Lark Bunting
New member
- Sep 14, 2016
- 710
I was out again last weekend. Had some buddies come up on Friday night, one of them had a deer tag for this area. I have a deer tag and elk OTC. Seems I have been into decent deer habitat...which I cannot differentiate between elk habitat; pines mixed with aspens. :shrug:
My son was supposed to be coming out with me but he had a horrible cold on Thursday/Friday and decided he was not up for the death march. Probably a good idea. I put in 9 miles between Fri-Sun. That was at a hunting pace too, not just crashing through the woods. I had a doe run across a trail I was sitting near. Not sure what spooked it but it never knew I was there and I couldn\'t find it in the aspen grove it ran into. I drove a couple miles up the road that afternoon to where I had taken the shot at a deer a few weeks ago. I parked just off the road and walked around my truck to the passenger side. I put on my pack and grabbed my bow off the seat and when I looked up I had two more does staring at me through my driver side window. I knocked an arrow, and quickly realized I was technically standing on the road. I walked slowly to the back of the cab so I could range them over the bed of the truck...11 yards...9 yards...8 yards...error. They were inside the range of my rangefinder! Unfortunately, they were moving to me closer to the road. In Colorado we have to be 50\' from the center line of a maintained road. I was maybe 5\'. I moved back toward the front of my truck and waited for them to move away from the road. I followed them up a hill and tried flanking them from the down-wind side but I never saw them again. I have shared the story with several people and most of them said I should have taken the shot. There was no way I was taking the shot from the road. I don\'t regret not taking the shot. I am hoping karma rewards me with a perfect set up this weekend for making the right decision. I\'m a little scatter-brained right now because I always leave camp with the intent to hunt elk but get interrupted by deer. :crazy:
I am going to a different spot this weekend with my son. We saw elk in this other spot last year and have some decent intel on the area. Same GMU and I\'ll have the deer tag and elk tag. This is a strange place as it\'s a lot of dense, rolling hills. Not your typical, \"Find a bench 2/3 up a mountain, saddles, north facing slopes, etc.\". It\'s 8200\' to 9200\'. There are aspens, pines, meadows...deer and a few elk. Seems we could get back away from the ATV trails better in this spot.
With two E/S elk tags and an E/S deer tag between the two of us, I have to think something is bound to happen.
Crossing my fingers!
I\'ll finish with a question. How long will you sit on an area? I have (undiagnosed) ADD, badly, and tend to just wander around looking over the next ridge, around the next corner, up the next hill. I feel I should sit an area longer but it will take everything in my fidgety body to sit longer. I\'ll do a calling setup and sit for 15 minutes then move on after scanning the area for animals.
My son was supposed to be coming out with me but he had a horrible cold on Thursday/Friday and decided he was not up for the death march. Probably a good idea. I put in 9 miles between Fri-Sun. That was at a hunting pace too, not just crashing through the woods. I had a doe run across a trail I was sitting near. Not sure what spooked it but it never knew I was there and I couldn\'t find it in the aspen grove it ran into. I drove a couple miles up the road that afternoon to where I had taken the shot at a deer a few weeks ago. I parked just off the road and walked around my truck to the passenger side. I put on my pack and grabbed my bow off the seat and when I looked up I had two more does staring at me through my driver side window. I knocked an arrow, and quickly realized I was technically standing on the road. I walked slowly to the back of the cab so I could range them over the bed of the truck...11 yards...9 yards...8 yards...error. They were inside the range of my rangefinder! Unfortunately, they were moving to me closer to the road. In Colorado we have to be 50\' from the center line of a maintained road. I was maybe 5\'. I moved back toward the front of my truck and waited for them to move away from the road. I followed them up a hill and tried flanking them from the down-wind side but I never saw them again. I have shared the story with several people and most of them said I should have taken the shot. There was no way I was taking the shot from the road. I don\'t regret not taking the shot. I am hoping karma rewards me with a perfect set up this weekend for making the right decision. I\'m a little scatter-brained right now because I always leave camp with the intent to hunt elk but get interrupted by deer. :crazy:
I am going to a different spot this weekend with my son. We saw elk in this other spot last year and have some decent intel on the area. Same GMU and I\'ll have the deer tag and elk tag. This is a strange place as it\'s a lot of dense, rolling hills. Not your typical, \"Find a bench 2/3 up a mountain, saddles, north facing slopes, etc.\". It\'s 8200\' to 9200\'. There are aspens, pines, meadows...deer and a few elk. Seems we could get back away from the ATV trails better in this spot.
With two E/S elk tags and an E/S deer tag between the two of us, I have to think something is bound to happen.
Crossing my fingers!
I\'ll finish with a question. How long will you sit on an area? I have (undiagnosed) ADD, badly, and tend to just wander around looking over the next ridge, around the next corner, up the next hill. I feel I should sit an area longer but it will take everything in my fidgety body to sit longer. I\'ll do a calling setup and sit for 15 minutes then move on after scanning the area for animals.