Moosie
Grand poopa
.........With...... a ..... Muzzle loader 
(Biggest, First..... Whatever)
OK, It's a Dink I'll fess up before you scroll down...... but had a great time. :hump:
My buddy Neil has a Elk tag (Muzz) and I had the elk/deer tag (Muzz). We've been out a couple times and haven't seen a whole lot of bucks. The elk we were seeing were all small too.
We decided to sneak out the day before Thanksgiving. As I kissed my wife at 4AM leaving the door she asked "Are you coming home tonight or for thanksgiving dinner". I told her earlier in the week I was going to go hunting for my days off and stay in a buddies cabin and skipping Thanksgiving. I forgot to tell her I decided to come back for Thursday to eat and hang with the family and be merry and relax !! I didn't think she would have let me but I guess I was wrong.
The tempature was -4 and we decided to just glass from the road. With the snow pushing the game around we knew it wasn't going to be hard to spot some.
It seems that every person we talked to said they weren't seeing any game. They also said they were just seeing wolf tracks and no Game tracks. We kind of just nodded and sometimes we would pull ou tthe spotting scope for them and show them a couple dozen critters just up from the road.
I think every canyon we stopped at had critters in it. We knew we weren't going to find anything big but there were some Spike Bulls somewhere that needed to be put down. Several groups we wnet after had some Branch antler bulls in it but more were spikers. At one time in the evening hunt we had a 3 point and Spike 700 yards accross the canyon and down. a Spike 200 yards on our ridge right above us looking at us and a 5 point and spike crossingthe saddle kiddy corner between the other elk. Althoguh we never shot, it was fun to see that many bulls (Even though small) to be all around us.
First thing in the mornnig we saw Elk bedded down up a hill side with others feeding in a bowl bext to them. We grabbed the guns and headed up the hill on the far side. There was a 2x3 pt bull with my buddies name on it. We hiked up the flat, snowcovered, sawtooth hills...... with no jackets in -4 deg temps and still managed to sweat.
We closed the gap and peaked over the finger ridge and had the bull standing at about 170 yards broad side. Although still a poke with the Muzzle loader. I probably would have tried. Neil wanted to close the gap. So we snuck back down to about 70 yards or so and popped back up. Unfortunately , there was a cow, head cocked, ears forward, looking right at us. Although it took 2-3 mins for the elk to leave, they bunched up and there was never a shot. They ran 300 yards and looked back at us. Then went around the corner and onward.
We walked forward 20 yards and Neil said "BUCK". I looked and giggled and said "Dink" you mean. We watched it and it didn't care we were there one bit. It was Sniffing the Does and pushing one around. I let out a *SIGH* and told neil to hand me the shooting sticks.
I looked back down the hill at the truck, and decided to shoot it. (Thats my justification line there fella's )
I think after I shot it at 120 yards the Does stayed around and watched it slide down the hill and were happy not to have it bothering them any more.... When I shot, It went through both front shoulders and collapsed right away. It started sliding down the hill in the like a sled. It went about 100 yards or more and finally stopped. By the road there was only 3" of snow but on top there was 1.5 foot.It looked like a innertube sliding down snowplowing a path as it went.
We drug it to the top of the hill and slid it down to the truck (Or 40 yards from it) to take the pictures.
So this Last picture is funny to me. We drug it (Or I kicked it once and it went all the way down). to just above the road. We went to get the camera and phone for pictures and..... Yep, no battery. So we left the deer there on its' side, went back to get batteries from the gas station, and came back. I propped the deer up for pictures and it looked like it was alive and jsut bedded down.
I so wanted to set it up and park and film hunters driving by and jumping out of their riggs to blast at it. But, we didn't.
We're heading back up tomorrow and Saturday to see if we can lay the hammer down on a couple of dumb elk.
(Biggest, First..... Whatever)
OK, It's a Dink I'll fess up before you scroll down...... but had a great time. :hump:
My buddy Neil has a Elk tag (Muzz) and I had the elk/deer tag (Muzz). We've been out a couple times and haven't seen a whole lot of bucks. The elk we were seeing were all small too.
We decided to sneak out the day before Thanksgiving. As I kissed my wife at 4AM leaving the door she asked "Are you coming home tonight or for thanksgiving dinner". I told her earlier in the week I was going to go hunting for my days off and stay in a buddies cabin and skipping Thanksgiving. I forgot to tell her I decided to come back for Thursday to eat and hang with the family and be merry and relax !! I didn't think she would have let me but I guess I was wrong.
The tempature was -4 and we decided to just glass from the road. With the snow pushing the game around we knew it wasn't going to be hard to spot some.
It seems that every person we talked to said they weren't seeing any game. They also said they were just seeing wolf tracks and no Game tracks. We kind of just nodded and sometimes we would pull ou tthe spotting scope for them and show them a couple dozen critters just up from the road.
I think every canyon we stopped at had critters in it. We knew we weren't going to find anything big but there were some Spike Bulls somewhere that needed to be put down. Several groups we wnet after had some Branch antler bulls in it but more were spikers. At one time in the evening hunt we had a 3 point and Spike 700 yards accross the canyon and down. a Spike 200 yards on our ridge right above us looking at us and a 5 point and spike crossingthe saddle kiddy corner between the other elk. Althoguh we never shot, it was fun to see that many bulls (Even though small) to be all around us.
First thing in the mornnig we saw Elk bedded down up a hill side with others feeding in a bowl bext to them. We grabbed the guns and headed up the hill on the far side. There was a 2x3 pt bull with my buddies name on it. We hiked up the flat, snowcovered, sawtooth hills...... with no jackets in -4 deg temps and still managed to sweat.
We closed the gap and peaked over the finger ridge and had the bull standing at about 170 yards broad side. Although still a poke with the Muzzle loader. I probably would have tried. Neil wanted to close the gap. So we snuck back down to about 70 yards or so and popped back up. Unfortunately , there was a cow, head cocked, ears forward, looking right at us. Although it took 2-3 mins for the elk to leave, they bunched up and there was never a shot. They ran 300 yards and looked back at us. Then went around the corner and onward.
We walked forward 20 yards and Neil said "BUCK". I looked and giggled and said "Dink" you mean. We watched it and it didn't care we were there one bit. It was Sniffing the Does and pushing one around. I let out a *SIGH* and told neil to hand me the shooting sticks.
I looked back down the hill at the truck, and decided to shoot it. (Thats my justification line there fella's
)I think after I shot it at 120 yards the Does stayed around and watched it slide down the hill and were happy not to have it bothering them any more.... When I shot, It went through both front shoulders and collapsed right away. It started sliding down the hill in the like a sled. It went about 100 yards or more and finally stopped. By the road there was only 3" of snow but on top there was 1.5 foot.It looked like a innertube sliding down snowplowing a path as it went.
We drug it to the top of the hill and slid it down to the truck (Or 40 yards from it) to take the pictures.
So this Last picture is funny to me. We drug it (Or I kicked it once and it went all the way down). to just above the road. We went to get the camera and phone for pictures and..... Yep, no battery. So we left the deer there on its' side, went back to get batteries from the gas station, and came back. I propped the deer up for pictures and it looked like it was alive and jsut bedded down.
I so wanted to set it up and park and film hunters driving by and jumping out of their riggs to blast at it. But, we didn't.
We're heading back up tomorrow and Saturday to see if we can lay the hammer down on a couple of dumb elk.
