live weight of bull? help

popeyoung2 · Oct 9, 2009

Hey guys,
I killed a very old 8x7 tule bull in California last weekend. I boned out all the meat and it weighed 300 lbs. boneless. Any idea of the live or dressed weight? I was thinking 600 lbs. live.
There must be a % rule of thumb. Thanks

WapitiBob · Oct 9, 2009

http://ces.uwyo.edu/PUBS/B594R.pdf

apollosmith · Oct 10, 2009

A mature, fat bull can weigh 800-1000 pounds. It's hard to tell from the body of your bull, but I'd say 600 pounds is pretty conservative. My bull last year had about the biggest body I've seen on a bull - it's hard to say for sure, but we put him at ~900 pounds on the hoof.

ramtagless · Oct 10, 2009

Nice bull popeyoung. Not sure on weight.

Curious - were you in an area that required you to use a shotgun or was that your choice?

popeyoung2 · Oct 10, 2009

The only public land required shotgun or bow. The terrain was impossible for bow. It ended up being a 157 yard shot after lying in the dirt for 4 hours waiting for them to move. It took me 24 years to draw a tule tag. This herd has been there for 20 years and this is the 3 rd year of the hunt. I will get an age back from the state but i am guessing a 12 year old bull based on the bugler teeth and trying to chew the inner tenderloin. I am picking up 300 lbs. of hambuurger monday.

Hazmat · Oct 11, 2009

A friend's elk yielded 545 pounds of meat! Butcher said it was the biggest he'd seen. I'd say he was well over 1000 pounds.

HAZMAT

tuleelk · Oct 12, 2009

600 lbs is probably a very good guess for that elk. Really big tule elk bulls at Grizzly Island top the scales at over 800 lbs. Have yet to see those size animals anywhere else, plus they start to lose weight quickly during the rut. Hard to tell from the pics but I think 550 to 600. We have measurements from other known weight animals so if you had total length and girth we could get in the ball park. Going to guess you probably do not, hahahaha. Nice bull for sure.

Joe

popeyoung2 · Oct 12, 2009

The first reply sent a link to a u of wyoming study which is very well done. 300 lbs. of boneless meat put the elk field dressed at 580 lbs. and live weight at 780 lbs.