cjack
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I loaded up the truck, hitched up the trailer, loaded the Kawasaki Mule and headed out Tuesday for Eastern Utah and my first "Rifle" cow elk hunt. After a rest stop in Masquite Nevada I hit the road early Wednesday morning for the DNR office in Ogden Utah to pick up my cow elk tag. One hour later I reached my destination of Coalville Utah.
The plan was to meet up with the guide Thursday morning in a small town a little to the North called Hennefer for a three day hunt on a very large private ranch. My guide "Dusty" was right on time at 6:50 am with the temperature at a brisk 5 degrees. After a quick 5 min. drive to the ranch we gathered my things and loaded them into Dustys Cherokee. We waited 10 minutes until shooting time then headed up a snowy, icy ranch road in hopes of seeing some elk in the nearby "dry farm".
After about 1/4 of a mile Dusty stops the Jeep and says I'm going to walk 10yds up the hill to the left and check out the first field, just as I'm getting out of the Jeep to join him I see his eyes light up! We have a group of about 20 elk 1000yds out. He said these elk are weary from a season of being hunted so he eased the Jeep up the ice crusted dirt raod another 100yds and began our stalk.
The elk were feeding across the field and headed up the mountain to bed down for the day so our plan was to get ahead of them and have them feed toward us. Walking on the crusty snow was a little noises and slow going but we were able to get to where we wanted to be undetected. We popped our heads up to see where they were at and they were covering more ground than we expected so we had to hurry to another position another 1/4 mile up the hill. By the time we reached our spot the herd had grouped up with another 25 or so elk. Now we were looking at a herd 40 to 50 elk, all cows and spikes which was good because I had a cow tag. At this point we were at 440yds and Dusty said we need to take the shot. I lowered my bi-pods and settled in a prone position. My scope is a fixed one so I had put the cross hairs on top of the back of the largest lead cow and pulled the trigger, it was a clean miss but we could tell where the bullet hit. I quickly chambered another round and took another shot, again putting the cross hairs on the top of her back, again another miss. Now the group was moving so I took aim at the first one that presented a broadside shot and missed my third shot! Now I began to panic as the herd was moving further up the hill but at a pace slower than I expected. Dusty was backing me up in case I wounded one so he had his 6.5mm set up on his pack and told me to shoot his rifle. I scooted over and lined up a shot on the closest cow which was now at 630yds!! Dusty dialed in the scope so all I had to do was put the cross hairs on the vitals......this time we heard the familiar thud of a good shot. The brush on the mountain was thick and we lost track of the elk but thought we saw some thrashing a little above where I took the shot. We patiently laid there for about 20 minutes while the herd made their way around the mountain and out of site.
Still not certain I had an elk down we headed back to the Jeep and drove it up to the base of the mountain, about 100 yds from where we thought it was. About 80 yds into the search we found a HUGE blood trail which led us to my first elk that laid about 30 yds from where I shot her.
We dragged it down the mountain (assisted by the snow) then hooked it to the Jeep so we could drag it to where Dusty wanted to leave the gut pile for some coyote hunting later.
Dusty made quick work of boning it out and had me back at my hotel by 11:00am. I was able to make it to Las Vegas by 6:00pm for a little celebrating and then home by Friday morning at 11:00am.
My guide Dusty was professional in every sense of the word and I never would have been successful without him. I learned a lot but more important I had a great time!
The plan was to meet up with the guide Thursday morning in a small town a little to the North called Hennefer for a three day hunt on a very large private ranch. My guide "Dusty" was right on time at 6:50 am with the temperature at a brisk 5 degrees. After a quick 5 min. drive to the ranch we gathered my things and loaded them into Dustys Cherokee. We waited 10 minutes until shooting time then headed up a snowy, icy ranch road in hopes of seeing some elk in the nearby "dry farm".
After about 1/4 of a mile Dusty stops the Jeep and says I'm going to walk 10yds up the hill to the left and check out the first field, just as I'm getting out of the Jeep to join him I see his eyes light up! We have a group of about 20 elk 1000yds out. He said these elk are weary from a season of being hunted so he eased the Jeep up the ice crusted dirt raod another 100yds and began our stalk.
The elk were feeding across the field and headed up the mountain to bed down for the day so our plan was to get ahead of them and have them feed toward us. Walking on the crusty snow was a little noises and slow going but we were able to get to where we wanted to be undetected. We popped our heads up to see where they were at and they were covering more ground than we expected so we had to hurry to another position another 1/4 mile up the hill. By the time we reached our spot the herd had grouped up with another 25 or so elk. Now we were looking at a herd 40 to 50 elk, all cows and spikes which was good because I had a cow tag. At this point we were at 440yds and Dusty said we need to take the shot. I lowered my bi-pods and settled in a prone position. My scope is a fixed one so I had put the cross hairs on top of the back of the largest lead cow and pulled the trigger, it was a clean miss but we could tell where the bullet hit. I quickly chambered another round and took another shot, again putting the cross hairs on the top of her back, again another miss. Now the group was moving so I took aim at the first one that presented a broadside shot and missed my third shot! Now I began to panic as the herd was moving further up the hill but at a pace slower than I expected. Dusty was backing me up in case I wounded one so he had his 6.5mm set up on his pack and told me to shoot his rifle. I scooted over and lined up a shot on the closest cow which was now at 630yds!! Dusty dialed in the scope so all I had to do was put the cross hairs on the vitals......this time we heard the familiar thud of a good shot. The brush on the mountain was thick and we lost track of the elk but thought we saw some thrashing a little above where I took the shot. We patiently laid there for about 20 minutes while the herd made their way around the mountain and out of site.
Still not certain I had an elk down we headed back to the Jeep and drove it up to the base of the mountain, about 100 yds from where we thought it was. About 80 yds into the search we found a HUGE blood trail which led us to my first elk that laid about 30 yds from where I shot her.
We dragged it down the mountain (assisted by the snow) then hooked it to the Jeep so we could drag it to where Dusty wanted to leave the gut pile for some coyote hunting later.
Dusty made quick work of boning it out and had me back at my hotel by 11:00am. I was able to make it to Las Vegas by 6:00pm for a little celebrating and then home by Friday morning at 11:00am.
My guide Dusty was professional in every sense of the word and I never would have been successful without him. I learned a lot but more important I had a great time!
