Elk Drives for Archery Hunts

[SpotNStalk]

Have any of you archery elk hunters have ever assembled a group of 7 or 8 of your closest archery elk hunting buddies and tried using "elk drives" as your method of hunting?? I'll try not to turn this into a b%!ch session because I really want to know if people have actually been successful using elk drives for ARCHERY hunting. I know it is fairly common practice for modern firearm deer and elk hunts in different areas of the country but what about archery hunting?

The reason I ask is because I have been hunting elk with a bow now for about 5 years and feel that I have a really good spot for late season bowhunts. As with nearly all areas, crowds can sometimes be a problem and it continues to get worse every year. Three of the past 5 years now my brother and I have come accross a group of 6-10 hunters hunting the same canyon we hunt. Their "method" of hunting is to get guys in their party on all sides, top and bottom of this nice big canyon that invariably holds elk as soon as the snow starts to fly. Well, to make a really long story less lenghty, there were 8 guys that came through the canyon about two hours after sunrise using this method, all with portable radios, pushing elk all over gods creation, spooking everything in sight. There were over 200 head of elk in this canyon this morning and these guys were using their radios to coordinate with each other to surround this herd of elk, pushing them back and forth to each other but none of them were getting within 150 yards. Keep in mind this is a fairly open canyon with pockets of trees but mostly sage brush. When my brother and I (and maybe a couple of other hunters not from this group) have this canyon to ourselves we can usually get pretty close and at least feel like we are "hunting" because its possible to attempt a stalk when the animals aren't so nervous. Does anyone think elk drives are a viable hunting method for archery hunters?

 

[c3]

That is the stupidest thing I've ever seen in the woods. I actually witnessed the exact same thing this year with my 14 year old son on his first bow hunt.

We had 12 forkhorn bucks and a few dozen does 200 yards below us when 10 or 12 morons did a drive through the area. They walked 75 yards right past us, yelling and screaming and never even had a clue we were there. Neeedless to say the deer were scattered all over the place. Of course they didn't get anything either.

I believe that doing drives for bow hunters ia a complete waste of time and counter productive to ever harvesting an animal.

Cheers,
Pete

 

[Bobbby]

Ya I would agree with that note totally. There's no way but I would give you 1/100 odds (which is generous) of an archer taking an elk on a drive. Rifle season possibly, archery season very very doubtful

 

[MewelDeer]

I don't like this style of elk hunhting either, but I know of a group of guys who use this method very successfully. The setting is different though. They are on islands in the Missouri River. It seems to me that in open country it would be a waste of time.

 

[SpotNStalk]

I have never seen any of these guys get a shot (other than the one that launched an arrow at a deer down in a wooded draw from 80 YARDS!!). Personally, I don't understand why anyone would do this. I would get really tired of seeing the ass end of elk trotting away from me because I am too stupid, impatient, etc. to "hunt" them. Two years ago we got into this canyon before first light. There was about 6 inches of fresh snow and the elk were clearly in the area given the fresh tracks we saw. We had two guys drive a herd of elk across a completely bare ridgeline into the canyon about 100 yards away from where we were set up and we watched the elk run full speed diagonally across this canyon and out the other side never to be seen again. On our way out of the canyon back to our vehicle we cut a fresh blood trail that we tried following back to is origin to see if we could find the other hunter and congratulate him. We went a couple of hundred yards without seeing anyone and since we were going up one side of a steep draw we headed back down to the trail and realized that the wounded animal went straight up the other side of the steep draw. Figuring that the animal may not have been hit very well, I now am left wondering if one of these guys was launching "questionable" shots at the elk and I doubt very seriosly if these guys would follow that trail as one should.

I realize everyone has a right to be out in the woods and I really don't mind sharing but a little respect for the other hunters and the animals we pursue would be nice. In my opinion what they are doing is little more than harrassing the animals because I can't see how they would ever get a good ethical shot at game that is so spooked and on edge. It seems these guys hit this area during the heart of the late season from the weekend before Thanksgiving through Thanksgiving weekend. I guess that leaves the last weekend of the season for everyone else or I'll have to take more time off work rather than being able to hunt the 4 days I have off for Thanksgiving. Kind of a bummer. At least I know I'm not the only one that thinks this is a stupid way to "hunt" with a bow.

 

[SpotNStalk]

Oh yeah, I guess another clue to the intelligence of these guys is that they all use this method of pushing the elk which I guess they think requires them to run at times. They will actually have arrows nocked and run up and down snow covered hills. Yesterday one of these guys was headed straight uphill toward my brother's stand with arrow nocked. He had no idea my brother was there and when he got to within 15 yards the guy slipped and I guess his arms and legs were flailing all over the place trying to keep his balance and the guy finally couldn't recover and landed right on his face. My brother actually couldn't help chuckling and the guy jumped up embarrased as all hell and tried to play it cool "Hey buddy! hows it going! I didn't know you were up here." I could hear the guy who was basically yelling from only 15 yards away from my brother. I had just spotted some elk in a small draw that had just started to bed down so I went to get my brother. While I was there my brother pointed out to the guy that he was pretty luck he didn't impale himself with his broadhead but the guy clearly didn't understand the point of the comment and when we separated he headed off downhill at a good clip, arrow nocked.