You would think that with as many years that I have hunting under my belt, that I would know enough to not tempt fate on the night before an elk archery hunt. Well that’s just what I did on my son Nate’s and I annual elk hunt with Specimen Creek Outfitters in Gardiner, MT. Usually we have Otto, the most experienced guide in the Specimen stable, but Otto couldn’t make the first day, so we were saddled with Trevor, a very capable 20 year old. This guide is ten years younger than my son.
Like all guides on the night before a hunt, Trevor stopped by our room to introduce himself, and to ask all the usual questions like, “have we hunted elk much and have we practiced any?” Well I jumped all over that second question and showed Trevor pictures on my phone of the tight groups at 60 – 70 yards that I have been shooting all Summer long. I even added in, “Just put the bull in front of me and I’ll do the rest””. If I had eyes in back of my head I would’ve seen my son cringe, but I don’t so I didn’t think anything of my boast. I was confident in my shooting-at targets anyways.
We have been hunting with Specimen Creek for three years now and the hunting is only getting better, or we’re just getting luckier because this year we seemed to time it just right. We were into bulls every day, on public land and sure enough on the first evening of our hunt Trevor has a bull answering him. We set up on the edge of a patch of Aspens with some open sagebrush between us and the next patch of trees. We could see this bull coming from a long ways off, when Nate whispers to me that it’s 60 yards to the next edge of cover. The mature 5 X 5 came through the cover and stepped right out in the sagebrush at 40 yards, perfect. I came to full draw and let it fly. Right over it’s the bulls back. No problem. The bull only moved about five yards so I reloaded and let fly again, and again a clean miss. The bull had had enough and trotted off. After it left, Nate asked me what pin I used and I said “all of them”. Seriously, I can’t remember anything about the shots. To say that I got razzed all the way back to the truck and then again all through dinner would be an understatement. But I certainly deserved it.
Otto shows up late that night and of course by breakfast the second day he’s well aware of my big mouth. We were working bulls all week but on the fourth morning the hunting gods smiled on me again. We were on the horses going up the trail when we heard a strange noise about 200 yards up. Otto thought it was probably a grizzly so we stopped to see for sure. A few minutes later a bull pops his head out of some trees, right on the horse-trail. We stay still until the bull walks into the timber and Otto tells us to get off of our horses and set up off to the side a ways. I was the first one ready so I got ahead and settled in on the uphill side of a small balsam. I could hear the bull breaking sticks just over the rise about 75 yards away. I could also hear Otto in back of me coaxing this bull to come a little closer. I didn’t know where Nate was. First the horns came into view over the rise, and then the body. By now I was at full draw and the bull stopped broadside at 15 yards. All I kept saying to myself was “top pin, top pin”. I let fly again and this time it was a good hit. I could hear Nate behind me yell “Ya”. The bull crumpled down the hill with a broken front shoulder and a badly punctured set of lungs. He staggered for 100 more yards and fell dead.
After a few hours of high-fives and a messy quartering job, we got the bull back down to the truck. I was thankful for a young guide and a young son by then. The photo session went well, but before I took any pictures, I deleted all the photos of the great groups that I had shot all summer.
David Willette is the author of Coyote Wars: A Deer Hunter’s Guide to Hunting Coyote but his real passion is bow hunting for elk. Contact him or check out his book at coyotewars.com.
