Bull of a Lifetime

[cohunter14]

I haven't done one of these writeups in quite a few years, but this one deserves the time and effort.

Some background before the story: my father got me into hunting as a kid, and him and I have spent 29 of the last 30 seasons together in the elk woods, with the only season missed being a year where he had back surgery and couldn't make it. We were rifle hunters for most of that time, but my dad decided to get into archery hunting a number of years ago and I followed suit. Most of the years since then, we have both archery and rifle hunted elk, with most of our dedication still going to rifle season, and we bounced around different low-end OTC units that were closer to home archery hunting. We had a few attempts at filling a tag with a bow while doing this, but it hadn't happened.

The last few years, we have dedicated more time to archery, and last year was the first year in my hunting career that I didn't have a rifle elk tag. Instead, I focused on archery and used the rifle season to take my son on his first elk hunt. Last year, we got into bugles nearly every day in another OTC unit in Colorado, we just weren't able to make it happen. The goal was to hunt the same area this year and see if we could finally punch a tag.

We arrived in our area mid-day on Friday, and we were joined by my wife's cousin, who was on his first archery elk hunt. We decided to try to get out and check a few areas and some trail cameras we had set up. We ended up being greeted with afternoon rain that wasn't predicted, which made the woods super quiet, and we weren't able to hear any bugles during the evening. We were surprised at the lack of elk on some of our cameras, but it helped to focus our attention to other spots for Saturday morning.

Saturday morning arrived and we were on a ridge calling right at first light. We ended up hearing a bull bugling well off in the distance in an area we know well. We immediately made plans and started working our way towards the bull. The bull kept sounding off on his own, but as we got a mile and a half in, we realized we were too far behind, and he was working his way up a steep hillside to bed. We had two trail cameras in that area as well, so we decided to grab those SD cards and back out to go have lunch, with plans to go around the mountain and traverse our way through a saddle and into the bedding area, instead of trying to follow him up the mountain. However, more afternoon storms hit starting right around noon that brought rain and lightning and continued on through the rest of the day, ruining our plans.

We made plans that evening for the next morning to enter the area from that same saddle and get down to the bench where we heard the bull that morning, in hopes of getting on his level and cutting him off on his way to bed, instead of trying to chase him from a mile and a half away.

 

[cohunter14]

Saturday evening, we also had an interesting conversation. My father said he probably only has another 1-2 years of hunting left in him. At 67 years old, he can still get around okay and is in good shape, but he felt he was slowing down and keeping us from hunting harder. He also said he would feel guilty if he shot something as he can't really help pack it out due to having multiple back surgeries. I looked at him with a smile and said "BS, there is no guilt here. I'm going to call in a bull for you, you're going to shoot it, and I'm going to pack it out. I want you to shoot a bull with your bow!" Little did I know what the man upstairs had in store for us!

 

[cohunter14]

Sunday morning, we threw some early morning bugles out from the same ridge as the morning before, in hopes of hearing the same bull. We also wanted to make sure that bull or a different bull wasn't in a different location. We were met with silence, so we continued with our plan and headed to the saddle we wanted to drop in from. However, when we got there, we were greeted with another ATV already parked on the trail. Not wanting to interfere with another hunter, we decided we would move to the next saddle to the west and work our way up to the top of that. This would take longer to get to, but it was closer to where the bull bedded the day before. We figured instead of dropping down on the bull, we could stay near the top of the saddle, keeping the thermals right, and listen for the bull to work his way up to the bedding area on the other side, then potentially make a play from there.

We worked our way right to where we wanted to be near the top of the saddle in a small meadow. We sat down on the edge of the meadow to eat some breakfast and relax as we waited, in hopes of the bull working his way up the other side. Minutes after sitting down, we hear a bugle. Only this bugle isn't coming from the bedding area on the north side of the saddle, it's on the south side of the ridge and just to our west. We stay silent and continue listening, and we quickly realize that this bull is working his way right towards our saddle, as he continued to sound off on his own. We quickly scrambled to grab our gear and get on his side of the meadow, so we weren't out in the open when he got there.

 

[cohunter14]

We quickly scrambled to try to find a setup, but it wasn't pretty as the small pines on the edge of the meadow were pretty thick and left very few decent shooting lanes. We got my dad and my wife's cousin set up as good as we could and I backed off to call. Unfortunately, the thermals were going all over the place and, shortly after hearing the bull chuckle from inside of 100 yards, we heard some crashing. We did our best to try to call him back in, but it quickly became evident that the bull caught our scent.

