Start My Hunt! New Sponsor!!! New Contest!!

cnelk

New member
Mar 23, 2017
5,542
I would like to welcome Start My Hunt, another sponsor to BacktrakOutdoors!
You will see their banner roll across the top with our other sponsors

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Mike has put together some very informative Colorado maps that Im sure many will find helpful.
He also been very generous and has offered to give away FOUR of his maps!

We will have four different contests that any member or sponsor can enter and win via a random draw.

I will let Mike introduce himself and tell everyone about his product

Stay tuned for the CONTEST THREADS!!!
 
Thanks for sponsoring Mike! Looking forward to the contest and hearing more about your product! :upthumb:
 
Awesome! Welcome Mike! Kinda funny seeing this as I actually JUST purchased a few of these maps last week and am looking over them now, very well put together and worth every penny for a map freak like myself. I definitely recommend you give his site a look.
 
Hi, my name is Mike, and I am a new sponsor to Back Trak Outdoors. First of all, thanks for the welcome from everybody above. Having hunted elk in CO for over 35 years now, I wanted to combine my backcountry experience with my technical knowledge to find a better way to scout out elk. What I have come up with are my ElkTracker Maps.

My ElkTracker maps show all of the following for USFS Lands which make them unique and something you will not find anywhere else all on one map?

Elk Scouting Hot Spots?over 7,000 (All of these require some boots on the ground and some work).

Elk Security Habitat?Millions of acres

Elk Prime Forage Areas?Lots, Lots, Lots

Roads and Trails Status--Based upon the 2015 MVUM road maps

Land Ownership (Lands Open to Hunting)?Based on the 2013 status

Colorado Parks and Wildlife Elk Seasonal Range Data (Summer, Winter, and Migration Routes)

All maps are fully customizable to the area you want to hunt based upon a center-point coordinate or familiar landmark. Each map can also be made at any scale you choose. That is why my service is different. You get quality elk habitat, centered on your choice of landmark, with all of the above features added. Please read my testimonial page first--

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These maps offer great information based on the habitat in your area. And they can be customized. I checked them out thoroughly and they accurately identify cnelk and OTCWill\'s best hot spots. Great scouting and hunting tools!
 
I had to come back to comment on this. I\'m going to buy your map for the unit i\'ve hunted since the 50\'s. I\'m curious if your hot spots will be near my honey holes. If they are, honey holes will be thing of the past, and anybody with $35 will have a huge advantage over those who don\'t buy a map. This is great for your business, but what will it do to hunting?

It will also take away one of the most important parts of someones hunt. Finding elk. Hunting is becoming easier and easier for those who are too lazy to do their own hunt.

Sorry, but this bothers me.
 
\"Still Hunter\" said:
I had to come back to comment on this. I\'m going to buy your map for the unit i\'ve hunted since the 50\'s. I\'m curious if your hot spots will be near my honey holes. If they are, honey holes will be thing of the past, and anybody with $35 will have a huge advantage over those who don\'t buy a map. This is great for your business, but what will it do to hunting?

It will also take away one of the most important parts of someones hunt. Finding elk. Hunting is becoming easier and easier for those who are too lazy to do their own hunt.

Sorry, but this bothers me.


Nice to see you back Pete. I hope all is well. I was just thinking today what it will be like in a few years if a bunch of hunters go buy these maps. It might be great for a couple years but the elk will leave the honey holes and find new areas.
 
\"Still Hunter\" said:
I had to come back to comment on this. I\'m going to buy your map for the unit i\'ve hunted since the 50\'s. I\'m curious if your hot spots will be near my honey holes. If they are, honey holes will be thing of the past, and anybody with $35 will have a huge advantage over those who don\'t buy a map. This is great for your business, but what will it do to hunting?

It will also take away one of the most important parts of someones hunt. Finding elk. Hunting is becoming easier and easier for those who are too lazy to do their own hunt.

Sorry, but this bothers me.

Still Hunter, I respect your opinion. While it is true that my maps may give others that are new to an area an advantage, they will still need to work for their elk. There is nothing easy about packing out a big bull over a mile or two. But I look at it this way--unless you are hunting in a loin cloth with a stick and obsidian points, you are using technology to enhance your hunt. Every piece of gear you buy is most likely an improvement over the previous model. These are all just tools to help in the field. My maps are not necessarily designed to show people exactly where to hunt, but to show them the types of areas to look for and what elk habitat consists of in the field. Also, do you begrudge the guys who hire a guide? Same concept, just costs a lot more.
 
All

I decide to get a map from Mike to review just like Pete was referring to.

Upon giving him a central point of reference, Mike told me that no \'hot spots\' were identified, but prime forage and security habitat was.
Geez!!! Isnt that what we want to find when we go scouting??

StartMyHunt maps do NOT tell you where you will kill your next elk, they give you data of many factors to go check out based on that data.
The data starts with a minimum distance from a motorized roadway/trail so that took away all my spots that were within that distance.

I have posted here many times that MANY of my good elk spots I can hear vehicles.... so in actuality, StartMyHunt maps wont show any of those hot spots...
 
I\'m curious about that too Brad. Some of my spots are very close to major roads. I consider it great elk habitat, and i\'m wondering if it will show on his map. Who knows? Maybe i\'ll learn about some spots I haven\'t found myself.

Mike...I don\'t have anything against you making a living off this idea. I just hate to see elk hunting made any easier than it\'s becoming. I agree that elk hunting will always be hard, because of the size on them. However, we don\'t want to make the killing of them too easy. The average is about 20% success rate now. Depending on the unit. If that number gets too big it will mean less tags. Nobody wants that. It\'s hard enough getting tags now.

Personally, I like to see a hunter work hard in the whole hunt. Not just the hiking, and hauling out the meat, but also in finding the elk. Lets not make that part too easy. We also don\'t want everybody to be in the best spots either. That will make the present hot spots....dead spots. It will drive the elk from the good forage areas to lesser areas just get away from hunters. This is not good for the elk either.

I hope your business works out. I also hope it doesn\'t change elk hunting too much.
 
x2

My map was purchased for my area as well and neither of my \"honey holes\" were listed. They too are like Brad\'s in that they are close to roads, so they will never be listed as one of his \"hot spots\".

They have given me a few new ideas of places to scout in the summer, and reaffirmed a few other ideas I had of places I wanted to scout anyway. Can someone else buy this map and go to these places before me that didn\'t do the same prerequisite homework that I did? Sure. But, as mentioned above, none of these \"hot spots\" are easy to get to and I really don\'t see that happening, but who knows, maybe i\'ll be proven wrong.

After a few different scouting trips and after the season is over I\'ll report back as to whether or not I ran into anybody else that saw these \"hot spots\" on his maps and give an honest review as to whether I even thought they should be considered hots spots in the first place. But really, I\'m not sure anybody is purchasing these to get an easy way out, if they are there are MUCH better things to spend their money on than a map that shows a meadow with good forage 4 miles form the nearest road. Most like myself are honestly just looking to reaffirm their own homework and hunches, previous areas they\'ve had luck, etc.

My .02
 
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