small herd

[lightmag]

So i went with my brother back into the spot he called the 5x5 out on sunday morning. We headed in around 5:30, hiked in the 2km to the spot, walked into the bush a bit cow called and not even 5 minutes later, "crack" look to my right and out pops a spiker bull 30 yards from us!!! we freeze, he circles sniffing the heads down small embankment, we slowly move towards the ridge 100 yards in front of us and i tell my brother to sneak slowly as they might be down there, we look over and see a cow, calf, the spiker and a another cow 45ing the opposite bank 80yards away!! we set up hopeing the bull follows up the rear, nothing!! we bugel, wait, cow chirp, waait, nothing!! then a bugel back, sounds aways back and 90 degrees away from the cows? we stalk, wait call, stalk, wait call, circle the whole area in about an hour, nothing!!!!! tons of beds, poop and trails, no rubs? we were covered in scent and the cows never spooked so we are heading back in tomorrow 6am!! i'll let you know what happens..

[jml11]

Sounds exciting! Can I come :p...maybe I'll learn a thing or two ;)

[lightmag]

Sounds exciting! Can I come :p...maybe I'll learn a thing or two ;)


so back in this am, hike in again, just get to the edge of our area (15-20 year old cut full of populars, willows and knee high underbrush about half KM from a river) and before we start calling a bull bugels to our left CLOSE!!! we sneak down to the edge of the small clearing and wait, we cow chirp, then we just see his back line parallel us at 50 yards and disappear!! winds blowing right at us plus we are all scented up. We wait, we bugel and get a instant response but now 100 yards back?? we wait, cow chirp. nothing!! so we move towards him 50 yards and bugel, instant reply but again he has moved slighlt away from us??? we move in again, find his rub and WALLOW!!! look up and he is stairing at us 75 yards in the heavy timber all we see is eyes, nose and eye gaurds!!!!! and he moves off again.
We back off and quarter away 100 yards and all of a sudden he bugels hard and chuckles a ton at the end, we instantly bugel right on top before he even finishes and freeze and wait, nothing!! we move and wait again, now it's almost 8am, we decide to hit the other side of the block 500 yards away where the cows were last night, half way there we hear a... wait... new, lower, meaner growler bugel!!!!!!!! we make it to the edge of the ridge were the cows were last night and wait, othing, we chirp and we get a low growl? wait, chirp, nothing, wait nothing, we bugel, nothing, 20 minutes, nothing!! damn, wind never blew in his direction, think he/they just shut it down around 8:15am.. back in tomorrow am as we are pretty sure the 5x5' s the first bull always a 100 yards away and the other different bugel could easly be a bigger heard bull? atleast we are hopeing.. more after tomorrow morning, need a nap now, lol..

[guest]

Oh the Fun of calling in a good bull !!

Good on ya, very cool experience regardless, it all makes you better at what your doing !

Go get em !!

Try raking the trees too, as buddy bugles or rakes you move in and hammer em! Try the same thing with cow mews that won't shut up......

a few of these things have worked for us....

Good luck

CT

[jml11]

Souds like you are into a good herd...lucky b*****d :cool:

Hopefully I'll finally have some luck with these PG Elk this weekend!

[lightmag]

elk piss me off!!! 3 days of action, tons of answers yesterday today.... NOTHING!!!!! if a guy didn't know better you would think the bush was dead!!

We are going to give it a 2-3 day rest and then hit it again..

[PGK]

Stop bugling at them. PG elk hate being bugled at. Since day one of the season opener a few years back, every tom dick and harry has been wandering around out in the elk holes with a bugle sounding like a dead rabbit. PG elk are bugle smart.

[jml11]

Finally had my gun on a bull today but could only count to five. He wasn't talking either...just got lucky!

[lightmag]

Finally had my gun on a bull today but could only count to five. He wasn't talking either...just got lucky!


right on, damn 5's!! remember if you have the time check for 1 inch "stickers" anywhere to make the magic 6.

did he just show up after calling? how long? i find they usually come in in 15-45 minutes when they come in silent.

[lightmag]

Stop bugling at them. PG elk hate being bugled at. Since day one of the season opener a few years back, every tom dick and harry has been wandering around out in the elk holes with a bugle sounding like a dead rabbit. PG elk are bugle smart.


true and i usually stick to that theroy but this guy only seems to answer to bugels, if we just cow chirp we get nothing, then we bugel and instant reply?

i'm no expert on elk, 3rd year hunting them but i have had 3 legal bulls in our sites, 1 each year so we must be doing something right, lol.. or just really lucky. Always open for ideas and pointers.

[jml11]

right on, damn 5's!! remember if you have the time check for 1 inch "stickers" anywhere to make the magic 6.

did he just show up after calling? how long? i find they usually come in in 15-45 minutes when they come in silent.

I was setup and calling just after first light but no responses and no sightings. I walked around a bit trying to see if anything was moving around...cow calling occasionally to cover any noise I was making. I was working my way back to my truck when I spotted an elk about 150 yards out walking through a block. Pulled my binos and saw it was a bull! He was on the move and I wanted to get a better look as I could tell right away he might be legal, so I let out a cow chirp and he stopped...but his head was right behind a tree :icon_frow. It gave me time to get my bipod legs out and get my gun on him so I could glass him better (my scope is way better optics than binos). I gave another chirp and shortly after he started working his way to me. Since this is the first elk I have played with for a few years I got excited and tried to speed up the wait by finding a better potential shooting/viewing lane...unfortunatley he hadn't moved far enough into the small ravine between us and he pegged me. My lane was clear though so I setup on him again and he actually stood there for awhile before finally walking away. I was only able to count 5 on one side and 4 on the other but never really got a solid look at him from the side, at least not the lower part of his antlers. He was quite tall and there was a big gap between what I saw was his G3 (2nd eye guard) and G4 (next point up), enough that normally you would expect another point in between put I just couldn't find one :(...it's possible he was a barely legal 6x5 and if I had just been patient he may have walked right up to me and I would have known for sure. Live and learn...

He was all alone so I wonder where the main herd is? Hopefully close by!

[jml11]

Stop bugling at them. PG elk hate being bugled at. Since day one of the season opener a few years back, every tom dick and harry has been wandering around out in the elk holes with a bugle sounding like a dead rabbit. PG elk are bugle smart.

As long you don't sound like a dead rabbit you should be good then :grin:! I know quite a few people who have had success bugling around here.

[lightmag]

As long you don't sound like a dead rabbit you should be good then :grin:! I know quite a few people who have had success bugling around here.

all three bulls, 2 6x6's and the 5x5 came in to bugels and only, never calling back until we bugeled.