What are your favorite tactics for hunting elk? For example, do you prefer bugling/cow calling elk hunting in the early seasons or do you like to hard, cold and lonely in the middle of November with knee deep snow on the tail of a lone bull? How do our hard core elk hunters on this forum hunt elk?

Since we can't hunt here during the rut, calling is out. I'd like to try it sometime though, it would be pretty interesting.

However, my favorite way to hunt elk is to follow a fresh track in snow until I get close enough for a shot. The worse the weather, the more interesting and exciting it can be.- Sheister

I really enjoy the early part of elk season. Getting in as close as you can with a cow call is about as thrilling as it gets for me.

Taos,
Nothing beats a Bugling, Snorting, Seriously piss-off Bull elk destroying a Cedar tree to get your blood pumping.
Bowhunting Bugling Elk dosn't get any more exciting. OK ... Africa takes first place... Elk second.

Greg

I like slamming on the door of a 1975 chevrolet.

I was working out of Hobbs, New Mexico but had to go to service a rig near Springer, New Mexico one fall. They told me it was twenty miles back up the Vermejo River on the WS Ranch. I thought I'd died and gone to heaven. That ranch was known as a wild game paradise.

I met the companyman at the hotel the night before and conducted our business. He told me to take the bit to the rig and watch for elk. I'd never seen an elk in the wild at that time, and couldn't sleep that night thinking about it.

I started in the next morning at daylight. The road followed the river and you drove through the small stream time and again. I jumped mule deer, coyote and turkeys, but no elk.

Then he jumped out of the river bottom on my right, ran across the road in front of me, as far as the treeline, about thirty yards from me, and spun around to face me. He was a big, in his prime 6x6.

I was stunned. He glared at me as I rolled the window down. I'd never seen anything so majestic.

I didn't have a camera so I decided to spook him. I reached out and slapped the car door hard. He didn't spook. He didn't even blink. He lowered his head, dug-in with his front feet and threw sod over his back like a brahma bull. I was speechless and getting spooked myself. He began to roll his head side to side displaying his rack, with a cold, hard look in his eye.

I built up my nerve (the engine was still running) and I slapped the outside of the car door again. He snorted, took a stiff-legged jump towards me, then started tearing up the turf once again and waving his rack. He wasn't going to back down. I decided just to watch him as long as he'd stay.

A few minutes later, he seemed to cool down, and after looking down his nose at me one more time, he spun around, laid his rack along his hump, and waltzed into the trees like he owned the place.

I have to agree with Greg. For me, bowhunting is the only way to go for Elk. The most exciting moments I've ever had hunting have involved bugling Elk and a bow. I've called bulls in to within 7 yards using nothing more than breaking branches, banging and scraping a stick on trees and brush. I've also had success with a calls, both cow and bugle. The hardest part is avoiding them scenting you; absolute number 1 thing to be aware of is wind direction. If the Elk are downwind of you don't waste your time going after them.

I thought of another type of call: the rustle of a bag of alphalfa pellets. I bought a cow Elk from a fenced ranch here in NM and never saw Elk move so quick as when they heard that bag.

Our tactics for late season elk are simple. Get up arond 4:00am and hike to the highest
ambush point you can find. After the sun comes up you'd better have you rifle at the ready. We just wait for the weekend warriors to show up after their breakfast in town and run the elk up the hill right to us. Works like a charm.

I will agree with the other posters about bow hunting during the rut. If you have the time and are willing to work, there's nothing like a bull at 15yds. (my closest kill with a bow) a small satellite 4X5. I'm not real picky when hunting with traditional equipment. If you thought "buck fever" was bad, times it by 10 and now you have "bull fever"! Nothing else like it, well... maybe a grizzly charge! The meats not too bad either!

Elk country

[ 06-11-2002, 02:16: Message edited by: Elk Country ]

Late season hunts out in the sagebrush! Easier walking and packing and no worry about meat spoilage. Of course, there isn't anything wrong with a blackpowder hunt in the rut either.

Mac

The spot I usually hunt typically works like what Elk Country described. I have a spot picked out that is a rock and sage brush ridge about 600yds up to the first tree line. I get up before light and hike up to the first line of aspens and wait for the crowd to star moving them around. It's worked for the last five years.

Where I usually hunt in Colorado I love to stalk around in the Quakie patches. In Oregon, I do a lot more glassing.

JMeier

I hunt elk every way I can. Early season archery during the rut to late season deep snow rifle hunts. They are both fun and exciting ways to hunt. Getting up close and personal with a pissed off bull with only a bow in your hands will get anybody�s blood pumping. By the same token standing on the top of a wind blown ridge in 2 feet of snow watching 50 head of elk single file out of heavy timber to feed is very thrilling too. Tracking a bull in heavy timber trying to get around his defenses to get a shot is very exciting and challenging.

I guess now that I think about it my favorite way to hunt elk is the way I am doing it at that time be it early season rut, mid season tracking or late season hunting. As long as I am hunting I am happy!

I hunt the last season in Colorado, this year starting the 10th of November. It is usualy cold and snowy, except last year. I hunt on top of a mountain at about 8,500 ft. I run 8 miles on a 4-wheeler, park it well before daylight and hunt on foot. I use the 4-wheeler only on existing roads as per rules of the landowner, we hunt BLM land but have to access through a private holder. Where I hunt the topo lines are close and the hunting challanging. I may stand hunt or stalk and track, it all depends on the day and conditions. Those magic hours of first and last light I am still and quite as a mouse. I shoot a rifle that will hopefully stop the Bull in his tracks because one step could mean a lot of hard work packing in steep terrain. This is my way, it has worked in the past, hopefully it will in the future. Good shooting.

[ 06-11-2002, 23:37: Message edited by: phurley ]

Bowhunting big bulls by tracking them with two feet of snow on the ground during the late rifle seasons! That's the hardest hunting that I know of.

I like to hunt elk any of the above, but it's sure fun tracking them thru a foot of powdered sugar, looking up at the scrapes where the G3's rub the trees. A few years back we tracked three bulls that way, fell right into their lap after about 45 minutes of tracking. It's a hunt I will never, ever, forget.
Leif

I love to hunt elk and deer horseback..This can only be done in certain locals...I love to jump them out and step off the horse and shoot offhand and in a hurry or flop over a rock for that longish shot, to me this is the ultamate of exciting hunting...It requires a lot of skill to handle horses and shoot game..