COR
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Post by COR on Aug 28, 2016 11:44:20 GMT -5
I can't believe no one has mentioned Colorado. It's got a ton of public land and although cow tags are lottery you can pick up a bull tag in many public land access units OTC for around 600 bucks...but you have to understand, it's no easy trip. Success rates vary. Most hover at about 20% or less but 6 trips in current area hunting has yielded two Bulls because it took me two years of hunting to figure it out. You have to plan on investing on more than one trip to even begin to understand the subtleties of the area you hunt.
And if you really get serious, you'll want horses. You'll try it once without them. Once you try them you'll never turn back...Sixshot would recommend mules and I'm not so bold to argue with him. I'm just more familiar with horses.
Plan on a working vacation that MAY include the joy of humping out a bull elk...great views, great lunches in the mountain, great memories...if you catch the wapiti just remember the work just began after he falls. Sweat equity.
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Post by sixshot on Aug 28, 2016 14:22:25 GMT -5
For a first time elk hunt in the west I would at least go with a drop camp. That is, have some one pack you in on horses & leave you in elk country & then pack you out. Elk country is always remote & getting in there is tough, getting one out is way, way tougher!! It can spoil on you very easy without horses to pack it out. If you are elk hunting as a foot soldier expect a lot of company & company isn't a good thing when hunting elk because they leave when they get pressured & when elk leave they can cover a lot of ground in a hurry. Deer move from cover to cover, elk change zip codes!
Having said all this if you can afford an outfitter that's the best odds, next up is a pack in drop camp as mentioned above. The least odds are a do it yourself foot soldier elk hunt in new country, with lots of ambition & lungs tuned up for 1000 ft. elevation & you're headed to 6,000-8,000 elevation or more. Two days & you're wanting your mother!
Any of you that want to send me a PM I can help out a bit.
Dick
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Fowler
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Post by Fowler on Aug 28, 2016 18:15:06 GMT -5
Yes if you are coming up from Texas there is no doubt Colorado is the easy first step, reasonably close, over the counter tags, three times more elk than any other state has, and huge expanses of public land. My home in fact. However none of this is a secret and the hunting pressure here can be intense, I have seldom had easy hunts, normally working my butt off BEFORE season, plotting, planning, get camp in, so that when season gets here you can hunt far easier. I have stood over dead elk many times thinking "Fowler what did you just do" realizing it was just me and a pack frame to get the beast out to the truck, the longest pack was 7 miles and 3000 vertical feet. I was 25 and bullet proof, perhaps a bit arrogant and naive in the ways of the woods, and too stubborn to quit so I persevered and killed a lot of elk through determination. Luckily I fell in with a gentleman who owns and loves horses and mules (ride the horses, pack the mules), and saw me for what I was when I was 30 and we started hunting together, I didnt need guiding, and I didnt mind working around camp, cutting wood by hand in a wilderness unit by hand in mid November is not a small undertaking. Trust me the freedom of knowing anywhere a elk could get into one of the pack mules can as well is very liberating in the woods. I have literally kissed a mule when she had packed out my elk for me knowing I didn't have to hike hours back into get the next load of meat. Back in those backpacking days life was hard enough and I lived in the middle of elk country that I never worried about getting in shape for the hunt. Now living in the Denver metro area, being 43 not 23 anymore, and not being the college cross country runner I once was I have started getting on the dreaded treadmill 5 days a week in prep for a mid November elk hunt. Coming from low elevation to elk country anywhere is tough enough, not committing to it enough to get your ass in shape before you come is just asking to have a miserable hunt once you get here. Days of 8-10 miles a day in rough uneven country is the rule not the exception.    But when the hunt comes together there is no sweeter hunt in the lower 48 that I know of, sitting in a box blind waiting on a pig or a whitetail to come out is alright, very relaxing, but high country elk are earned through sweat and blood.     I say all of this not to run you off, I say this so you will commit to the work one of these hunts requires so you can get in shape and be prepared to enjoy the hunt once you are here. Don't come out west expecting to kill an elk your first season. Expect to work you butt off, be tired, banged up, and learn a lot being in the woods. I have always done better than the average Joe hunting elk because I was willing to out work the next guy. But luck favors the prepared and for those who will put the time in, hunt hard and honestly, success will follow and there is no greater success than elk I believe.  |
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paulg
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Post by paulg on Aug 28, 2016 18:18:17 GMT -5
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Fowler
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Post by Fowler on Aug 28, 2016 18:35:58 GMT -5
Not a bad article, way overly simplified, but I have killed elk under each scenario listed in the article. The truck hunt is the most practice for most hunters, but it also is the hunt that is the toughest to get away from other hunters. I will tell you that we used to have a lot of success truck camping for the base camp, packing in the day before season and being in the saddles between major drainages when shooting light of opening morning came up. We counted on all of the truck hunters leaving camp too late and moving too noisily so that they would push the elk out of the drainage and into the next. We would be waiting for the herds to go back and forth from the hunting pressure. This plan generally worked for the first couple of days of season and we would kill our elk generally on opening morning up to the second day, if not we head back to the truck to regroup since we packed super light and would have provisions for just a couple nights. After that we generally still hunted the dark timber in the nastiest areas we could find, tough but very rewarding hunting to be sure. Good memories for sure. |
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Post by zac0419 on Aug 29, 2016 6:07:48 GMT -5
Colorado is really a dream for public land DIY hunts. Pick an area and start studying the maps.
