WY Elk: KHunter archery 2016

Hmm. No midday update today has me thinking there's quartering and packing underway. This has been a fun follow. Can't wait to see how it unfolds from there.
 
This follow ain't helping! I leave in 4 days for 2 months of elk/dèer hunting and these awesome reports are keeping me up at night! Looking at pics I would shot one of the smaller ones already, GREAT HUNT good luck!

C
 
Looking forward to it!
Hurry up and try to make it happen before 10pm eastern time; I gotta work in the morning! Lol
 
Haven't heard a solid bugle in 2 days. This thread gives me motivation. Great stuff! Thank you!
 
image.jpgimage.jpgimage.jpgWell after I pissed that great bull down my leg at 35 yds and not hearing any bugles late morning we took it easy for a few hours to wait it out on the mountain and then started wading into the country we thought the bull may have moved on to. I guess I should be frustrated that we could not find that bull again knowing he was the biggest one I had seen....except we found this instead!

This bull had 15 or so cows up near a ridge top. We were focused on reaching an aspen patch to dig up the sleeping bull from the morning and I barely saw some of the cows just before we walked out into the open and would have blown them out.

We went to ground and started glassing the herd, then this big bull walks out and starts bugling sporadically and pushing his cows around and checking some of them as the herd moves up over the ridge top. Note the skyline photos just before they disappeared about 5 pm.

what a bull! Kind of makes me forget all about that little squeaker of a "sleeping in the sun" morning bull I missed out on. :)
 
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How about a brief intermission on hunting that big bull to see a video of the wide, wide bull from day one.

[video=youtube_share;_B6g0V4uaFM]
 
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Shooter bull for sure! Can't wait for the final chapter!
 
image.pngSo this big bull and cows went up over the ridge out of sight. To get right after them we have to be very exposed for quite a distance so I decided we should wait just a little bit to make sure they weren't actually coming back down and since down is also towards the truck I was hoping they would.

Sure enough that's exactly what they did. Next thing you know we have this big bull and 15 or so cows coming down the ridge about 6:15 PM and it really looks like they're going to come down to our right so that we would have the wind in our face as they walk by hopefully at close range along a narrow draw.

They are really starting to come down and get to about 250 with the bull a little further in the back. Everything is right on cue for an evening opportunity.

Suddenly they hang up and it seems like about all of them are looking off to the left which from our perspective is a little over the top and other side of the finger Ridge from where we are so we can't see what they're looking at. Then they start getting knotted up a lot tighter as a group and really looking to the left. I tell my brother I don't like the look of this at al. It didn't even seem like a threatening Bull but it just feels like there's a hunter over that way just by how they are acting. I continue hoping that is not the case since we haven't seen any hunters in a week of hunting. Which is certainly a first time occurrence for me

The herd skedaddles back over the top of the ridge again and by the way they went we are sure they are not coming back. When the last cow Clears the ridge we start hoofing it up to get up over the ridge On what we have expect to be a hopeless mission to see where they may be.

We don't get very far and we look off to the left and sure enough there's a couple hunters who by where they were, were had obviously exposed themselves to these elk.
To put it mildly they really screwed the pooch on a big bull opportunity.

Had to go back to work for a few days and recover my body a little bit. Heading back into the unit tonight for five more days of hunting and hopefully to close out this already terrific hunt. The pressure is on because if I don't get it done in this stretch I'll go back the following week and miss a really amazing trip to San Miguel de Allende MX with my wife and a bunch friends. I think they call these first world problems...
 
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image.jpgimage.jpegWell the morning after I ran into those two hunters who blew up my opportunity on what was my then number one Bull. I go to a different area and hit the jackpot.

If finding the biggest bull of the week on your eighth day of hunting and that Bull has 33 cows can be considered the jackpot. Just look at this dude you can't see it but he's a 7 x 6 and has an 8 to 10 inch kicker off of one royal. I tell ya the bulls just keep getting bigger and bigger as this week runs by.


We had no choice but to watch them leave the flats and go up into some gnarly North Dakota worthy Badlands twisty canyons mess. Where we were unable to find them until about 1130 in the morning. We glass them at that point a mile and a half away probably at that point way closer to two access points where we had been hunting in previous days What was really cool to see is it was 75° and they're just standing out in the bright sunshine in short sagebrush on a little knoll in a tight little knot. For sure these Wyoming herd Bulls definitely know how to keep their cows in a tight group Been seeing that all week.

At that point I really need to be turning around and heading for camp to pack it up and get back home. Which we did. And as I was driving along the main road I look where I know those elk pretty much were and sure enough they are still right up there on that ridge at 1230 an hour later. I could see them and frankly could run up that ridge 3/4 mile and perhaps get on him although the cover didn't look so great. Very tempting but I honored my commitments to be home when I said I would and left them standing there in the heat no doubt panting As was I!!!

So I guess that's the end of the first eight days of the hunt. The next things I'll try to post will be what occurs tonight and the days ahead.

More than anything I was thankful to have enjoyed all of this with my hunting crazy brother from New Mexico who is a terrific elk hunter and elk caller and put a whole week into this hunt with me. We had a ball and dug up some great bulls. And he held my arrows whenever the 300 to 320 inch bulls were hanging around in bow range. :hump:
 
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Thanks for sharing your hunt with us. I hope you catch up with one of the big guys again. I'm assuming this has to be a draw unit and not a general tag?
 
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