Utah Cow Success

[RoosterKiller]

Spent the last week chasing elk in utah. The work paid off.Now I need to eat.

 

[baco]

Congrats on the cow

 

[DAWG]

Cool. The UT cow tag is one of the best out of state hunting tag values there is. I have to wait till late Nov...

 

[sdnative13]

Good job guy. I was planning on calling you tomorrow to see how your hunt went but I guess I no longer need to. Just let me know when you want me to fire up the BBQ for some backstraps steaks.

 

[jls456]

Very nice cow. You have some good eatin' there.

 

[Vermonster]

Some great eats right there! Congrats!!!

 

[daddy63]

Congrats on the cow. Is there a story to follow?

 

[RoosterKiller]

Congrats on the cow. Is there a story to follow?

Well if you want the story here it is. We got to utah on Oct 5. The opener was the sixth on Sat.
Utah's been in a drought so everything was dry and noisy.Opening day we went out . I climb up the mountain in the dark pines where I figured the elk would be. I saw a total of 7 elk that day.Only two were cows. I did draw up on them but they changed directions and the shot never materialized.In the late afternoon I radioed back to my buddy that I was headed down and to be on the look out for anything I might scare up. As I headed down and my friend was waiting, some hunters on the other side of the canyon jumped a bull with some cows and scared them right to where my friend was waiting for me.He got a shot and down went his cow. I thought wow first day and we already got one. Good!. We spent the next day retrieving his cow and got it to the processor.Monday we were back at it looking for another cow. We would see a lot of Elk for the next two days but we would always see them running.Could not get a shot.The could hear us becuase everything was so dry.It was warm in the 50's so the elk would lay up in the pines and were not moving. We would go in after them but they would run off and we would just see their butts going out of sight. Since its now during the week we don't have the benefit of other hunters to chase the elk to us as had happened on opening day. So we had to come up with a strategy that would allow me a chance at a shot. Since we knew the elk were in the pines and each set of pines held elk and the pines were seperated by aspens, and since the elk were in rut and all the fighting was over I thought "What would happen if you ran a couple of groups together.' I was wondering if it might create some confusion with mixing the herds. Well It was worth a try. So I went through the first stand of pines and got a Bull with about 20 cows going. I chased them through the pines and out into the aspens.Normally I now would stop and not spook them. Well not this time. I kept on them and they headed for the next set of pines. When they got there the resident bull began to bugle and then the interloping bull started bugeling back.I got to the pines and had no problem locating them becuase of the bugeling.So I continued to chase them.It was very warm for the elk and they did not like all of this running,but off we went. Now I had more than 40 head of elk running across that mountain. We got to the next set of pines and this is were it got weird.In this third set of pines it was full of bachelor bulls and spikes.Well when the ladies hit that stand of pines there was so much bugeling going on it was like an orchestra.There were so many elk together at this time I could not believe it.There had to be over a hundred elk.I had spikes so confused they would just stand there looking at me. I had 5 point bachelors walking 30 feet from me bugeling trying to get those females that were running all over. I slipped out of the pines into the aspens hoping to spot some cows.it was pretty confusing in the pines by this time. Once I got out of the pines I was looking around to see what would come out. There was so much bugeling going on and I had gotten so many elk bunched up that it was really caotic. While sitting in the Aspens I hear a lot of mewing and I look over to see three cows standing about 60 yards away mewing for the rest of their herd. I took aim at the biggest of the three and let her have it. She went down and the rest is history.However the most exciting part of the whole thing was the spectical of seeing all of those elk together. Just standing there - looking confused. Hell those bulls are probably still sorting out them cows. This is what it took to fill that tag.

 

[hunterdoug]

very cool rooster, now thats thinking out of the box. congrats great story.

 

[daddy63]

I agree great strategy especially since it worked so well. Too cool. Congrats. Was this public land?

 

[RoosterKiller]

I agree great strategy especially since it worked so well. Too cool. Congrats. Was this public land?

Yes it was public land. It was the Uinta National Forest.

 

[mtnsammy]

On my way home from Colorado I saw some big Elk in the back of trucks going thru Utah. Congrats. It is always good to have meat in the freeze.

 

[daddy63]

Roosterkiller,

Curious how you. Got your elk meat back home. Cooler with dry ice?

 

[RoosterKiller]

Roosterkiller,

Curious how you. Got your elk meat back home. Cooler with dry ice?

Since we got one opening day we took that one to the processor and he had it ready to go when we left. It was quick frozen so we just put it in coolers and it stays frozen. The other one is still at the processors in Utah. He will freeze the meat and then UPS it frozen to me.

 

[daddy63]

Thanks rooster killer. Tryin to get different ideas on the best way. Enjoy your eats