but it also meant the "downwind side" would put me directly between the bulls, and the pond they used that morning, and the bachelor group that they had been heading to! ...a logical direction they might want to go once the sun went down; especially since the bachelor group was already back out and in the sage just above the pond on the opposite ridge!

...I couldn't believe it! No wonder I didn't see the bachelor group when I had hiked up and out that morning. Rather than heading up and over "their' ridge again, they had headed down hill toward the valley floor and the junipers down there. As I made my way around to the downwind side of "my" bulls, I had to creep and sneak from sage to sage, and juniper to juniper so as not to bump the bachelor group bulls that were scattered out between 300 and 600 or so yards away. These things would just NOT leave me ALONE!!!! (I know, I know... what a problem to have, right? ...but in this case...)

After a few minutes of weighing this set-up vs. that set-up, that stand of junipers with that clump of junipers, I finally found a spot I was happy with; a single medium sized tree (about 12 or so feet across and fairly dense), with several loose clumps/trees off to the sides of me, a big patch of loose timber behind me, and a fairly open sage corridor in front of me heading generally to where I thought the bulls might have been. For this set-up, I decided to set up on the OPPOSITE side of the tree from where I thought the bulls might come in from so as to stay out of the direct sun and in the shade of the tree, as well as to allow me to shift left or right if need be under some sort of cover should the bulls come in high or low. ...not knowing exactly where they were - if they were even there - forced me to "keep my options open." Regardless which direction they came in on (right or left), the large patch of junipers behind me by about 40 to 50 yards made the area around my location the most logical "doorway" for the bulls to pause in. If they were there in front of me somewhere, it should have been the "perfect" set-up, or so I had hoped.

Just as I started to clear grass, dead sage, twigs, etc. from the area around my feet, a bugle sounded off 250 yards or so directly in front of me, at the perfect opposite end of the sage corridor! "BINGO BABY!!!"

Quickly finishing my clearing, I dropped my pack, pulled my quiver, nocked an arrow, grabbed my release, and grabbed my binocs and rangefinder. A quick scan in the binocs out in front of me showed the tips of the antlers of the 320-ish bull sticking up above some low junipers. Checking my footing, I quickly started to range various junipers around me; 41 yards, 53 yards, 67 yards, 25 yards... I picked the most likely spots the bulls might cross to the left or to the right of me, and made note of the ranges. Without getting into a debate on shot distances, with my bow and overall archery set-up, I know I can COMFORTABLY (with accuracy) shoot to 65 yards with plenty of energy to get a good pass through; I had practiced shooting at distance a good bit in August and was confident in my abilities. Given the openness of the area, I was fully prepared to have the bulls pass by at 45+ yards, so I took a moment to calm myself a little bit and go through the mental motions of taking a 45, 55, or 65 yard shot if that was the shot that presented itself.

With ranges set, the ground in front of me cleared out, my pack out of the way and an arrow ready, I grabbed my calls...

I gave him about 5 seconds, and "answered" him with a couple of high-pitched Lost Mews with the Imperial Plate; eeeeEEEEWW... EEEEEEEWW...

As soon as the last call left my mouth, two things happened simultaneously; the 320-ish bull snapped his head around in my direction, and the big bull leapt to his feet! Apparently, the 320-ish bull had been standing pretty close to the big bull as he was bedded, because when the big bull jumped up, the two of them weren't more than a couple of yards apart. As soon as the big bull got locked on to my direction, he also let loose with a bugle.

Letting their curiosity stew for a bit, I stayed quiet and took a moment to double check what I was looking at; "OK... the 320-ish bull is on the left, and the big bull - is it the big bull... Big tops? Little kick to the tip of the main beam on that one side? Check - yes, its him... the big bull is on the right..." Trying not to move too much, I had to peer through the juniper I was hiding behind as the bulls were directly in front of me, standing and staring in my direction. As I watched, the third bull materialized out of the junipers behind the other two, and started feeding.

After a minute or so, the big bull bugled again, and started thrashing the juniper next to him while the 320-ish bull still stood looking around. With the third bull still feeding, the 320-ish bull looking off to my left somewhere, and the big bull just starting to pause in his thrashing effort, I hit them with the Hyper Lip Double;

"Come Here."

