Wish me luck…
November 29, 2008 - 5:47 am
Irradiated by Stingray
Irradiated by Stingray
Morning comes a lot quicker when you’re trying to get the drop on big-ass quadrupeds. Today marks the first time I’ll be going into the field armed with intent to kill something bigger than me. The good news is I’ve got an excellent partner. The bad news is the last time I was hunting was about 12 years ago, and then it was for dove, not elk.
If anybody has any spare good will laying around, I could use it for a few days.
November 29th, 2008 at 6:22 am
Good Luck!
November 29th, 2008 at 8:26 am
What’s the worry? You are much more likely to twist your ankle or suffer the pain and humiliation of a hangnail than you are to be hurt by an elk you are hunting, unless you insist on killing a 7×7 400″ bull with a Swiss Army knife. Hunting elk is strenous but easy, so go have good time and leave the anxiety in the closet for something important.
November 29th, 2008 at 3:24 pm
The luck isn’t for “not getting hurt” so much as it is for “actually getting an elk”.
Which isn’t looking promising too far.
November 29th, 2008 at 4:29 pm
Actually, the hard part is getting the dead elk to the vehicle.
Trust me on this.
Shooting an elk is the easy part.
Your “friend” is taking you along as an after-shoot pack mule … standard use for newbie elk hunters.
November 30th, 2008 at 8:08 am
Actually, the easy part is getting the vehicle to the dead elk.
Trust me on this.
I have shot and killed seven, and all but one were killed such that it was quite easy to drive up to it, right where it dropped, field dress it, and winch it into the truck. The seventh was in the trees about 50 feet up a slope, and the winch made short work of pulling it down the slope, through the trees, and up to the truck.
Your mileage may vary, but I have found elk hunting in New Mexico to be much less work than deer hunting in Oklahoma or Missouri.
November 30th, 2008 at 9:23 am
Good luck. Have a blast!
November 30th, 2008 at 12:59 pm
Drive up elk hunts?
OK … if you can kill elks on the flats, I’ll concede that.
Generally, up here in the NW, they are up in the hills/mountains, and end up dead in stupidly difficult places.
November 30th, 2008 at 6:37 pm
I’ve killed six in New Mexico, and all were on the flats, five above 9,000 feet. Wait for it to get cold and snowy, and elk will come down out of higher places to feed in grassy meadows.
On several occasions, I’ve literally had my choice out of 300-400 animals at once. Given that I hunt for meat, not for antlers, any big, healthy cow is as good as any other.
November 30th, 2008 at 11:10 pm
Good luck!!!