Bad luck happens, and we sat there discussing what we could have done differently for a few minutes. Thoughts then shifted to going back to listening for the bull on the other side of the ridge, so we started working our way back to a good spot to listen from. As we were doing that, the bull that had busted started to sound off again, definitely farther off, but as he continued to sound off, we knew he wasn't that far out, and we had a good idea on where he was now heading to bed. Once again, we shifted our plans and started traversing our way across the hill, with the intention to let him get to his bed and then rile him up again.

 

[cohunter14]

You know what they say about the best laid plans, right? Well, our original morning plan had been busted, our quick setup had been a bust, and this plan was about to join those ranks. OnX can be such a help at times, but it's also amazing how topos can be off at times, and also how you can't necessarily see the topography with satellite imagery.

We started traversing the hill, which the topo showed as being the same grade the whole way, only to find ourselves scaling across rocks on some extremely steep terrain that was not shown via the topo. There was no rush to get to the bedding area, but at the same time it was frustrating, and I felt bad for putting my dad in that spot. As we were stopped and catching our breath for what was probably the 20th time on what was supposed to be a traverse of a hillside, I turned and apologized to him, and he just smiled and said, "oh well!"

As I turned back around, something above me caught my eye and I turned to see what appeared to be a smaller bull trotting off right on top of the ridge. In the quick glance I got, I figured he was maybe a smaller five point, and still worth pursuing as he wasn't completely spooked. I also figured if we got to the flat on top of the ridge, it would potentially make for some easier walking if we kept going after the other bull. So, we started climbing up the steep, rock infested hill to the top, some 100 yards away.

 

[cohunter14]

It took us a few minutes to get up there due to the steepness of the hill and the rocks, forcing us to stop and catch our breath multiple times. When we got to the top, we were once again catching our breath when we heard what we thought were some cow mews. A few minutes later, a bull sounded off from a couple hundred yards away, on the same flat top of the mountain. We figured it was a different bull from the one we saw trot off, as the sound came from a different direction.

We slowly started moving in towards the bull, but it was some extremely thick vegetation we had to work through, with a bunch of new growth aspen mixed in with blow downs and more mature trees. Eventually, we found two different shooting lanes about 40 yards apart that gave both my dad and my wife's cousin roughly 30-yard windows. The bull had sounded off again, and we figured he was maybe 150 yards out now, so this would have to work. They both setup in the two different spots and I moved back to start calling, hoping I could convince the bull to come into one of the two shooting lanes.

 

[cohunter14]

I let out two cow calls and the bull immediately responded. I quickly cut him off and screamed a bugle at him. It was a natural response on my part, but I quickly wondered if I had messed up, thinking that if it was the smaller bull, I could have scared him off. I gave it maybe 30-40 seconds and made two cow calls again and the woods erupted with a bugle. The bull was coming, and he was coming in quick!! He had covered a ton of ground in that short amount of time and was moving right towards my dad's shooting lane.

Before I could even respond to his bugle, I heard crashing. I immediately threw out a bugle, thinking he either caught our scent and busted, or my dad had shot and he went running.

 

[cohunter14]

I moved sideways a few yards so I could see my dad and I could see that he had taken a shot. He turned to me and gave me a thumbs up.

I worked my way over to my dad. He looked at me and said "I shot and could hear it hit him, but I'm not sure where it hit. He was BIG!!!"

His hands were shaking pretty good, as were mine. My wife's cousin worked his way over to us and we began the painful waiting game. After 20 minutes, we decided to go check out the spot where the bull was, 25 yards from where my dad shot, and there was immediately good blood. We went back, gathered our things, and started the blood trailing.

 

[cohunter14]

The blood trail was one of the easier trails I've ever followed, with heavy blood on the ground and the surrounding trees and new growth aspens. We got to a point where it got a little thicker and we had stopped to figure out where the bull had gone when I looked through two trees and saw a part of the bull's body on the ground. I tapped my dad on the shoulder and pointed.

We walked over to the bull and our jaws dropped. The thing was an absolute giant. As we got closer, the excitement got even better. The bull had double drop tines and was a bull we had gotten on one of our trail cameras that we grabbed the day before. We literally had been drooling about that bull after seeing the picture, and now here he was. The high fives and hugs commenced as we stood in awe of what was in front of us. A prayer of thanks was said, and the work began.