All three looked in my direction, and then started scanning around me.

"Come HERE, NOW!"

What happened next was absolutely beautiful...

Instantly, the big bull was on his way.

Never bugling after that, the big bull took the lead, the 320-ish bull followed (at a safe distance), and the third bull half-heartedly took up the rear, feeding as he went. As the big bull walked, he mewed every now and then, and stopped at every juniper in his path to give it a royal thrashing. Only one problem; he was headed STRAIGHT to me. Not to the left a little bit. Not to the right a little bit. DEAD at me. To the point where I was actually having trouble seeing him through the juniper I was standing behind.

Every now and then I had to peek around the center of the juniper to check his progress; although I could hear occasional snapping of twigs and a mew now and then, between the three of them (which were staggered a bit), it was hard to keep track of which snap belonged to which bull! Although I chose to wear the predator green deception that night because it blended in almost PERFECTLY with junipers, I was worried about me being silhouetted behind the tree and having my movement spotted. As such, I stayed pretty much centered behind the juniper until the trunk no longer masked the big bull's movement; in no time, he was headed straight to my tree, and closing fast!

1:40 am

Ward, pass the chips, pleeze.

I have to admit, I'm usually pretty calm up to the point of taking the shot, but my heart was POUNDING! "...this thing is going to thrash the tree I'm standing behind!!!!!" Here I stood, bow and arrow facing the bull/tree, with me on hair trigger waiting for him to go left or right.

At THE. LAST. SECOND. the bull raised his head and veered to my right (being right handed, the absolute worst side to choose). As his head went behind the bulk of the juniper branches, in one fluid motion I stepped forward, rotated to the right, and came to full draw. Just as I anchored, he cleared the tree and came to a stop with just his shoulder clear of the tree. I can still hear him breathing and - for lack of a better way to describe it - "licking his lips."

With him looking straight ahead, I centered the sight in the peep, and in a smooth motion rotated my upper body and dropped the sight down and as far back behind his shoulder as I could without hitting juniper branches. In my peripheral vision, I could see him JUST start to turn his head to look in my direction when I touched off the release. ...so much for long distance shots! I literally centered the entire SIGHT WINDOW on his chest!

WHACK! At 6... 7... 8 feet (I don't know, it was less than three steps), the arrow SLAMMED into him and buried up to the fletching, angling down through the chest, tight behind the shoulder. He EXPLODED out of there, ran about 20 yards, swung around me, and crashed down hill.

"That's a dead bull."

I took a deep breathe, smiled, said a few well deserving and heart-felt "Thank Yous" to the Lord above, and - out of habit - grabbed another arrow. Checking on MY bull, he was about 60 or so yards down hill, and - well - not going to need a second arrow.

As I put the arrow back in the quiver, and started to set my bow down, movement in front of me caught my eye; it was the 320-ish bull. He had continued on in, and had watched the whole thing from about 20 to 30 yards out. Still behind the juniper a bit, I was able to get my camera out and snap a couple of pictures as he cautiously approached, trying to figure out what the heck was wrong with his buddy!

I couldn't believe it - my bull had a 4-point stance more solid than my TRUCK it seemed; he just wouldn't give in. Finally, after what was a heck of a lot longer than I was expecting, he laid down and it was over.

...it wasn't until then, that this bull and the third bull finally figured out something wasn't right, and headed back to where they had been bedded.

Jason

And by the way the story doesn't end here. After we collect our thoughts of what just we happened, I decide we should walk up the ridge which was our original plan. We walk about twenty minutes up the hil while I am playing the encounter over and over in my mind. We get to an area that we know elk cross. We decide I should try and call. As I am getting my bugle ready, hear comes a cow up the hill towards us being chased by a bull. The cow stops at about 15 yards below us and the bull walks to our left behind a small tree and brush. My hunting partner Jim draws an arrow, waiting for bull to walk out. Well, the bull trots out of the brush, broadside, never giving a shot. He turns down hill and disappears. This bull was bigger than the first, a nice six point where the other was a big five point. This bull was also caked in mud. He must have been in a wallow recently. Two bulls inside twenty yards in less than 30 minutes and no shot!

