A post by Caleb

Sunday December 16, 2007

My First Cow Elk...Down
Hi!! My mom has asked me to tell you about my hunt. So, here it goes...

My dad and I woke up first thing Sunday morning and met the two of the three outfitters I worked for this summer, Fred who is 83 yrs old and also has an elk tag and Brett who is 22 yrs old. We headed to the mountains on our six wheeler and their snowmobile, but the snow got too deep for our six wheeler so we decided to split up. Brett and I decided to take the snowmobile and venture further into the mountains. While dad and Fred stayed with the six wheeler they agreed to let us know if they spotted any elk. So, Brett and I

headed for elk country. Brett tends to like speed on everything he drives. I had my gun on my back and had not one thing to hold on to so I was balancing for dear life but we finally arived to our destanation. To our suprise there was not one single animal. It looked quite desolate and serene. Brett decided to go look over a ridge 50yd from us. I waited for him to return, when he came back he said there were elk scattered all over in the valley below. We called dad and told him that we found the herd. Then we snuck in close to the elk. There were three bull elk 100 yds away from us but all the cow elk were too far away and were off our property so we decided to wait for them to feed their way up to us. About 15 min into the wait we were shivering and frozen so we decided to go to them instead of them coming to us. We got very close to some bulls. Whenever they would look up from grazing we had to freeze in our tracks but we finally made it across the opening and into the trees. We quietly started heading towards the elk. (Meanwhile my dad had to take the family to church so he called and wished us luck.) After 30 min of tromping through snow and brush we came to an opening and in front of us in the trees there were 4 cows and 1 bull. We stopped and waited for a chance to shoot. The cows were wagging there tails and making funny noises. And before I knew what was happening Brett threw me to the ground and told me not to move. At first I had no idea what was going on. Then I looked to the right and 40 yds away there was a cow elk. She had no idea that we were there. I silently clicked the saftey on my gun and aimed above the shoulder then pulled the trigger, she fell but

was trying to get up so I put another bullet in my gun and shot her in the neck. She died instantly. I was so excited!! I ran over to her. It was a perfect shot. I hit her right in the lungs. As I always am, when I come upon a elk, I was amazed at her magnificent size.

Then we gutted her and tied her to the snowmobile. We picked up Fred and then came home and hung her in our garage.

It was fun!!

I always enjoy hunting in God"s creation.

Me and my 270 caliber gun and my trophy

(biggest thing i have ever shot)

Me and the cow elk. We start butchering on Thursday.

My Mom is excited to fill the freezer.

Making the best of my "antlerless" elk - with some sheds I found this spring.

Thanks for taking the time to read my story.

Caleb