Fowler speaks the truth about putting in the time to make it enjoyable. I've chased these ghost up and down the mountains a few years and it's not fun when you ARE in shape, you have to respect this terrain. I'm hoping to be back out there in '17, this time using horses to get us deeper in. The closer you are to your car, the more "luck" has to play into your success. You want "luck" to be a small factor.
Great pics Fowler!! I moved away and now live near the coast in FL. I was just in Grand Lake last week wondering how I ever could leave such a place.
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Post by keechikid on Aug 29, 2016 22:03:51 GMT -5
Reading all the stories from you guys out west has been making me think about trying to get out west and try a public land elk hunt.
Just being from Texas I am not really familiar with how all that works. Public land and mountains both to be honest. I have spent a lot of time hunting, but I have never hunted any where but my family's ranch here in east Texas. I wouldn't even start to know where to begin.
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Post by sixshot on Aug 29, 2016 23:40:32 GMT -5
When I was in the Air Force in Texas I also worked in a sporting goods store & a whole bunch of Texans always went to Colorado every year elk hunting. Said it was about as cheap as finding a good deer lease in Texas. Some of them hunted New Mexico & some journeyed on up to Wyoming but most went to Colorado & did quite well after they learned a bit about elk hunting.
Colorado has some of the tallest mountains in the west but lots of elk & a whole lot of elk hunters, do your home work & you can tag a elk & many times a dandy buck. Just check with the Fish & Game & see what units are harvesting the most elk & see what the access is all about, some of it can be reached by 4 wheel drive and a good bit of hiking but most of the good stuff in all the western states is by horses or mules. Elk don't like company, start crowding them a bit & you'll see what I mean.
Tomorrow is our opening day of archery, we've got some hot water holes & the grandkids are wound up pretty tight, I won't hunt tomorrow, I'll just tag along & watch, should be exciting. By Monday at least one of them will have an elk.
Bill, you long legged goose, did you shoot any of those elk, or our you just wearing out the mules?
Dick
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f3
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Post by f3 on Aug 30, 2016 0:36:21 GMT -5
Most people from the east aren't used to the units and tags we have in the west. Seasons can be extremely short. Washington states seasons for rifle ran about ten days when I lived there in 2005. The elk and deer seasons were separate. Spike only for elk and 3 point minimum for deer. Being successful in either was a huge accomplishment. I lived in Wenatchee and most locals didn't hunt the clockum because you needed a bullet proof vest. People would steal your elk if you couldn't get to it fast enough. No joke, if you killed an elk someone would run up and try to tag it.
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paulg
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Post by paulg on Aug 30, 2016 5:39:20 GMT -5
Most people from the east aren't used to the units and tags we have in the west. Seasons can be extremely short. Washington states seasons for rifle ran about ten days when I lived there in 2005. The elk and deer seasons were separate. Spike only for elk and 3 point minimum for deer. Being successful in either was a huge accomplishment. I lived in Wenatchee and most locals didn't hunt the clockum because you needed a bullet proof vest. People would steal your elk if you couldn't get to it fast enough. No joke, if you killed an elk someone would run up and try to tag it. This is why I don't hunt the Ocala Forest here in central Florida. My former son in law has been in more than one scrape with other yahoos out there after shooting a deer and having one dragged off before he could get to it. That kind of behavior is more prevalent when they're allowed to run dogs on deer. I like reading about the bear, elk and moose hunts of the members here but I have to honest with myself and at this point in my life a hunt, for me, out west is really a romantic and nostalgic thought. The older I get the more willing I become to live vicariously through others. |
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Post by sheriff on Aug 30, 2016 10:36:53 GMT -5
Colorado was always my first choice, OTC tags, lots of public land. A group of us from the Sheriff's Office went every year for a lotta years.
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Post by sixshot on Aug 30, 2016 17:27:01 GMT -5
I happen to live in a part of Idaho where the foot soldiers actually do quite well on elk because of all of the logging roads. The elk can be reached, its just hard to get one out once you have it on the ground. Boning them & using a pack frame is about the only way without horses but many people do it. Now central Idaho, which is the largest primitive area in the lower 48 states, that's a whole "nother" ball game, rugged doesn't do it justice. Its like the country Fowler shows above, not as tall as Colorado in some places but its like being on another planet. Go there and its either horse back, float if you have the nerve, some fly in camps or else you don't go. A foot soldier might never come out. Some go in there & don't want to come out, I've met a couple.
The good part about central Idaho with horses is you can hunt during the rut, I've killed some monster bulls in there in September.
Dick
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Post by bushog on Aug 30, 2016 18:09:57 GMT -5
All being said is true about the elk.......
I just turned 53 and hey Fowler, you thing 43 is tough.....well, Dick may chime in on this one....
I hunt right at 10,000ft and live at 8000 and the extra 2000ft can really get ya'
As far as other folks go, if you sit still, sometimes they'll help you.
I've killed 2 bulls that were pushed to me by others.
Oh, and leave that bugle thing at home.
All they do is scare elk and attract hunters.
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f3
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Post by f3 on Aug 30, 2016 18:22:55 GMT -5
Like Dick said the Frank Church and Selway are a whole experience in themselves. For a person that loves solitude it's heaven. Last summer I walked from Corn Creek to Lost Horse. I didn't see a single person for 5 days on the Salmon river to Selway section of my trip.
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Post by keechikid on Sept 1, 2016 10:32:01 GMT -5
This thread makes me think we should organize a forum campout/hunt where some of you guys from out west can show us poor blighted easterners how to get it done.
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