So if you have ever wondered if someone really takse your advice when asked and are successful, the answer is a resounding YES! So thanks for the advice over the years. By the way, while I have used both the original single and double hyper lip over the years, the one with the orange top is absouleltly great (I can't remember the name of it).

A big hand to you Chris, for sticking it out, not settling for a smaller bull and giveing us a great story of the events!!! A well deserved trophy indeed!

What do you think that one scored?

Jake

...now maybe I can stop the therapy I have been needing for 21+ days now and spanning more than "TWO rifle seasons"!!!! LOL! LOL!

winner

Rob

I can easily see some reading this and putting unit 1 on the top of there list. I'll look forward to the wrap-up since I haven't decided if this put unit 1 higher or lower on my list.

Stomper - I hear you! ...but it always surprises me just how fast it seems to come around again. Pretty soon we'll be planning for turkey hunting! Maybe I'll have a remarkable Kansas whitetail hunt and will have an opportunity to post that...

The other "funny" thing about this bull is his front tines; they are the shortest fronts of any bull I saw during the hunt (except maybe the alfalfa bull)!!!! Figures, don't it??? Now, before anyone gets all incensed about me "complaining" about a bull as great as he is, you do have to admit - they're pretty stubby. Take a look at the 320-ish companion bull to mine... THOSE are eye-guards! More importantly, those are the type of eye-guards that most of the 320+ bulls I saw (again, only a few) had. The entire time I watched my bull, I either never got a great look at his eye-guards, or just didn't pay attention (too busy looking at his tops). ...not that it would have mattered; just an observation. Had he had the fronts of the others, he would have been pushing 370!!!!!

Oh well... gives me incentive for next year to go find a bigger one!!!!

Oh... and anyone know a certified scorer in the Boulder/Longmont/Berthoud/Loveland/Fort Collins area? I have a buddy who is a B&C scorer, but he's in La Vita.

1) This year was an abnormally high moisture year up there. I think someone said they had more precip up there than anyone can remember. ...and that was coming off of a fairly easy winter. While the winter of two years ago killed a bunch of elk, this past year was pretty mild and "wet." Antler growth was above average in many areas up there.

2) The average bull in Unit 1 is identical to 2, 201, 10, etc. Supposedly (and from what I saw I believe it) the average bull is in the 305 to 310 range. Most "big" bulls harvested are the 320-class range. According to those who are knowledgeable of the area, occasionally the 350+ bulls make an appearance and get whacked. BUT HERE IS THE IMPORTANT DISTINCTION BETWEEN 1 AND THE OTHER UNITS - Unit 1 (in my opinion) is largely RELIANT on OTHER units/areas for its occupancy by big bulls. Yes, some big bulls may grow up there, but given the terrain and habitat across unit boundaries, habitat is comparatively "limited" in Unit 1. I truly believe that many of the big bulls that are killed on the north end of the Unit (around the alfalfa field) are actually bulls that come over from Unit 201. Big bulls in the southern 2/3's of the Unit are using BOTH Utah and Colorado. Get more rain over in the Utah side, and you may not see a bull. Period!