We broke the bull down, and you could tell the adrenaline was still running full through my dad, as he busted his butt helping us cut and quarter the bull and get all of the meat in game bags.

We were also blessed that my brother-in-law and his father arrived mid-morning that day, and we somehow had two bars of cell service where the bull expired, so we were able to guide them to our location, and they were able to get there right when we had finished breaking the bull down.

Even with the help of those two, the amount of work that went in after that is something I will also never forget. It was so thick in this area and there were so many blowdowns, it quickly became the most brutal pack out I've ever been a part of. We were able to get everything but the head and front quarter out that afternoon and we arrived back at our camp just before 5:00pm, after he had shot the bull at 10:35am.

The next day, my brother-in-law and I went in to retrieve the front quarter along with the head and cape. Getting the head out of that same area was absolutely brutal with all of the new growth combined with the width and weight of it, but it was well worth it to live out my promise to my dad, that I would call one in for him, he'd shoot it, and I'd pack it out.

 

[cohunter14]

This will forever be a memory I'll never forget, and I'm sure the others who participated in this hunt will feel the same way. I'm so thankful that God gave us this opportunity, and I'm so thrilled for my dad. He truly shot the bull of a lifetime, and I was right there by his side the whole time, which is amazing. I can only hope that I can still be doing this when I'm 67 years old and be able to run up and down the mountains with my boys. He's truly a badass and I hope I proved to him that he has more than one or two more years left to hunt.

We unofficially scored the bull at 372 gross non-typical. Score isn't something we've ever been concerned about, and I think either one of us would have been thrilled with him shooting a raghorn, but the stars somehow aligned, and he was able to take an OTC giant.

As I wrap this up, I'd be remiss if I didn't give a quick plug for Corey Jacobsen. I've had the pleasure of knowing Corey for a number of years now, and I've followed his teachings and the UEH for a long time. However, I had the privilege of attending Corey's Elk Camp over the summer, and being able to go through that instruction and hands-on experience definitely helped me in seeing exactly how they do things, from the setup to the calling. It was instrumental in how we handled our situation, and I can honestly say that I'm not sure we would have had this success if not for attending that over the summer. Highly recommended for anyone, regardless of your experience!!

 

[ribo451]

That’s a great bull and a great write up. I don’t think I’ve ever seen one with double drop times. My dad is 71 and has a heart condition and had a knee replacement last year. He can’t hunt like he used to but still gets out. Him and my mom have been going out and telling me about all the bugling bulls they are seeing and hearing in the same area I got my bull last year. The area is too steep for them to feel comfortable chasing after them and they had been hoping to catch the bulls closer to the roads they are walking in on but that hasn’t happened. But they are still getting out and enjoying elk hunting.

My help packing out elk is two 70+ year olds and my brother who has rheumatoid arthritis. All 3 of them are willing but not really able. Once I get moved to our new place and get things established I see pack goats in my future.

The county I live in and mostly hunt in has a website that shows aerial photos and topo maps and something new that it has is LiDAR. LiDAR shows the ground through the tree canopy. It’s great for you to see what the ground is actually like. I don’t know if onyx has that but hopefully they will soon if they don’t. It’s great for e-scouting.

 

[cohunter14]

Thanks ribo, and I appreciate the info on LiDAR as I haven't heard of that yet.

Good luck to your folks! Hopefully they'll be calling for some help packing out in the near future.

 

[ribo451]

There is a giant rabbit hole you can go down with LiDAR. I first saw it on a tv show where they were mapping jungles in South America and Central America and finding long lost temples and civilizations that have been swallowed up by the jungles for centuries. Pretty cool stuff.

 

[ribo451]

This is my property with the LiDAR overlayed on the aerial photo. Once you get used to using it it can be pretty handy.

 

[Ilelkhntr]

Congratulations to your dad on a great bull!
You guys talking about your dad’s slowing down at 67 and 71 is kind of a wake up call for me. I’m working on getting myself back into shape and I’ll be 65 next June. Take it from the old guys, it’s easier to stay in shape than get in shape!

 

[sjl2012]

Congrats to your whole group!! That's an awesome hunt just to be a part of!!

 

[bowhunterjae]

Congratulations! WOW, what a BULL. WHAT AN AWESOME HUNT!