The average western hunter

[utah400elk]

My Dad shot a deer today. About a half mile later found this.

I'm not afraid to hike in the dark, but I get why some aren't keen to.

Hunting in grizzly area would definitely change how I hike in and out in the dark. This guy almost cried when we were hunting in unit 15 in NM for elk. No big bears. He was more afraid of snakes and in general the dark. He needed two to three flash lights just to take a piss. Kind of funny to me. Now if I had seen a big grizz track like that, I would have been a little more cautious.

 

[mtmuley]

I access where I hunt mostly from a gate on a closed road although I do use other access points. Seems like people will go further on a road or trail than they will off of them. When I leave the road or trail I am by myself. mtmuley

 

[elkhuntinfool78]

Imo there are way more people willing to go in farther these days than I saw 10 years ago. It's made it harder to get away from the crowds. I agree with mtmuley that getting off the main trails is key however I still have ran into a few guys in spots i never would have thought I'd see anyone. For myself finding success means longs hikes in the dark off trail.

 

[hank4elk]

Used to never see anyone way back. Except on main trails. A few.
I have always used game trails or no trails to hunt from. A quarter mile from trailheads and trails have been productive recently.
Over the ridge where everyone is driving....asking if I have seen any elks.

Hunters here just watched several road hunters drive right by herds of elk.No clue. 100 yards away from road.
None here so they are heading behind my mesa to walk into the wind.

 

[Pagosa]

I'm finding more hunters both along the roads and in remote areas. We have hiked several miles and hour or hour half before daylight and have multiple hunters with the same plan. Road hunting in crazy in the area I'm in, I feel bad for the wildlife in Montana

 

[WesternWyoming]

I'm happy for road hunters. That means there are fewer folks on the game trails where I hunt.

 

[BuzzH]

There's your argument for hunting elk and deer with a 375 H&H...............

7-08 for me even in griz country, I'm not skeered. Will use it to hunt grizzlies too.

 

[406dn]

I'm going to be nicer than some. Every hunter is dealing with something. It might be physical, it might be emotional. Most people do not like to get too far from their comfort zone.

A big consideration is can you get an animal out if you get one. If you are older, out of shape, dealing with a bum back, you aren't going in very deep.

That said, the worst thing about being a road hunter is that so much of what a hunt offers, goes missing. This fall, while we did not kill a bull, we saw many interesting things. We saw fresh black bear tracks most every day, in the area we hunted. I'm a bit surprised we did not get a glimpse of it. We were into cows and spikes nearly every day, but not brow tined bulls. But it is always fun to have elk close by.

Last year after I killed my bull, we packed it out on horses, to a road, since that was much closer than getting back to where we were camped. I rode one horse back to camp, my brother stayed with the other horse and the meat. When driving a truck up the road, I came around a curve. The was a pickup parked in the middle of the road, with a hunter standing in front of it, using his binoculars. He was 40ish and likely north of 250 pounds. It amused me that he was glassing from the road, at maybe 1030 in the morning. I don't think his plan included getting in deep.

When we hunted a different area, where horses can't easily go off trail, we were in about 9 miles hunting and exploring. When eating a lunch we heard animals wading the creek. It was a pair of hunters on horses, doing what we were doing. Where we hunt now, there is far more solitude, even thou we are rarely a mile from the road.

 

[Little Big Man MT Chris]

I was hunting in griz country today, and after @BuzzH posted that pic yesterday I was a little on edge , just because I’ve seen a griz twice down there this year, last one was danger close at 40 some yds… I couldn’t get that bear out of my head this morning

Every time I heard something weird I’m spinning around thinking he’s gonna be like 15 feet behind me coming to eat me. Ha ha ha ,

I was hunting in a blizzard, hoping it would push some elk down out of the hills, but the only thing I saw was a whitetail little buck cruise past me at 100yds



I got back into hunting about a decade ago after my divorce and heavily pressured public land is the only thing I’ve known and I just figure out how to make it work, I’m stubborn and I just keep grinding every day.

Driving out , 2 different groups of bulls looking at me from private that have already slipped through my area . One of these days I’m gonna get one of these big boys to walk in front of my rifle, but until then I’ll be back in the woods at sunrise tomorrow.