I posted on here a couple of weeks ago that I was heading on a two week elk hunt to the Pecos Wilderness in NM. Well, I’m back, and here’s my report and the requisite pics.
Started off at the trailhead.
Our gear was packed in, and I was told 60 pounds of gear max per person. So I complied, got everything leftover whittled down as light as I could, crammed the rest into my Kifaru MMR (expensive, but I believe if I had any other pack, and I’ve used a few, the hike in would have been that much worse), and still ended up with a 40 pound pack. We get there that morning, and there is so much extra gear that the packers, agreed to do a second run for us, since they have cattle in the area and were going to be going in and out anyway. Only problem was, I didn’t have any other bags to pack my extra stuff in, so I whittled down my pack more by cramming gear into existing packs and drybags. I still ended up with a 30 pound pack. Oh boy. But I decided to suck it up, since I thought the trail in was an initial steep climb and then practically sidehilling or slight climbs the rest of the way. Bad decision.
The hike in was 8+ miles and was absolutely brutal. The day started off nice, but then turned to drizzle and light rain on an already saturated trail. And the trail went up and down the whole way. There was a much easier trail at a different trailhead going in, but it was in much worse condition so we had to take the trail we were on. By mile 6, I literally about hit the wall. I had been cramming food down my throat all day and drinking plenty of water, but I got to the point where I couldn’t even stand to look at food. Kind of scary when you know you need it but can’t stomach it. Additionally, the altitude has always jacked me on the first day and half of mountain hunts I’ve been on. Pounding headaches and extreme shortness of breath. Don’t know why, since I am in really good shape and take my training and cardio beforehand pretty seriously. But after the first day and a half, it usually clears up and I am once again out walking and climbing everybody.
Anyway, finally made it to camp, which was halfway up the side of a drainage/mountain ridge and above a tributary of the Pecos, and basically collapsed and downed a lot of ibuprofen. Forced myself to eat a Mountain House meal a little later and crashed.
The next evening, me and my buddy called in a spike, who busted us, and later saw two cows and a couple more spikes. One of the cows almost gave us a shot. The others in our group failed to see anything.
The rest of the week, the bulls were bugling sporadically in the mornings, with little evening activity. Days would start off sunny, the showers would build up at midday, and then clear off for the evening hunt. The bulls were also bugling randomly during the middle of the day. We got onto a few herds and bugling bulls and had a few close calls, but nothing panned out. We also saw some neat country and did quite a bit of exploring.
Saturday rolls around, and me and my buddy slept in, since we’d been going pretty hard (I came back a full 10 pounds lighter despite eating everything I could get my hands on up there). We were sitting in camp around noon and a bull kept bugling up river and on the other side of the drainage from us. Finally, we were like “Alright sucker, you’ve tempted us one too many times,” and of we went after him. Murphy raised his head though, and as soon as we started after him, he started clamming up. We finally somewhat pinpointed him, dropped down and crossed over the river, and started climbing to get close to him. We’d bugle, he’d bugle back, and we’d slowly close the gap. Only problem was the wind was doing some really funky stuff that day. Uphill, downhill, sidehill, swirling, a combination of everything. I figured we were going to get busted sooner or later. Finally the bull shuts up and we can’t get a peep out of him. After not getting any responses for about an hour, we snuck up the mountain a pretty good distance to where we thought he was, and I told my buddy to hit the bugle. Instantly, the bull sounded off less than 150 yards away. We go into overdrive, and my buddy tells me to sneak up towards the bull while he calls. I climb up on a line that puts me in line with bull and my buddy, based on where it sounded like he was in relation to us. But the ground was really crunchy, and we were in a deadfall area, so it wasn’t easy to be quiet. I finally took a knee in a somewhat open area to wait. My buddy, who had lost sight of me by this point, bugles again and starts raking a tree with a limb to try to get a response from the bull. I don’t hear anything for a minute or so and then BAM, a huge bull elk appears out of nowhere 20 yards in front of me. All I saw was a mass of antlers; I had no time to count points or do anything but freeze.
He hadn’t made a sound; he just appeared. It’s amazing something that large can be that quiet. The first noise I heard was right after that, when he walked under a spruce tree and his antlers tickled some of the dead limbs. He was on a line that would put him in the open 20 yards to my left, but as soon as he passed the spruce, he turned directly towards me. My mind went into hyperdrive. I didn’t realize that there was a game trail next me that he was following. As I said, I was in the open, with only a spindly little Christmas tree between me and him. I was thinking, “There’s no way, he’s going to smell me,” then “There’s no way, he’s going to see me,” then “There’s no way, he’s going to see and smell me.” But he kept coming. I was looking at him out of the corner of my eye and from under the brim of my hat to try to eliminate that 6th sense that animals have which allows them to sense that they are being watched. I did notice a patch on his ribcage, which I thought was a wound from another bulls antler, and I was going to key on and try to put my arrow through it. I told myself that I was going to try to make a shot as soon as he was broadside to me. Only problem was that broadside was only 5 feet (yes, feet, not yards) away.
The bull reached the broadside point. This pic was taken where the bull was walking, and I am exactly where I was when I drew.
