B
bucksmasher
Guest
After 43 years of off and on elk hunting I finally got a nice 6x6 bull. It only took a great draw in a great area and help from my son together we ?Got?r dun?! 6:00 am we where in the Missouri river brakes and out in an area we had seen some nice bull?s frequenting the day before.
Just as it got light we saw a HUGE mule deer and thought sense we all had deer tags to fill too we'd go look him over. My daughter-in-law thought she would like to hunt it, so we put on a hunt. The deer had a different plan than us and we never saw him again. However, as we where glassing the area for him we picked up this bull, he was a LONG ways away but he looked very respectable.
Change in plan? as we were working our way over to the bull we had a truck load of ?Hunters? come screeching up jump out of the truck and start banging away at a small group of does that had crossed the road and where in between us and the truck. DINKS! They did not get any either. As luck would have it, the elk did not look too concerned. We keep with the same plan working over to him. He was easily a mile from where we where and we had covered 2/3 of that. Stopping for a look and a brake we discovered eight other hunters ?RIDGE? walking, most people call it hunting but ALL the game see them and run off way before there is any ?Hunting? .We thought this may just help keep the bull in our area we where working up on, it did. We got to where we thought he should be, and creped up over a ridge.
Glassing for a bit we concluded he must have dug him self in to a big pocket of timber and was lying down for the day to watch the festivities. It was apparent, further work was needed to find him. My son volunteered to go all the way around to the top and try to kick him out. My daughter?in-law and I set up on a good vantage point and got comfortable.
The wind was straight in to our faces to where we thought he would come out. I ranged the ridge we just knew he would walk out on at just under 300 yards. A tad, farther than I would have liked but it should be workable. We sat there until we thought there is no way we were going to see anything and almost gave up. Then OVER the ridge I ranged he stepped out in the sun, hum that is excessively far to shoot I figured, but kept hopping for some thing to happen. He started to work his way over to us but there was a problem, a Grand Canyon style coulee between us. I Did not want him in that for any reason, so IF there was going to be a time to shoot it was very soon. I tried the range finder but it was way over what it would range. Well I thought one Hail Mary shot and I would miss and we could go on, yaw right. I put the scope of the 45/70 on nine power slipped it on the shooting sticks and thought, the 100 mark wont work, the 200 yard is out, and even the 300 hash was silly. I raised it up and put the hair in front of the neck as he was walking and leveled it in the BOTTOM of the scope. Gently I squeeze the trigger, the blast always nocks me off the target so I lowered the rifle and watch it bullet hit. With a Loud WHAP it hit home about 4? down from the top of the elks hump, blood spurted from the hole. The elk turn straight to us and started to stiff leg walk straight to the biggest hole in the canyon. That WAS not an option!! I baled out of my hidey-hole, ran down my side of the coulee, and closed the gap down to around 300 yards as the crow flies. Through the shooting sticks up I fired again, hart pumping lungs throbbing, I did not hit him the next two shot. I calmed my self and tried again. WHAP the 300 grain hit home hitting the elk in the chest and angling over and smashing it's shoulder from the inside. That put him down for good and only ten feet from the drop off. Than the work would begin. It took me and daughter 40 minuets to get over to the elk, my son had been watching and had already got to the bull. He had most of the gutting finished as we got there (he is a GREAT kid). Ten o?clock my tag was filled out it took five trips with packs to get him out and loaded in to the truck. At 5:00 PM, we cleaned up and headed out of the river brakes tired to the bone. IT NEVER FELT SO GOOD!!!
Just think how ugly this could have turned out,if I had gut shot it and had to chase it all over the brakes and soot all its legs off. But in my defense I did feel good about the shot. It would either be a good hit or a clean miss. I shoot many 1000's of rounds out of this gun a year so it was kind of an educated guess...
well there you go
Just as it got light we saw a HUGE mule deer and thought sense we all had deer tags to fill too we'd go look him over. My daughter-in-law thought she would like to hunt it, so we put on a hunt. The deer had a different plan than us and we never saw him again. However, as we where glassing the area for him we picked up this bull, he was a LONG ways away but he looked very respectable.
Change in plan? as we were working our way over to the bull we had a truck load of ?Hunters? come screeching up jump out of the truck and start banging away at a small group of does that had crossed the road and where in between us and the truck. DINKS! They did not get any either. As luck would have it, the elk did not look too concerned. We keep with the same plan working over to him. He was easily a mile from where we where and we had covered 2/3 of that. Stopping for a look and a brake we discovered eight other hunters ?RIDGE? walking, most people call it hunting but ALL the game see them and run off way before there is any ?Hunting? .We thought this may just help keep the bull in our area we where working up on, it did. We got to where we thought he should be, and creped up over a ridge.
Glassing for a bit we concluded he must have dug him self in to a big pocket of timber and was lying down for the day to watch the festivities. It was apparent, further work was needed to find him. My son volunteered to go all the way around to the top and try to kick him out. My daughter?in-law and I set up on a good vantage point and got comfortable.
The wind was straight in to our faces to where we thought he would come out. I ranged the ridge we just knew he would walk out on at just under 300 yards. A tad, farther than I would have liked but it should be workable. We sat there until we thought there is no way we were going to see anything and almost gave up. Then OVER the ridge I ranged he stepped out in the sun, hum that is excessively far to shoot I figured, but kept hopping for some thing to happen. He started to work his way over to us but there was a problem, a Grand Canyon style coulee between us. I Did not want him in that for any reason, so IF there was going to be a time to shoot it was very soon. I tried the range finder but it was way over what it would range. Well I thought one Hail Mary shot and I would miss and we could go on, yaw right. I put the scope of the 45/70 on nine power slipped it on the shooting sticks and thought, the 100 mark wont work, the 200 yard is out, and even the 300 hash was silly. I raised it up and put the hair in front of the neck as he was walking and leveled it in the BOTTOM of the scope. Gently I squeeze the trigger, the blast always nocks me off the target so I lowered the rifle and watch it bullet hit. With a Loud WHAP it hit home about 4? down from the top of the elks hump, blood spurted from the hole. The elk turn straight to us and started to stiff leg walk straight to the biggest hole in the canyon. That WAS not an option!! I baled out of my hidey-hole, ran down my side of the coulee, and closed the gap down to around 300 yards as the crow flies. Through the shooting sticks up I fired again, hart pumping lungs throbbing, I did not hit him the next two shot. I calmed my self and tried again. WHAP the 300 grain hit home hitting the elk in the chest and angling over and smashing it's shoulder from the inside. That put him down for good and only ten feet from the drop off. Than the work would begin. It took me and daughter 40 minuets to get over to the elk, my son had been watching and had already got to the bull. He had most of the gutting finished as we got there (he is a GREAT kid). Ten o?clock my tag was filled out it took five trips with packs to get him out and loaded in to the truck. At 5:00 PM, we cleaned up and headed out of the river brakes tired to the bone. IT NEVER FELT SO GOOD!!!
Just think how ugly this could have turned out,if I had gut shot it and had to chase it all over the brakes and soot all its legs off. But in my defense I did feel good about the shot. It would either be a good hit or a clean miss. I shoot many 1000's of rounds out of this gun a year so it was kind of an educated guess...
well there you go