Case in point on both statements above... Several folks are talking about a big 390-class bull that was "picked up" by "someone" in Unit 1. Well, what's the story? First, back this summer, a credible source said that a 390 to 400-class bull had been seen in 201 - not really far from Unit 1. During the first rifle season, apparently one of the Governor's tag holders followed a 390-class bull across 201, into 1 and unloaded his gun on it twice, didn't kill it (aka, see it drop or act like it was hit), and so moved on to find another bull. ...I know what you are thinking, but stay with me, we'll come back around to that. Then, a week or so later, "someone" just happened to find a 390 bull dead in Unit 1, grabbed the antlers, snapped pictures, posted it in the Brown's Park Store, but wouldn't share any details for fear the CDOW would take the rack. Sound "weird" to you? Me too. Here is what I think - my OPINION... The rifle hunter indeed followed the bull into 1 from 201, and found it on the alfalfa field. As soon as it walked off the field, the hunter unloaded on it. Twice. Given how VERY close the Dinosaur National Monument is to the alfalfa field, my guess is the bull was able to jump the fence and get himself into the Monument; there is NOOOooooo following anything over into there, and even if the bull dropped over dead within SIGHT, Monument folks do not allow recovery of animals on their side of the fence! True statement - when an archery hunter hit a bull a while back and it jumped the fence, but could CLEARLY PROVE IT WAS SHOT ON THE PUBLIC LAND SIDE, the CDOW had to nearly get an act of CONGRESS to allow the bull to be recovered!! I guess it was a NIGHTMARE! Anyway... if the bull jumped the fence, it would make sense why the hunter went to look for "another bull" rather than staying with a 390 MONSTER! ...it also might explain why the "someone" who found the antlers is reluctant to say where he "found" them. ...just my opinion. (also, supposedly the other archery hunter in Unit 1 this year killed a big bull. "Someone" saw "pictures" of the bull and it was "supposedly" a 380-class bull. Unfortunately, however the hunter is "supposedly" not sharing any info or pictures, "supposedly" hasn't/isn't getting it scored, and - per the source of the info, in the picture the bull looked a lot like mine. Well... mine is no 380, and I know how pictures can make a bull look, so we'll see what information materializes in the days/weeks to come.)

201 produces GREAT bulls, and has more public land, and more elk, than Unit 1; hence the reason it takes a few more points to draw than Unit 1. If you have 13 to 17 points, seriously, don't burn them in Unit 1; you're better off putting them in 201 if you want to hunt big bulls!

For the southern 2/3's of the unit, the friend who helped me scout a bit up there this summer had a friend of his who drew a first rifle season tag in 1 as well. They hunted the entire week, and hunted the entire Unit. ...they saw one bull. One. ...and they had access to some of the private. Talking with a private landowner who had a tag, he had been able to take the only bull HE had seen as well; a 320-ish bull. One bull. I don't know how many points the guy burned, but - and DO NOT quote me on this - I think he burned 13 points. ...to see ONE bull. Oh, and in the area where I shot my bull, and where the bachelor group was, they never saw a single animal the entire season!

Like I said at the beginning of this story... the bulls are either there, or they aren't. When they are, from what I experienced and what others have told me who have hunted the area, you had better be able to make it happen while they're in front of you, or you just might watch them walk out of the Unit/huntable area for the rest of your hunt. I feel very fortunate that the elk were there for at least MY hunt, and that I was able to make it happen.

We got the bull packed out (Kurt's bro-in-law - the one with the friend with the rifle tag - came in and helped me), in the truck, and in coolers by mid morning the morning after shooting him. As we headed out, down off the mountain WAAAAAAY into the Unit and next to the Monument boundary came the DWM (...I felt lucky that I had filled my tag since - after him driving around right through where the bachelor group of bulls had been - I couldn't imagine where the elk might have gone!). After heading down the road a ways, I could tell he was trying to catch up to me, so I pulled over and waited. After the typical check the license, evidence of sex, etc., etc... he told me why he had been in there. Apparently, he had been trying to find/catch one or more guys from Utah that had been hunting in Utah with Utah licenses and, well, ...going over into Colorado.

I couldn't help but think of two things: 1) the tracks I had been seeing in there were probably from the Utah boys, and 2) my game camera may have helped save my hunt in that they saw someone else had been in there hunting legally and - possibly - cleared out during the times I was out and about (although that means they were probably in there at night, but....).

Although I never laid eyes on the "herd" bull with cows, I'm thinking it was a smart move to make a play for my bull when I did; had someone from Utah seen him, he may not have been around long if you know what I mean. I don't know...

...just kidding - I'm kinda partial to mine! :-)

Would I put in for it again if I somehow magically had 10+ points next year? I don't know; I guess it would have to depend on how the winter was up there and what the early spring looked like. Easy winter and wet spring - perhaps. I LOVED being able to glass long distances and locate elk without having to walk my legs off each day (this trip and blisters not withstanding...), but I have found out that I HAAAAAATTTTTEEEEEE Sage-tainted meat!!!! WOW is he the nastiest tasting elk I have ever had!!!!! ...I honestly don't know if I'll ever hunt the NW part of the State again JUST FOR THAT REASON!

