Bitter sweet adventures

With Tyler's sheep hunt taking place right smack in the middle of Oregon's elk archery season, I knew my time would be limited to bowhunt elk this year. Roosevelt elk hunting is tough, period. Every year, after a week of beating the coastal brush, I tell myself I'm going to hunt less green pastures in eastern Oregon for Rocky Mountain elk, but other hunts seem to get in the way, like sheep hunts or out-of-state hunts. So I end up Roosevelt elk hunting near home when I get time. Don't get me wrong, I have tremendous respect for the Roosevelt elk. In fact, one of my life goals is to kill a mature branch-antlered Roosevelt bull. I've come close, but have not put a big Roosevelt on the wall yet. Like I said, they are tough to hunt as well as tough to bring down with a stickflipper...

I spent opening weekend of the hunt along the coast with good friend Mike Roberts. I've enjoyed hunting with Mike in the past and thought even if we don't see much for elk it would be hard to ruin a fun weekend in the woods with Mike...so I thought. I could have decided to not share this story, but it is part of the hunt. It's reality. Everytime you pull a trigger or release an arrow you are taking the risk, the risk of wounding your prey without recovering the meat.

Mike and I enjoyed some of the best Roosevelt hunting I've ever encountered with multiple sightings of big bulls. I had two days to hunt and I wasn't looking for the biggest bull, I was looking for any bull. Driving from one spot to another, I happened to see a young bull feeding alone in a clearcut. Mike is more of a prankster than I am, so when I yelled, "Stop, bull!!" Mike didn't even slow down thinking I was crying wolf, until he saw the excitement in my face. He stopped the pickup and we decided I would sneak along the timber's edge towards the bull which was feeding 80-100 yards from the treeline. I got into position as Mike stayed higher in the timber and cow called. After a half hour of no response from the bull, we wondered where the bull had disappeared.

We guessed that it must have dropped out-of-sight but still remained in the clear cut. We snuck around wearing only three layers of wool socks to minimize our noise. We snuck towards a small hump where we should be able to see much more of the clear cut. We raised our heads to peek over the hump and there in front of us 40 yards was the bull bedded broadside, a beautiful velveted 2-point. Mike had all season to hunt and wasn't interested in shooting the young bull. Me, on the other hand, was more than willing. I would have to elevate my body another foot to clear the debris between me and my prey. I smiled at Mike, pulled my bow back, and stepped onto a stump at full draw.



Recovering my arrow at the bulls' bed

Up to this point the bull was clueless of our presence. Before the bull could move from it's bed, I sent a 100 grain Shuttle T-Lock Easton Axis shaft behind his shoulder. The bull jumped up from it's bed, ran a few yards and turned to look back. I sent another arrow which hit a bit high behind the shoulder. The first arrow was a clean pass through and the blood-soaked arrow laid in the bull's bed. The bull ran a hundred yards and stopped for ten minutes while Mike and I high-fived and, glued to our binoculars, waited for the bull to fall. We were certain we would watch him expire since he was nearly 500 yards from the timberline. Wrong.

The bull sidehilled the clearcut and made his way into the timber. To make a long story of emotional ups and downs a bit shorter, I flagged off specks of blood at last light a couple hundred yards into the timber. It rained an inch that night. We spent hours and hours gridding the timber only to get sopping wet and very dissapointed that we couldn't find the bull.

After losing the bull, I headed to e.Oregon for the sheep hunt. I got the phone message that Mike had found vultures in the canyon. He marked the spot and we waited for a day I could head back with him to see what we could find.

Mike and I headed into the canyon and he pointed where he'd seen the bulls, a good 400-500 yards uphill from where we gridded weeks prior. I never would have thought the bull could have traveled so far...uphill at that. As we approached the area, we jumped a sow and cub...which had obviously been eating like kings for the past few weeks. After a couple hours of searching, I found a femur, then Mike found a hip bone....and then we found the bull. Coming across your bull a couple weeks late isn't the perfect ending to a hunt, and finding the remains didn't make not finding the bull any easier on me. But finding the bull helped answer a lot of questions and I learned from the entire experience.

I hunted one more evening after finding the bull. I went with good friend Jim Godfrey after work not too far from home. We walked a few miles down a ridge calling and glassing. Neasr the bottom of the ridge we got into good elk sign and things were looking up. Jim bugled into a steep slope of timber and was cut off by the deep growl of a herd bull. I peeked around the corner to see a young cow standing on the old  two track road we were hiking along. Jim cow called as I set up. The bull bugled and elk were coming fast! At 39 yards the dark-maned elk stepped onto the skid road. I pulled my bow back. My target pins danced on the elk's blonde shoulder as I tried like hell to steady them. I released the arrow and felt confident the shot was good. The bull then bugled unaware of our presence from down in the timber once again but a bit further this time. The elk I shot wasn't a bull at all, but one of the bull's cows. I made the decision that elk meat was a must this year, much more important than the antlers of a bull.

After 30 minutes we went in search of the cow, she expired within 100 yards from the shot. Jim and I sat in the fading light and admired the cow's big body. What a hunt. I tell myself next year I will practice, practice, practice with my bow so there is no room for error or mistakes. But, sometimes it is inevitable. If you hunt long enough, you will have these experiences. You do your best to recover an animal and learn from the experience. Thanks to this year's elk season, I'll feed my family with the best meat in the world. If you disagree with elk being the best meat, just ask those two bears. I'm sure they'll agree.