Rubs

[Deertick]

While out exploring last weekend, Wife and I worked our way down a long draw that dropped nearly 800\' to a major creek. About 1/4 the way down, we found a lot of elk rubs ... and it looked like they were from multiple years.

What does this tell you?

What point of the season would you say is prime to hunt this spot?

 

[cnelk]

What point of the season would you say is prime to hunt this spot?

Any day you can hunt it

While out exploring last weekend, Wife and I worked our way down a long draw that dropped nearly 800\' to a major creek. About 1/4 the way down, we found a lot of elk rubs ... and it looked like they were from multiple years.
What does this tell you?

I would be sure to mark it on my GPS and when I got back home I would look at the area and see if I can figure out why that particular spot holds bulls.
I would think its more of a rut area opposed to a velvet rubbing area.

Was it flat?

 

[Jaquomo]

John, you found a good spot for anytime during the early season. Bulls will make those rubs whenever they feel like it and whenever they are in the area. Finding them from multiple years means you\'ve found a travel route they use year after year, usually in between feeding and bedding. I typically find these loose rub clusters back in the timber a short distance from meadows. It\'s one of the keys I look for when summer scouting in places where the elk will go after the pressure starts. The trick is then to decipher whether they are in an evening or morning travel route. Could be both, could be one or the other.

Either way, it means bulls!

 

[Deertick]

I typically find these loose rub clusters back in the timber a short distance from meadows.

I did what Cnelk did ... marked it on GPS, then looked at it on Google Earth.

What\'s so special about this spot?

Here\'s the description: A shallow 800\' south-facing drainage; Spruce forest at top, aspen and sage at the very bottom. Access from the top is via an ATV road that ends near the headwaters of the creek flowing through it. Access from the bottom would be very difficult, requiring a waist-deep water crossing and a 4 mile hike.

The rubs were about 200\' down from the top, off to the side of the meadow that meanders along the creek in the drainage. Aspen and Spruce were rubbed. Lots of moose sign in there, and fairly wet, whereas the surrounding hills were dry, decomposed granite, and heavily forested with dense deadfall.

Looking at Google Earth, 100\' above the rub area is a big flat bench in the spruce trees. Only other feeding area is up at the headwaters of the creek, but that has ATV roads all around it. Feeding in the drainage, though, would be ideal ... lots of grass in the narrow drainage, easy escape, and not many people will go DOWN hill to hunt there. I think most of the hunting pressure would stay \"up top\" on the flat.

Hypothesis: I don\'t think that the elk are going to go far when pressure comes from the top. I think they dive into this drainage (and others nearby) just low enough to avoid all but the most legged-up hunters, and remain close to the top to feed at night in the meadows of the headwaters of the creeks in the area. They make the rubs on return from feeding in the early mornings before climbing up to the bench to sleep.

I think I\'m finally starting to learn a bit about how to \"read\" these \"signs\".

 

[Jaquomo]

Bingo, John! I have a couple spots like that, with the pressure up on the flat that pushes them down into those drainages. Not many elk in there now because they\'re up on the flats. But by about the third day of the season they\'ll be back down in there, wallowing, making rubs on the way back up to the midway bedding benches.

Good find, and good job deciphering it!