I came to full draw (I think, it’s hazy) as quickly as I could. Cervus elaphus canadiensis exploded. In the instant I drew, the bull had turned almost fully away from me. I released, lost sight of my arrow, and watched the bull run. When he started running, I couldn’t see his left side, but after a few yards, I caught a glimpse of his left side and saw my arrow, buried to the fletching, sticking out. It had entered behind his ribcage, about halfway up his side, and was straight angling towards his right front leg. He tore off through the brush and I lost sight of him after 50 yards. I yelled to my friend to get up here now, and he came running up. His first words were “That thing was huge! Did he wind you?” He couldn’t see me when I shot, so he just saw the bull run off. Me, as I was shaking, trying not to freak out “No, I got an arrow in him!” My friend started freaking out. After replaying everything and talking everything over, I felt like I had made a solid liver hit, which then angled through the back of the left lung and went squarely through the right lung.
We forced ourselves to sit where we were and wait an hour. I couldn’t stand it any longer, and 50 minutes into it, we started blood trailing. I was concerned that we wouldn’t find any blood, since I knew there wasn’t an exit wound and the entry was pretty high on his side. The path of torn up ground and bulldozed brush was pretty easy to follow though. After about 25 yards we started finding blood. More and more of it too. We rounded a corner, and this was waiting for us.
Then the freak out session really began.
We found him at 5:30, or about the time I later found out the Ags were trying to implode against Fresno State. We were working on him until 3 a.m. the next morning, getting him caped correctly, skinned the rest of the way, quarted, debonded, meat hung, etc. And that patch on his side that I thought was an antler wound? I found about a 1.5” piece of carbon arrow shaft, the end with the screw-in insert in his left side lat muscle in a bunch of scar tissue. And in his right side backstrap, I found a 3-blade Satellite broadhead in another mass of scar tissue. He’d caught a lucky break last year. We finally made it back to camp and tried to go to sleep, but we were so worked up, we didn’t realize how late it was. All told, there was 245 pounds of meat sent to the butcher, and based on a 30% ratio, he probably weighed close to 900 pounds.
The rest of time was eventful for everybody else too. There were several missed shots and close calls. All in all a fun trip. Rest of the pics are from the hike out. The first two sets of three below, if you look at them side by side, it will give a quasi-panoramic view of the area.
Two weeks without a bath wasn’t really that bad after the first few days. Wet wipes are worth their weight in gold.
Final note, I need a good elk taxidermist recommendation. I’m in the DFW area, and since TexAgs knows stuff, I trust the opinion of said audience.
[This message has been edited by Log (edited 10/23/2008 7:55p).]
Started off at the trailhead.
Our gear was packed in, and I was told 60 pounds of gear max per person. So I complied, got everything leftover whittled down as light as I could, crammed the rest into my Kifaru MMR (expensive, but I believe if I had any other pack, and I’ve used a few, the hike in would have been that much worse), and still ended up with a 40 pound pack. We get there that morning, and there is so much extra gear that the packers, agreed to do a second run for us, since they have cattle in the area and were going to be going in and out anyway. Only problem was, I didn’t have any other bags to pack my extra stuff in, so I whittled down my pack more by cramming gear into existing packs and drybags. I still ended up with a 30 pound pack. Oh boy. But I decided to suck it up, since I thought the trail in was an initial steep climb and then practically sidehilling or slight climbs the rest of the way. Bad decision.
The hike in was 8+ miles and was absolutely brutal. The day started off nice, but then turned to drizzle and light rain on an already saturated trail. And the trail went up and down the whole way. There was a much easier trail at a different trailhead going in, but it was in much worse condition so we had to take the trail we were on. By mile 6, I literally about hit the wall. I had been cramming food down my throat all day and drinking plenty of water, but I got to the point where I couldn’t even stand to look at food. Kind of scary when you know you need it but can’t stomach it. Additionally, the altitude has always jacked me on the first day and half of mountain hunts I’ve been on. Pounding headaches and extreme shortness of breath. Don’t know why, since I am in really good shape and take my training and cardio beforehand pretty seriously. But after the first day and a half, it usually clears up and I am once again out walking and climbing everybody.
Anyway, finally made it to camp, which was halfway up the side of a drainage/mountain ridge and above a tributary of the Pecos, and basically collapsed and downed a lot of ibuprofen. Forced myself to eat a Mountain House meal a little later and crashed.
The next evening, me and my buddy called in a spike, who busted us, and later saw two cows and a couple more spikes. One of the cows almost gave us a shot. The others in our group failed to see anything.
The rest of the week, the bulls were bugling sporadically in the mornings, with little evening activity. Days would start off sunny, the showers would build up at midday, and then clear off for the evening hunt. The bulls were also bugling randomly during the middle of the day. We got onto a few herds and bugling bulls and had a few close calls, but nothing panned out. We also saw some neat country and did quite a bit of exploring.
