Solo Mustang & Muzzle Loader Bull Elk Hunt?????

[Mustangs Rule]

From my little house on the prairie, I see the mountains of two different big game units.

One’s elk tags always sells out. The other is closer, but close to a vertical wall of rocks and slick grass, rises to 10,000 in elevation.
This zone is big and all public wilderness.

It is so tough, rough, steep and deep that less than half the rifle elk tags are even applied for.

By rifle season it is notorious for blizzards. Near all access is on north facing slopes where the snow can come quick and stay till summer.

With my 60X spotting scope, from my porch, I watch elk, mountain goat, wild sheep, wolves and a rare moose.

During the winter I count avalanches after a big snow, most was 39.

At the bottom of the avalanche chutes there are small treeless meadows, Wet and green all summer and fall. That is where I see the most elk

A few months ago I got some new horses. One is a tough as nails super sure footed large bay mustang mare.

After reading the muzzle loader post here on HT, I got mine out. It’s a TC 50 cal New Englander with tang peep sights. Shoots 3”@100 yards.

This forbidding zone has a short traditional ML bull elk hunt, well before bad weather. Still, it never sells out, called a “Fools Hunt”

Next Year?





Next Year?

 

[Gr8bawana]

I say go for it!

 

[Werty]

I want to read more about this hunt.

 

[2rocky]

If it is in your local area,you have a unique opportunity to find those little out of the way spots of access to good elk country.

I forget what state you are in but I always shoot for the moon, but have a sure bet as a second choice. I've always dreamed of living somewhere where I had an "ALL GOLD CANYON" to myself....

 

[huntnpack]

If this is the hunt I think it is…I’m tempted every year as well. DO IT

Edit: Is it a rut hunt or no? That’s a major factor.

 

[Mustangs Rule]

If this is the hunt I think it is…I’m tempted every year as well. DO IT

Edit: Is it a rut hunt or no? That’s a major factor.

This hunt will miss the rut or most all of it. Bad news!

I have a friend who was a guide in Alaska and became an elk hunting guide here in the west. In the middle of those two periods there was a window when he was not guiding. He did this hunt twice and got skunked twice.

Not having the rut is part of that failure factor but also high visibility is another. These steep mountains are like an amphitheater for the game animals to look down and see hunters.

The factor I am counting on to increase my chance of success is my horse or maybe two.

Many years ago, I knew an old desert rat who hunted Inyo deer with horses.

He would glass and spot some bedded deer and slowly just walk along his horses using them as cover as they grazed. Real slow, no rush.

Then when they passed a tree or some boulders, he let them keep going and he shot the deer.

That is what I am counting on. My horses are the same color as moose.

Just use them as a moving cover. until I get a good stalk

These are good trail horses but turning them into hunting horses will take time.

 

[Martin Heilman]

Sounds interesting, good luck....