On september 5th I was the luckiest man in the world to take my first archery elk on a DIYOTC either sex tag in SW Colorado. On the third morning me and my brother woke in our tent at 4:30 to heavy rain and decided to pack everything back to the house as soon as the rain stopped and dry everything out and head back the next day. Well about 7:30 the rain finally stopped and we began the process of breaking down camp and literally as we were putting on our packs to head back 1.5 miles to the truck a bugle let out form the bottom of the valley and my brother quickly answered with his own bugle and surprisingly we heard multiple responses and they were clearly covering ground. So in a mess of throwing gear around we took off up the mountain with nothing but our calls and bows and a range finder and got in front of the heard. With my brother up the mountain about 100 yards calling and raking the trees within minutes I had a calf at 10 yards and a spike at 16 yards. Now all hunt I had told myself I'm not taking a cow but when we heard the bulls that were bugling start to head the wrong way and a huge cow come walking straight at me my decision changed real quick. As she got closer she passed all the trees i had ranged until she got to 25 yards and next thing I knew I had buried my FMJ to the fletching directly behind the shoulder. I was 98% sure I smoked her but there is just always that doubt. We went back to camp picked up everything that was thrown about and hiked it back to the track giving her time to expire. After some misleading information from another hunter who had so called "found the elk" and searching on the wrong rockslide and re-following the blood trail 500 yards (after a perfect double lung hit) we found her and had one hell of a time packing her out. I have to give all the credit to my brother for his incredible calling and being there threw the whole hunt. Here are some pictures hope you guys enjoy. This was one of the best experiences of my life. Brother carrying his weight Little blurry but this explains how we left camp to chase them slaying some of them prairie dogs
That's great congrats! Looks you like and your bro made some great memory's, that's what it's all about and elk is delicious!!
