my first elk

[Pekan]

So last year I decided I want to hunt elk. Being from Ontario originally, elk have a certain appeal. So I bought a book on elk hunting, read about the subject on this forum, watched youtube videos, generally got obsessed with elk just over a year ago.

So this season it was my main focus. I put in for an antlerless mule deer draw in a unit i knew i would likely get one as a just in case meat hunt. Otherwise I was all in for elk.

I've done a fair amount of general scouting in some of the south-west of Calgary public access, general tag units and myself and a buddy had some loose plans come September.

Archery season. After putting on some serious boot KMs, we found ourselves into the wapiti. Spotted over 60 in one day! Mostly cows, but one 5x5 and one 6x6 were confirmed to be in the artea.
We managed to turn that opportunity into a stalk that had us within 100m of a 6 point herd bull! He was bugling like crazy and a few of the cows were just as vocal. Unfortunately we ran out of daylight as well as cover to close the deal that day. But I was totally pumped and even more determined to get it done this year.

So along comes the rifle season. The rut is behind us, change of tactics. We made an educated guess where we thought some of those bulls would go to hide out the rifle season in a couple of wmu's. Went down for a to day hunt two weekends ago. We glassed, put on the boot kms, saw lost of sign, but no elk.
Rememberance day weekend. We pull the trailer down for a 2.5 day hunt. Foot access, public accessible land. Three of us head out. One guy with a muley draw tag and all three with general elk tags.
Friday 1/2 day, see three elk. They ran past me in high gear! two cows and a spike. OK, our educated guess looks like it might be correct.
Saturday, See about 40 muleys really getting rutted up. Bucks chasing does, bucks on the move in daylight.
Mid afternoon in the howling wind we spot three legal bulls @ 1000 yards. We rush to get into ambush position but don't see them again. But now we know we're into their sanctuary!
Sunday, windy as hell! See way less mulies, maybe 10, mostly does. We split up hike all over, nothing. Decide to go to our meet up spot. I'm there glassing the area near where we had been hiking through and boom, three bulls on a hill, maybe 2 kms away! two legal (3 point) one not.

So myself and a buddy put on the stalk. It seemed like the spike had us made from about 1.5 kms out. but they kept feeding along slowly. We practically run up the hills to get in position and crest our last hill and the bulls are now bedded. 480 yards in a huge cross wind....Not for me. So I drop down the hill and start hiking with the wind to then climb up directly down wind of them and shorten the distance. I creep int a good shooting position at 206 yards into the wind. The spike is staring right at me while I shift myself behind the rifle......Spike stands, the two others stand, and i place the crosshairs right on the largest one's chest.....boom! 270wsm, 130 grain bullet to the lungs!

He runs straight up the hill about 80 yards does a death roll that my buddy 2 kms away watched in his binos!

Done!
three hours later, after boning out this large creature, we make the roughly 5.5 KM trek back to the road. Then to the trailer for some beers!

He was a 4x5. Not a trophy by most peoples standards. But to me he's one hell of a trophy! He's a testament to all the research, hiking, searching, thinking, and hoping I've been doing over this past year. And soon he'll be hanging on my wall.

[ex811]

Congrats.
You put allot of work and effort into the Hunt, that makes it an Outstanding trophy in my books!!
Your freezer and Man Cave are Happy.

[Bub]

Great story and a hell of a hunt!
Congrats, mate!

[Pekan]

Thanks guys.

One other interesting thing about this elk. He had a 8" piece of a carbon arrow shaft embedded into his front chest below his neck. skin had healed around it and no real infection could be seen. We figured it was from last year. I'll see if my buddy has the picture he took.

[elkhunter11]

Congrats on the bull. Great story.

[Lefty-Canuck]

Originally Posted by Pekan

Thanks guys.

One other interesting thing about this elk. He had a 8" piece of a carbon arrow shaft embedded into his front chest below his neck. skin had healed around it and no real infection could be seen. We figured it was from last year. I'll see if my buddy has the picture he took.

Congrats!

Be careful cutting/eating meat from around the area, carbon splinters are not good!

LC

[mickeyjim]

Wow thats a tough animal. Congrats man!

[Bleat]

That's outstanding Pekan. Congratulations!

I'm in the exact same boat as you at the moment. LOVE whitetail hunting. Love hunting just in general. Oddly enough where we head out most it's not unusual to bump into elk as well, but we never really have given it much thought in the past. So I started reading up, asking friends, reading forums.......just generally learning all I can about them so that next year I'm ready. Still learning and have a ways to go, but getting there slowly.

Would you mind me asking which books you've read on the subject so far and possibly which you found to be the most useful?

Very much well deserved though with all of your planning and preparation. Congrats again

[mk63]

Congrats on a great bull, thanks for posting.

[JReed]

Congrats, welcome to elkaholics anonymous. Shooting elk is addicting and I'd shoot that bull any day of the week. I got a bull last year with .270 130 grain at 150 yards, dropped dead in his tracks. What a feeling!

[KBF]

Great story. Glad you were rewarded for your efforts

[reddeerhunter]

Nice bull. Glad it worked out.

[husky7mm]

Congratulations pekan, the first one always taste so sweet, especailly when its hard work. Looks like beauty country too.

[CNP]

You done good!

[goldscud]

Congrats. All your hard work paid off. It's a great feeling

[Rockman]

Awesome! Good going.

[58thecat]

That's just great.

[Pekan]

Originally Posted by Bleat

That's outstanding Pekan. Congratulations!

I'm in the exact same boat as you at the moment. LOVE whitetail hunting. Love hunting just in general. Oddly enough where we head out most it's not unusual to bump into elk as well, but we never really have given it much thought in the past. So I started reading up, asking friends, reading forums.......just generally learning all I can about them so that next year I'm ready. Still learning and have a ways to go, but getting there slowly.

Would you mind me asking which books you've read on the subject so far and possibly which you found to be the most useful?

Very much well deserved though with all of your planning and preparation. Congrats again

The book is called "Elk and Elk hunting" It's a bit older, but lots of good useful info in there. It's really got a mountain hunting bias tho. Which may not translate to where you hunt.
I'd say another great resource is Randy Newberg's youtube videos. Definitely helped us decide what to look for in terms of the seasons of an elks life. pre rut, rut, etc.

Happy hunting.

[alpineguy]

Congrats on your elk and putting in the effort you did. Thanks for posting

[Ceilidh69]

Great story - congrats

[CanuckShooter]

Getting your first elk is the best, it took me about 5 years of trying to get my first one. They can be tough to hunt sometimes.

[JonBoy]

Great story - love to hear of people that put in the time and effort and get their animal.

Still waiting on my first elk...

[Bleat]

Awesome. Thanks very much for passing along those resources Pekan. I'll definitely be checking them out. Congrats again.

[Sooner]

Beauty Elk for a first. Congrats

[matt1984]

Originally Posted by Pekan

Thanks guys.

One other interesting thing about this elk. He had a 8" piece of a carbon arrow shaft embedded into his front chest below his neck. skin had healed around it and no real infection could be seen. We figured it was from last year. I'll see if my buddy has the picture he took.

Congrats on the Elk! Any chance there was a Muzzy 3 on the end?

[Pekan]

Originally Posted by matt1984

Congrats on the Elk! Any chance there was a Muzzy 3 on the end?

No. Just a section of shaft.