Oh, and one last thing before I wrap up my final "official" post. For those that want to pick my brain next year when you draw the tag looking for access points, GPS coordinates, drainages, pockets, ponds, and wallows... I am going to make you pay out the NOSE!!!!! :-) ...I have to recover my vehicle costs somehow! :-) My wife reminded me that I had forgotten to mention one other little tid-bit of vehicle woes of this trip; during the scouting trip back in the summer, I had driven over a tree or something (well, I know I drove over a small juniper, but I'm not sure if that was it...) and poked holes in the transmission cooling lines and blew out a seal. I blew oil/tanny fluid all over the engine block/compartment on my way home, and luckily found out about it early enough the next day; I almost ran out of fluid. ...new lines, new seals, and a bunch of cleaning and testing later, and another $1,000 or so dollars went to the good people of Dodge! ...by far my most "expensive" elk yet!

...and now I have a taxidermy bill.

That one's not so bad, though! :-)

Thanks for hangin' with me through this. I hope everyone enjoyed it, and I hope I get to enjoy your stories in the future. ...I hope I get to post a few more too! Until this thread drops out of the daily hit list, I'll keep checking it each day and answer any questions folks have.

Alright - now all ya'll get back to work!!!!!

I have only seen a couple of 300 plus bulls bowhunting for elk (I started in 1986). Both were in Colorado. About eight years ago on the next to last evening of the season, I had a bull bugling above me about three hundred yards that was bugling every couple of minutes. The problem was that there a bull with a large herd of cow (30 plus) in the woods in front of me. I saw the herd go into the woods in the morning as the sun crested the ridges (I left the herd alone and went back to camp for the day with plans to ambush them that evening). If I would have went after that bull above me, my scent would have busted the herd and I figured my hunting partner and I would not have gotten a shot at anything. The bull looked alot like the 320ish bull you took a picture of except he had taller antlers. It was real hard to sit there for two hours and watch this bull through my binoculars! The herd bull had much smaller antlers than the bull above me but the herd bull had a bigger body.

Sorry I didn't get caught up with you before you headed up but it looks like you ended up okay without it.

Just wanted to say thanks for sharing your hunt in such a manner.

Bob, "glad" to hear I'm not the only one!!!

2shot, and everyone else that has attended a seminar or two, as always, I love to keep up with folks and hear how they do, so don't ever hesitate to shoot me an e-mail and let me know! ...by the way, the call you were talking about is the Imaka da bullcrazy ...I know, I know... I didn't name it! :-)

In all honesty, I usually end up on the low side of my estimates; sometimes a bunch, sometimes a little (truth be told when I walked up to my bull the first time I actually thought I shot a 330-class bull!), so I may be off a little bit...

Here is a side shot of the same bull. In my opinion, he wasn't overly long in the main beams, OK on the 4ths, and was a bit light on the mass. I figured him in the 320's... Now, with that said, in 2010... a bull like that is DEAD if he gives me half a chance!!!! He's a GREAT bull!

Also, I heard the same thing... Bulls up there have great fronts, small to OK thirds, good 4ths, and often times small 5ths. This year though, most of the "bigger" bulls had pretty decent thirds.

LazyJ - I hear you; that is the EXACT reason why I don't hold much stock in folks who claim the size of their bull and/or other's bulls by simply looking at a photo. ...depending on the angle, how close/far from the lens, etc. perceived size can really vary.

#2 - Apparently he doesn't know who I am...

#3 - Apparently he didn't know how many people already knew I had drawn a Unit 1 tag, already knew I had harvested a good bull, and how many people had already been talking about it...

#4 - Apparently he missed one of the PRIMARY REASONS for this thread in that I was trying to KEEP people from burning a bunch of points and/or putting in for Unit 1 simply because I got a nice bull (hence the stressing of what the REALITIES of the Unit are)...

#5 - Apparently he is unaware of how many MAGAZINES I could have put this story in - for $$$ - and chose NOT to for the very reasons he expressed...

