My hunting buddy, Glenn, was raised that you can walk, but that takes a lot more work than sitting and waiting for the animals to come to you.  Sitting patiently and waiting is his preferred method, and he “never had to shoot more than 50 yards” at any animal. He has had good success as an avid hunter for some 45 years.  Glenn has a difficult time hiking these days, so this might explain part of his persistence in his hunting method.

Glenn is a master diver and diving became his sport of preference, but 2 years ago I got an over the counter tag and he volunteered to came along.  He showed me around the area of his hunting youth, where he now owns a cabin.  He drove and waited while I walked uphill, did some loops, and eventually got a small bull.  Glenn told stories of how he and his family used to hunt the area, stories of a big bull that weighed a ton, and of a stray bull that ran between their jeeps while they were eating lunch.  He apparently used to walk a lot, but learned to sit and wait.

I hunted last year with my son Joshua, Glenn’s son Russ and a friend of his.  Joshua had just completed his US Army service in Afghanistan.  He had only been back a short time, hadn’t passed hunter’s safety, so he couldn’t get a hunting license.  The other 3 of us had drawn cow elk tags for the season.  Though it was an unsuccessful hunt, we had a good time and he learned to respect the thin air at 10,000 feet where we were hunting.  Most of that hunt was following Russ’s hunting idea, which were more along what Glenn has learned in the area.

We did see a herd of 6 bulls at very close range, but the only cow elk we saw were not destined for our freezer.  One was a herd of 20 or so cows that crossed the road in front of us, just before legal shooting time on opening day; the other was a group of 12 that I saw on the last day at about 750 yards that were running over the next mountain.

Over this past year I treated myself to a sweet new 3 x 9 variable scope.   I also replaced my leather strap with a flexible strap, which made climbing mountains with a gun much less technically challenging.

Glenn, Russ and I successfully drew cow tags again in 2011.  I had decided I was hunting my way for the better part of this year’s hunt.  Glenn and I would hunt his way a few days and he had the option of driving me places and hunting around the Jeep while I climbed mountains.  Russ would have to join me or hunt his way alone.

As it turned out, Russ wasn’t able to get away from last minute issues so Glenn and I headed to the cabin without him.  He indicated he would join us later.  As it turned out, Glenn filled his tag the first weekend with a young elk not far from the cabin.  It involved a short hike but no sitting as we could hear the elk calling each other from the beginning.   I was able to pull it out and we shared a superb heart and liver dinner with his parents at their nearby cabin.

Hunting my way, I saw elk and deer every day I hunted this year.  Some were too far to shoot at, some were running through the forest so thick I could only see 6” of them at a time, some saw me the moment I saw them, and were gone before I could get my rifle to my shoulder.

I had my first and last “distracted hunting” experience on one of these days.  Glenn and I were headed to the headwaters of the Rio Grande River when we came across a track train that belonged to a herd of a few hundred elk.  We were just outside of a small mining town where they had crossed the road the previous night so I took out my binoculars just to see if they were somewhere within the valley still.  Herds like that can move miles in no time and this train was surely moving, there wasn’t a piece of untouched snow for a stretch 100 yards wide and you could see where they came off the mountain, headed across the valley and headed over the next mountain into the next hunting district.  While scoping the hillsides however, back above the town about 9 miles away, I spotted 2 small specs about 50 yards below the top of the mountain.  They were elk.

Glenn looked at me like I was crazy, but I convinced him that a bird in hand is better then 1000 somewhere out there.  We devised a plan that he would drop me off, I would climb the mountain; he would come back to that lookout spot, and call me on my cell if they ran off before I reached the top.  It took me 2 hours to reach my destination near the top.

I had turned my cell to vibrate, so as I approached the top I was surprised when it rang!  I was attempting to sneak past 2 good-sized buck deer at the time, and not surprisingly, they hoofed it off down through the timber.  I dug through my layers and got to it before it rang the third time and was surprised to hear Glenn tell me the cows were still there.  “One got up just before I called and was walking down toward the trees just above you.”  I told him I wouldn’t be talking, but he could keep talking and I would listen…then I looked up.  30 yards to my left and just below me, a cow elk turned and disappeared into the trees.  By the time I got to where she was, they had all bolted down the mountain through the trees.

I told Glenn to meet me at the bottom.  I tracked what turned out to be 5 cow elk as they zigzagged down the mountain and never say them again.  What took me 45 minutes they probably covered in 5 and when they headed back up toward the thick draw between the first and the next mountain, I walked straight down, realizing that if I had been HUNTING instead of talking on the phone, I likely would have filled my tag.

The next day, I was somewhat surprised when Russ showed up at the cabin.  Glenn and I had scouted out a valley where the elk had been crossing in the moonlight.  We had talked to some outfitters that were headed out after their client’s tags had been successfully filled.  I knew where the elk were, and as I said, I was hunting my way this year.  They were hanging out 5200’ or so above the end of the Jeep trail in the 11,500 to 12,000’ range.  There had been a good snow a few days earlier; it was knee deep up on top.  That is where the elk were.