Saturday rolls around, and me and my buddy slept in, since we’d been going pretty hard (I came back a full 10 pounds lighter despite eating everything I could get my hands on up there). We were sitting in camp around noon and a bull kept bugling up river and on the other side of the drainage from us. Finally, we were like “Alright sucker, you’ve tempted us one too many times,” and of we went after him. Murphy raised his head though, and as soon as we started after him, he started clamming up. We finally somewhat pinpointed him, dropped down and crossed over the river, and started climbing to get close to him. We’d bugle, he’d bugle back, and we’d slowly close the gap. Only problem was the wind was doing some really funky stuff that day. Uphill, downhill, sidehill, swirling, a combination of everything. I figured we were going to get busted sooner or later. Finally the bull shuts up and we can’t get a peep out of him. After not getting any responses for about an hour, we snuck up the mountain a pretty good distance to where we thought he was, and I told my buddy to hit the bugle. Instantly, the bull sounded off less than 150 yards away. We go into overdrive, and my buddy tells me to sneak up towards the bull while he calls. I climb up on a line that puts me in line with bull and my buddy, based on where it sounded like he was in relation to us. But the ground was really crunchy, and we were in a deadfall area, so it wasn’t easy to be quiet. I finally took a knee in a somewhat open area to wait. My buddy, who had lost sight of me by this point, bugles again and starts raking a tree with a limb to try to get a response from the bull. I don’t hear anything for a minute or so and then BAM, a huge bull elk appears out of nowhere 20 yards in front of me. All I saw was a mass of antlers; I had no time to count points or do anything but freeze.
He hadn’t made a sound; he just appeared. It’s amazing something that large can be that quiet. The first noise I heard was right after that, when he walked under a spruce tree and his antlers tickled some of the dead limbs. He was on a line that would put him in the open 20 yards to my left, but as soon as he passed the spruce, he turned directly towards me. My mind went into hyperdrive. I didn’t realize that there was a game trail next me that he was following. As I said, I was in the open, with only a spindly little Christmas tree between me and him. I was thinking, “There’s no way, he’s going to smell me,” then “There’s no way, he’s going to see me,” then “There’s no way, he’s going to see and smell me.” But he kept coming. I was looking at him out of the corner of my eye and from under the brim of my hat to try to eliminate that 6th sense that animals have which allows them to sense that they are being watched. I did notice a patch on his ribcage, which I thought was a wound from another bulls antler, and I was going to key on and try to put my arrow through it. I told myself that I was going to try to make a shot as soon as he was broadside to me. Only problem was that broadside was only 5 feet (yes, feet, not yards) away.
The bull reached the broadside point. This pic was taken where the bull was walking, and I am exactly where I was when I drew.
I came to full draw (I think, it’s hazy) as quickly as I could. Cervus elaphus canadiensis exploded. In the instant I drew, the bull had turned almost fully away from me. I released, lost sight of my arrow, and watched the bull run. When he started running, I couldn’t see his left side, but after a few yards, I caught a glimpse of his left side and saw my arrow, buried to the fletching, sticking out. It had entered behind his ribcage, about halfway up his side, and was straight angling towards his right front leg. He tore off through the brush and I lost sight of him after 50 yards. I yelled to my friend to get up here now, and he came running up. His first words were “That thing was huge! Did he wind you?” He couldn’t see me when I shot, so he just saw the bull run off. Me, as I was shaking, trying not to freak out “No, I got an arrow in him!” My friend started freaking out. After replaying everything and talking everything over, I felt like I had made a solid liver hit, which then angled through the back of the left lung and went squarely through the right lung.
We forced ourselves to sit where we were and wait an hour. I couldn’t stand it any longer, and 50 minutes into it, we started blood trailing. I was concerned that we wouldn’t find any blood, since I knew there wasn’t an exit wound and the entry was pretty high on his side. The path of torn up ground and bulldozed brush was pretty easy to follow though. After about 25 yards we started finding blood. More and more of it too. We rounded a corner, and this was waiting for us.
Then the freak out session really began.
We found him at 5:30, or about the time I later found out the Ags were trying to implode against Fresno State. We were working on him until 3 a.m. the next morning, getting him caped correctly, skinned the rest of the way, quarted, debonded, meat hung, etc. And that patch on his side that I thought was an antler wound? I found about a 1.5” piece of carbon arrow shaft, the end with the screw-in insert in his left side lat muscle in a bunch of scar tissue. And in his right side backstrap, I found a 3-blade Satellite broadhead in another mass of scar tissue. He’d caught a lucky break last year. We finally made it back to camp and tried to go to sleep, but we were so worked up, we didn’t realize how late it was. All told, there was 245 pounds of meat sent to the butcher, and based on a 30% ratio, he probably weighed close to 900 pounds.
The rest of time was eventful for everybody else too. There were several missed shots and close calls. All in all a fun trip. Rest of the pics are from the hike out. The first two sets of three below, if you look at them side by side, it will give a quasi-panoramic view of the area.
Two weeks without a bath wasn’t really that bad after the first few days. Wet wipes are worth their weight in gold.
Final note, I need a good elk taxidermist recommendation. I’m in the DFW area, and since TexAgs knows stuff, I trust the opinion of said audience.
[This message has been edited by Log (edited 10/23/2008 7:55p).]