#6 - Apparently he is unaware of how many unauthorized story publications - PRIOR to this thread - I put the kibosh on, again - for those very reasons...

#7 - Apparently he has no concern over maintaining his own credibility and respect on this forum after that post... and

#8 - Apparently he types before he thinks...

Hmmmmmm...

Again, congrats on a great bull and a great story.

Rob

Good one Chris! Nice response, but I especially liked #2!

"#2 - Apparently he doesn't know who I am... "

HC = Yeah, because he's "Rick James B!4!Tch"!

He sure caught me by suprise when I read it!!!

2 stars in one day. Gotta be a bowsite record.

"That's right, I am the Shee-ot (coo coo kachoo)... And that's MR. Shee-ot to you!"

Those that know me know that my whole existence in the public hunting world has been to help folks be more successful in the field and to make decisions based on fact and critical thinking rather than emotion, hear-say, and the latest gee-whiz-bang marketing hype. Hence my effort here to relay the realities of Unit 1 rather than let all the talk surrounding my hunt/harvest skew people's decisions during the upcoming 2010 draw. Apparently Mr. Davis didn't bother to read the whole thread, or just didn't get it.

For those that missed it, a Mr. Brian Davis wasn't too happy that I posted this story, and - shall we say - used "colorful" language to express his displeasure and opinion of me personally. To the moderator's credit, his post was pulled in short order.

Here is my educated guess:

Mr. Davis has been looking forward to putting in for Unit 1. He probably thought the area was a "secret" or "overlooked" unit that - apparently - few people knew about and so he thought he might have a shot at drawing it soon. ...I'm guessing he's sitting with 9 or 10 points or so. To him, this thread "exposed" Unit 1, and will make next year's draw jump out of reach to him, OR put more people in the draw reducing his odds of drawing.

While that is possible, my effort to quell "the hype" around my hunt was an effort to AVOID that scenario. In addition, however, based on last year's draw, I personally burned 12 points (I needed to get rid of mine), but the other person who drew burned 11 - so the days of 9 or 10 points to draw might be in the past anyway. We'll see...

No need to defend you or this post. As soon as I saw the post (by Brian Davis?), I sent an editor alert. Any of us who have saved more than 9 points knows way more about the possible places to hunt than anyone else! Why else would we be saving points?! And if Brian Davis should read this post, and my earlier comments, your information helped me make a decision about where I should try to draw. I will not be trying for unit 1, 2, or 201. I wish I was forty with 9 points. But I am not. If there is anything to be upset about it is the DOW making the decison to allow 20% of hard to draw units available to someone with a minimum of 5 points. I wasn't given that opportunity. If I was, maybe I would be in the picture with the bull that Chris shot instead of him:)! The only secret that got out was that Brian is an idiot.

Memo to Brian......save the "F bombs" for the construction site and the poker games.

I am not sure if it will work in the end, but I think the folks that live there will like it. From what I have heard is they hate it hate; having to live there and only be able to hunt your own unit for a trophy 2-3 times in a lifetime! (unless you are a land owner that is)

While some will like it and some won't...I think it incents those who now apply for the PP code to actually apply for the license they want. In terms of draw statistics, the future demand stats should show a "truer" picture of actual demand per GMU.

I have been told in the past, the adopted CDOW formula for license quota split between method of take is supposed to take into account demand between rifle, muzzleloader and archery demand. (eg if more archery hunters apply, we get a higher quota)

While current demand based on last year stats may reflect and lead one to believe they can draw a particular unit in a reasonable amount of time, the impact of 20% random draw may make things worse too. Not only has 20% of the quota become less "predictable", if a "truer" demand emerges and shows rifle season demand shoots up, the archery tag quota may go down in the future. How many years would 201 take to draw with an archery quota of 1 or 2 licenses?

I hope the 20% random draw has litle impact, but there may be some unforeseen and discouraging results if it leads to any further "reallocation" and loss of the quota splits. If the quota for archers drops, 20% of nothing coupled with a tag reduction is not a positive change IMO.

Congrats on a great bull, I hope it drives demand up for unit 1 so I can draw my unit next year with only 12 points.