Russ and I hiked up, we are both in good shape so the hike was actually enjoyable.  When we reached the woods around the top, we could hear the cows squawking and the bulls bugling several hundred yards ahead of us over the hill and through the quaking aspens.  The snow as indeed just under knee deep, and it was soft so it was quiet.  I motioned to Russ we should go to the left, he wanted to go right, we settled on meeting on the other side of the mound.  I took a few dozen steps over the hill to the left and there were 10 cow elk scattered in the trees.  One spotted me and they were gone.  It turned out the same thing happened to Russ on the other side of the hill; neither of us got a shot off figuring it is better to not shoot than to take an iffy shot.  We stalked the elk for the next few hours, catching up to them a few times and seeing them bound off through the forest.  Eventually we determined we better head back to avoid getting stuck on the mountain in the dark.

The trip down to the truck included being on the wrong side of the mountain we started on, but knowing that down is the river and over there is the valley we started in, we headed out.  I guess we did break one cardinal rule on the way back to the Jeep.  Russ decided to head straight down the mountain and, being more familiar with the mountain we were on, I suggested we cut across and get on a nearby logging road.  He continued down, I headed for the logging road.  I knew he wouldn’t get lost as we both knew that there was a road at the bottom of the mountain about 2 miles down.

A short time later he apparently decided to join me but it took him 20 minutes to “shimmy across a ravine on a log” that was waste deep in snow.  Eventually he caught up with me, about 200 yards from the Jeep.  The hike Russ thought was going to take a few hours, turned out to be a 6-hour hike, 5300 vertical feet, 5 miles, no elk meat, but we did get to them and see them.

When we returned to the cabin, though he was probably a little pissed at the length of the day’s hike, I talked him into going up behind the cabin and showing me where they used to hunt.  We hiked about a mile in, to a “park” surrounded by woods, where animals sometime cross to get to the river.  I suggested we go left; he went right.  I met 4 elk walking down to the river before I could establish a place to sit.  They bolted, I let them go and found a seat.

I can sit for about 20 minutes before I feel I’m just wasting my time.  I started up after the elk that had come down, and found them headed up a path toward the top of the mountain.  It was getting dark; I could see parts of them as they passed between the trees and headed up and over the mountain.  I met Russ on the path back to the cabin.  He hadn’t seen anything.

A snowstorm was moving in and Russ had some obligations at home, so he decided to head out that night. That night I decided I would head toward the Rio Grande headwaters again the next morning and Glenn had decided to spend a little more time visiting with his parents.  There were 2 more days left in our season.

I overslept a little and didn’t get around to leaving the cabin until it was just light enough to see shadows in the fields.  I got about ½ mile up the road from the cabin and thought something looked out of place.  I pulled over and took out the binoculars to see what turned out to be a few hundred elk grazing in the field about a ¼ mile below where we had hunted the previous evening.  I turned the Jeep around, parked it by the cabin and hoofed it up the trail.  The cabin sits at about 9500’ and at that altitude, hoofing does still require an occasional stop for breath.  It took a half hour to get to where the elk should have been coming up the mountain through the park.  It was light enough to shoot when I saw the first cow elk, heard a bull bugle from the far side of the park and I froze.  The cow wasn’t sure she saw me, but she was nervous enough she started trotting toward the bull.  Several others started to follow her and before I could set up for a good shot, they were out of sight but not panicked.

I continued along at a faster pace and got to where I thought they should be, but they were not there.  I could hear the bull bugling the cows to him still a ways in front of me.  Then I noticed a blur in the trees a few hundred yards away, below me, and to my left.  Another small herd was hurrying toward the other bull but hadn’t seen me.  There was a small rise between me and a clear shot at them, so I headed up the rise intent on getting a little in front of them and getting a clear shot before they saw me.  I took several steps according to that plan when a 5 x 5 bull popped over the top of the rise about 30’ in front of me; he was leading the cows, which he did, immediately in the opposite direction!

A few bounds got me to a place to take a shot and by then the herd was flowing like water through the trees.  These majestic animals move through trees and snow like fluid, but to my advantage the trees were a few feet apart instead of a few inches and the elk were only 75 yards away.  I placed the crosshairs where I had a clear shot and timed the animals as they crossed into my sights.  I picked a cow and fired between the trees as she crossed.  She went down immediately after what turned out to be a perfect heart shot.

I cleaned her out, removing probably ½ of her weight as she had apparently been eating all night.  After halving her it took a few hours to drag her out and down to an area near the cabin where Glenn met me.  On the way, I jumped a huge mule deer buck; likely the largest I had ever seen but I had my elk and I didn’t draw a deer tag this year.  He ran off and I watched appreciatively.  Glenn and I were sitting in the cabin drinking coffee in front of a warm fire by early afternoon with both our tags traded for elk meat.

I still don’t know which is a more effective hunting strategy, sitting and waiting or hiking and stalking.  I do know that I earned my elk this year as I hiked most of the daylight away.  The majority of this time was spent above 10,000’ on steep slopes and in and out of thick forests.  I know that if I had walked up behind the cabin and sat on the hill before daybreak every day, I could have shot an elk walking by.  These are amazing animals. For a picture, I will sit and wait.  For them to give the ultimate sacrifice, I think I would rather have to earn it.

I think I can taste the work put into this elk, and it taste very good.  Yes, we shared some elk with Russ; but he probably still wishes he could have stayed one more day.